國際經(jīng)貿(mào)高級英語17

1、nTEXT The Launching of A BusinessThe Launching of A Business Matsushita began his business in 1917 with savings of 100 yen and with four assistants, including his wife, Mumeno. None of the five had the equivalent of a high school education. More basically, not one of them knew how to manufacture an

2、electrical socket. The Matsushita “factory” was established inside his two-room tenement house. Total space available for working and living equaled 130 square feet. With no revenues and very limited financing, they scrambled to manufacture the new socket design. The insulation required inside the p

3、roduct proved to be a major problem. To overcome their lack of technological know-how, they worked long hours, seven days a week. Assistance finally came from a former Osaka Light colleague, who had learned how to make insulation and explained how to do it. In the middle of October 1917, after four

4、months of work, they succeeded in creating a few samples of the new design.Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano But wholesalers received the product coolly, if at all. Their concerns were the same as those startups often hear today. “Come back when you have a track r

5、ecord. I cant afford to take you on if there is a risk that you might be out of business in a few months.” “Having only one product is a problem. If I bought each item I handle from a different manufacturer, I would have to deal with thousands of suppliers, and that wouldnt work. Come back when you

6、have a broader line of products.” To generate much needed cash, Matsushita and Mumeno pawned clothes and other personal items. They also worked furiously to build the failing business. Matsushita attempted to improve the design of his attachment plug and to invent additional products.Unit SeventeenM

7、atsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano A wholesaler who liked the young entrepreneurs learned that one of his suppliers was having a problem. Kawakita Electric was shifting from using porcelain insulation plates as electric fan bases to less breakable ones made from an asbestos-like

8、material. The electrical firm needed the new bases immediately but did not have a source. The wholesaler suggested that Matsushita set aside the electric plug project and make 1 000 insulator plates. He agreed to do so without hesitation. The distributor told him that if he completed the order quick

9、ly, he might receive additional business for as many as 4 000 or 5 000 units. The job was labor-intensive and, after a while, tedious. Because Konosuke and Mumeno worked 18 hours a day, seven days a week, they were able to fulfill the order before the end of December. In payment, they received 160 y

10、en. Supplies and the mold cost half that, leaving a good profit margin.Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano In early January, Matsushita was told that the managers at Kawakita liked the product. They liked the quality. They liked the speedy delivery. As a result, a s

11、econd order was placed, this time for 2 000 insulator plates. Unconventional Strategies Unconventional Strategies By 1922 the firm was introducing one or two new products nearly every month, but none were eye-popping successes. Matsushita began looking for bigger possibilities. In early 1922, he fou

12、nd one. Demand for bicycle lamps was big and growing, yet all existing models had severe drawbacks. The flame in candle-lit models was often blown out by the wind. Acetylene products were expensive and required constant refueling. Battery-powered units ran for only two or three hours.Unit SeventeenM

13、atsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano Matsushita was convinced that the battery-powered concept was promising if only his company could manufacture a much improved version. He wanted the lamp to be simple in structure, so that it would not break down easily, and economical, meaning

14、that the battery would have to last more than ten hours. After three or four months of effort, he realized that he could rearrange the power sources, thus permitting fundamentally new structural designs. After more than 100 test models, he devised a bullet-shaped lamp that seemed to be especially at

15、tractive. Prospects brightened when a new miniature bulb appeared on the market. “With the new bulb and a battery which I had specially reconstructed,” Matsushita later wrote, “I found that the lamp would burn for 30 to 50 hours.”Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano

16、With samples in hand, Matsushita himself went to a store that had been selling his other electrical products:“I described the merits of the new lamp and expected to hear exclamations of surprise and delight and an immediate offer to buy.”Instead, the proprietor showed little interest in the offering

17、. He expressed concern that battery lamps had a poor reputation and that the special batteries required would be difficult for customers to find when replacements were needed. Surprised but not discouraged, Matsushita visited other electric dealers. To his dismay, he received the same response every

18、where. Matsushita tried a different distribution system altogether:bicycle dealers. The underlying logic was simple. Bicycle stores should be in a better position to appreciate the value of the new product. But even bicycle shops were reluctant to handle a type of product that generally had a bad re

19、putation.Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano Because Matsushita had so much faith in the new device, manufacturing had gone ahead despite the lack of orders. Instead of cutting back to minimize the financial downside, Matsushita decided to invest even more funds in

