The Entrepreneurial Spirit Conferred by Marathons
Speaker at the "Entrepreneur's Day" in Pingshan District, 2021 — Li Shaoyan
I am a grassroots entrepreneur. After graduating from Zhengzhou University in Henan in July 2005, I came to Shenzhen to make a living. At that time, I chose to work as a foreign trade salesperson. During my employment, I was the most diligent and had the best performance. Due to my personality, which likes to challenge myself, I started my own company in January 2012. In my spare time, besides work, I use running to relieve stress and relax. Since starting my business, my greatest realization is that entrepreneurship is actually similar to running a marathon. In the competition, it's not about who starts early or who runs fast, but who can run longer and more efficiently. The twelve years of hard entrepreneurship have been supported by the spirit of the marathon, which has given me faith, endurance, persistence, and focus.
The first time I went to a marathon alone, I left the hotel before dawn at 4 a.m. to check in at the starting point. In December, the air was filled with a breeze, and I felt desolate and lonely, but I had no fear in my heart. As soon as the starting gun sounded, I quickly merged into the crowd. When I really started running, I only focused on my heart rate and pace. When I first started my business alone, there was an office, a computer, a set of sofas, and I did everything by myself, from purchasing, factory inspection, business trips, moving goods, shipping, taking orders, to after-sales service. Running has strengthened my body, allowing me to have enough physical strength to do more things. Marathon running is a dual challenge of physical and mental strength for anyone.
This process is a struggle with oneself, using one's strong willpower to subdue negative emotions such as laziness, negativity, shrinking back, and giving up in the heart, thereby achieving the goal of conquering and reshaping oneself. It is also a spirit of persistence towards the goal and never giving up. In this way, I have formed my own philosophy of running by measuring every meter, which has subtly influenced my mental state, making it easier to face and solve difficulties encountered at work.
According to incomplete statistics, the average life span of Chinese start-up companies is generally 2-3 years. On the road of entrepreneurship, you will encounter all kinds of difficulties. Entrepreneurship requires the founder to have great resilience and delayed gratification. Entrepreneurship is a cycle of continuous decision-making → decision verification → optimization → re-decision-making. Therefore, in the process, you must continuously evolve and replace yourself, which is not only physical but also mental pressure. For a longer period, there may be no orders and no income. When the company falls into continuous losses, it is like the feeling of not being able to catch your breath during running. Many people will slow down and want to stop and rest at this time. If you are discouraged, your efficiency will decrease and even give up completely. The marathon has cultivated my idea of never giving up and a strong desire for success, supporting me to continue to "transfuse blood" for the company. On the other hand, I am also constantly looking for new breakthroughs. In the difficult days of entrepreneurship, I am on edge every day, but I still insist on running and releasing pressure. While running, I think about the company's development plan and what needs to be improved and improved. This process is the spirit of self-revolution, which is a competition with loneliness, a psychological contest with oneself. Not only do you have to keep running, but you also need to adjust your physical state while running, effectively control the pace and rhythm of breathing, output the maximum energy with the least physical strength, and achieve the optimization of the output ratio to run more steadily. Entrepreneurship is even more so. We have also started corporate transformation this year and established a new corporate sales model. And make the sales channels sustainable, positive, and self-healing and adjustable strategies.
The spirit of the marathon can be brought into every detail of entrepreneurship. Running brings real action. Just like some people with great ambitions but who are slow to take action, if they cannot implement it, it will be meaningless talk. So take a step, every step is progress. Human action is concentrated in the thighs, as long as you take a step, you have already succeeded half.
I often tell my colleagues that when standing on this track, you must be tenacious and run on this road, and you must focus on this industry, dig deep into this industry. Only if you don't give up on yourself, no one can give up on you. But you can't change tracks often. If you are not happy with this company and change jobs frequently, if you can't achieve results on this track, it is useless to change tracks. The most important thing is the accumulation of your own strength. In this way, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step, and a river begins with small streams. The products are being selected, and the team is also evolving, but the only constant is the entrepreneurial spirit of "making a little progress every day." From a certain perspective, making a little progress every day is not only a spirit of self-reflection, but also a "marathon spirit" that never relaxes. There are no shortcuts in marathons, and there are no shortcuts in entrepreneurship. The method of entrepreneurship, the first hand is "explosive power", and the second hand is "endurance". "Explosive power" once made our entrepreneurship and innovation explode, but what really made it "taste the sweetness" is persistence. Persist in the "surplus technology concept", persist in focusing on the global market perspective, and persist in the transformation from "engineer thinking" to "user thinking"...
Every marathon is a challenge, and you need to prepare salt pills, energy gels, and be ready for endurance and physical strength. During the period, you need to interweave strength and rhythm. We entrepreneurs must not only have a strong will, but also remain true to our original intention no matter how the environment changes.
In previous years, the sudden outbreak of COVID-19 slammed on the brakes of China's rapid development of domestic and foreign trade, bringing a certain impact on the pace of China's economic development. The global spread of the epidemic has had a significant impact on the world economy. My feeling is that our manufacturing industry is actually facing huge challenges: 1. The impact of the epidemic on the manufacturing industry is profound and is gradually showing a weak state. 2. The market consumption is weak, including both domestic and foreign sales markets.
This year, I can deeply feel the decline in the purchase rate of the foreign market. Compared with the online click rate, order rush, and transaction rate in previous years, there is a significant downward trend, which means that ordinary people abroad are also reluctant to spend. In this situation, most manufacturing companies are not saturated with orders, which makes it more necessary for us to huddle together for warmth and resource integration.
Our company is actively seeking survival and development in the cracks, improving internal consumption through product development and innovation, and expanding more sales channels. The difficulties and obstacles everyone encounters are similar, and the difference lies in whether some people persist, maybe it's just a matter of time. Like running a marathon, you may be a little slower, as long as you don't stop and persist until the end, you will eventually win this game. If you give up halfway, there is no chance at all.
Entrepreneurship is a continuous exploration, continuous trial and error, continuous learning, and continuous evolution. If your evolutionary ability does not keep up, it is very likely to be eliminated, so we have an urgent sense of crisis and pressure, which urges us to continuously improve ourselves.
There are many people running marathons, but there is only one champion. The process of producing a champion is a process of creating and continuously widening the gap, which is very similar to the gap between people and between enterprises. But in this process, the gap between enterprises is gradually widening, excellent brands stand out, the strong are getting stronger, and weak brands are in a difficult development situation and are restricted step by step. So the marathon is not a sport that competes in explosive power, but a sport that competes in endurance. We should do business more, accumulate steadily, and go far. We believe that the difficulties encountered in business operations are both a crisis and a challenge, prompting us to change and innovate continuously.
On the marathon track, I often meet people who give me a lot of encouragement and support. At this moment, I am grateful to meet so many young entrepreneurs of the same frequency under the care of the party and the government. We are like a cloud moving a cloud, and a tree moving another tree; we empower each other, encourage each other, and achieve together; we practice our commitments with actions, arm ourselves with learning, and be builders and witnesses of the new era.
I am a young entrepreneur, full of strength, and the road ahead is still very long. I must strive to create my own world and move forward!
I have experienced setbacks, pain, and joy. I hope that these experiences are not just fleeting moments but rather lessons that pave the way for the next decade of beauty and maturity. With the courage to challenge limits, the confidence to surpass myself, and an unyielding will, I persist in running in sync with the rhythm of this era. Isn't this the spirit of the marathon? Let us all run together on the track of entrepreneurship, may Jia Yao accompany you every step of the way, running towards the future. I am full of vigor—how about you?
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