20、a new merchandising strategy. He hired three salesmen and put them on the road visiting every bicycle store in Osaka. At each shop, the sales reps left a few samples, put one lit lamp on display, and asked for no money. They told retailers that the company would accept payment only if the products w

21、ere sold and the stores were convinced that their customers were satisfied. Curious retailers, having never seen anything quite like that and being asked to assume no personal risk, agreed to the scheme.Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano After four or five days, it

22、 became clear that most retailers were impressed when they saw for themselves that the demonstration lamps lasted 50 or more hours. As a result, they showed the new product to their customers. After the samples were purchased and retailers received initial reports that their clients were happy, they

23、 began to place orders. Within weeks, as word traveled about the quality of the new lamp, sales skyrocketed, actually passing 2 000 units per month. The formula used to create the bike lamp success was employed again and again in the 1920s, 1930s, and beyond. The strategy was driven by a keen sensit

24、ivity to customer needs and the use of emerging technological capabilities to satisfy those needs. Matsushita Electric was never first to come out with an entirely new product category, but its offerings were almost always better and/or cheaper than the industry norm.Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Wo

25、rlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano Coping with Hard TimesCoping with Hard Times Frightened by the economic situation, consumers drastically reduced their spending on nonessential items. When electrical distributors saw their trade falling, they responded by cutting or eliminating new purchases. T

26、he net effect on Matsushita Electric was staggering. By December 1,1929, its sales were down by more than half. Warehouses began to overflow with unsold products. A financial disaster was suddenly a real possibility. Among the management at Matsushita Electric, many had concluded that the only possi

27、ble course of action would require a significant layoff, perhaps half the employees. Matsushitas top managers thought sizable staff reductions would save the company, but also decimate it. Twelve years of momentum would be halted. Excellent labor relations would be shattered. Plans for further expan

28、sion would have to be shelved. Furthermore, because theUnit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano Japanese economy was still deteriorating, the chances of laid-off employees finding work elsewhere were slight. Large numbers of staff would be thrown into poverty. Frightened

29、 and depressed, the managers asked Matsushita what they should do. The orders he gave were as unusual as the economic depression itself: “Cut production by half, starting now, but dont dismiss any employees. Well reduce output not by laying off workers, but by having them only work in the factory fo

30、r halfdays. We will continue to pay the same wages they are getting now, but we will eliminate all holidays. Well ask all the workers to do their best to try to sell the stock backlog.” Both a Confucian and feudal tradition had emphasized a certain paternalistic concern in Japanese labor relations,

31、but this specific idea was novel. In 1929 there was no tradition of dealing with downturns by shifting manufacturing employees to sales. When the company announced the the sic policy to a room full of employees, Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano the proclamation w

32、as greeted with cheers. With everyone spending many hours each week trying to sell the inventory, and with production at only half the old rate, the excess stock disappeared quickly. Employees soon went back to their regular shifts. A Man with A MissionA Man with A Mission At the temple, Matsushita

33、had witnessed a sizable organization where people worked with the kind of dedication rarely seen outside small entrepreneurial settings. “There was something to be learned from what I had seen,” he later wrote, “from the way it was apparently thriving, from the mountains of donated logs, from the en

34、ergetic and dedicated way the members of the sect threw themselves into the construction work.” The implication was clear. If a corporation could somehow be made meaningful like a religion, people would be both more satisfied and more productive.Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepre

35、neur?Cindy Kano Two months later Matsushita chose to share his emerging ideas with a large group of employees in an unusual and very emotional meeting. One hundred sixty-eight office workers and executives gathered at the Osaka Central Electric Club Auditorium on May 5, 1932. Matsushita began by rem

36、inding them of their collective achievements: In only 15 years, they had progressed from startup to 1 100 employees, sales of three million yen per year, 280 registered patents, and factories at ten locations. He told them about his recent experience at the Tenrikyo sect, and how that had inspired h

37、im to reexamine his vision of the company. He then made his now famous proclamation: “The mission of a manufacturer should be to overcome poverty, to relieve society as a whole from misery, and bring it wealth.” He used tap water as an example. Here, he said, is a vital product that is produced and

38、distributed so cheaply that virtually anyone can afford it. “This is what the entrepreneur and the manufacturer should aim at: to make all products as inexhaustible and as cheap as tap water. When this is realized, poverty will vanish from the earth.”Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Ent

39、repreneur?Cindy Kano Had he been conducting himself for 15 years in ways that suggested a lack of concern for others, his speech would have had little if any credibility. But the message was not inconsistent with the manner in which the organization had been run. His words simply articulated a visio

40、n for the firm on a broader and higher plane. The new mission connected the goals of the company to very basic human values. When Matsushita asked that his business principles be spoken aloud each morning by every employee in group assemblies, some balked at the formality, others at the pretentiousn

41、ess of the ceremony. Nevertheless, he refused to acquiesce. Even before Matsushitas 1932 speech, his company had a dedicated and energetic work force, partially because of paternalistic personnel practices (an employee organization created in 1920 had sponsored hundreds of cultural, recreational, an

42、d sporting events), partially because of an unusual amount ofUnit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano communication (an inhouse magazine was launched in 1927), and partially due to the founders own credibility and role modeling. Yet in the years after 1933, the aligned a

43、nd inspired work force became a larger source of competitive advantage, despite ever-increasing size and the general tendency for organizations to lose employee commitment over time. Many at the company came to believe that they were associated with a noble and just cause. Up from the AshesUp from t

44、he Ashes Freed from postwar controls, Matsushita and his management began rebuilding the company. They reintroduced methods and ideals that worked well in the firms early years but were lost in the war and its aftermath. They began a search for more advanced technology. In a very big move, they aggr

45、essively sought to expand not only in Japan but throughout the world.Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano A divisional management system that had been introduced in 1933 was designed to foster growth by keeping product lines very responsive to their specific markets.

46、 When those markets became increasingly irrelevant during the war, the system was abandoned in favor of more centralized direction, a factory focus, and economies of scale. In 1950, when Matsushita regained control of the firm, he reinstituted the division system. Three product groups were created,

47、one run by Konosuke himself, another by son-in-law Masaharu, and the last by Arataro Takahashi. The first division manufactured radios, communication equipment, light bulbs, and vacuum tubes. The second made dry batteries and equipment related to electric heaters. The third sold storage batteries an

48、d transformers.Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano Two of the new divisions were operating above breakeven. The third one, run by Takahashi, was not. When he examined productivity, quality, technology, and skill levels among the work force, he found all needed impro

49、vement. But for this man who had worked with Konosuke Matsushita for decades, none of those factors seemed to be the central problem. The division was performing poorly, Takahashi eventually concluded, because they had abandoned key policies and strategies that had made Matsushita successful before

50、the war. Takahashi called his work force together, told them that he had studied their lack of profitability from many perspectives, and then delivered a Matsushita-like speech:“ The fundamental cause of our problems is that we no longer act according to Matsushitas basic policies. If we follow thos

51、e principles, if we modestly examine our activities in light of those principles, we will succeed. If quality is bad and a product does not sell well, we have to stop the factory and improve the product. When we make goods of inferior quality, we are not contributing to society, and that is inconsis

52、tent with the principles.”Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano Takahashi revived the morning recital of the Matsushita creed and had his management reexamine the business in light of those ideals. As a result, dozens of practices were altered. Scrap iron that was dis

53、carded during the war was saved and sold. The factories were inspected every morning, and work would not begin until they were clean and litter-free. The quality of products was studied from a customers perspective and then improved. The organization was back on track in a relatively short period. Q

54、uality and productivity improved in all three divisions. A customer focus was renewed. Morale increased. By early 1951, Matsushita Electric was once again ready to expand. And until his death in 1989, the firm expanded with breathtaking speed. (excerpted from Fortune)Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Wo

55、rlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy KanoUnit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy KanoExercisesn. Translate the following into English, using the words or phrases in the text:1.為了彌補技術(shù)知識的貧乏2.擁有多樣的產(chǎn)品種類3.獲得額外的1000個或2000個底座的訂單Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur

56、?Cindy Kano4.留下了一個很好的盈利空間5.不愿銷售名聲一般不好的產(chǎn)品6.對顧客需求的高度敏感性7.利用新興技術(shù)力量來滿足需求Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano8.大量減少非必要物品的開支9.將被擱置的進一步發(fā)展的計劃10.讓產(chǎn)品系列能對各自的市場迅速地作出反應(yīng)11.從顧客的角度對產(chǎn)品質(zhì)量進行研究和改進Unit SeventeenMatsushita: The Worlds Greatest Entrepreneur?Cindy Kano12.從用瓷作絕緣體到用石棉作絕緣體的轉(zhuǎn)變13.由于生產(chǎn)過剩而產(chǎn)生的大量產(chǎn)品積壓14.妥