You hanming's personal data

You Hanming, Professor of Marketing, City University of Hong Kong

In the past, we talked a lot about the governance of marketing and the governance of secondary schools and universities in Hong Kong. In this issue, I would like to share with you the dialogue record of the high-level round table dinner held by the China Management Development Group of the City University of Hong Kong in March this year.

In the past few years, a moral wind has blown all over the world. From the Enron incident in the United States to the financial sea triggered by the "fake, big and empty" in the American financial community, this wind has been blowing harder and harder, and it seems that it has never stopped. A while ago, this trend spread to the west was packaged with the concept of "corporate governance", which was discussed in full swing in the business and academic circles.

Coincidentally, this column also entered this field unconsciously. I have talked a lot about marketing governance before, as well as the governance of secondary schools and universities in Hong Kong. In this issue, I would like to share with you the dialogue record of the high-level round table dinner held by the China Management Development Group of the City University of Hong Kong in March this year. In order to let readers know the ins and outs of thoughts, I adopted the viewpoint of Professor Tan Zheming's "Man's Falsification of Virtue" in his book The Analects of Confucius and China Thought as the beginning of this article.

Look at hypocrisy from Confucianism

What is hypocrisy? Confucianism has been talked about in many places, but it is often indirect, not as obvious as what Laozi said. Professor Tan Zheming divides hypocrisy such as "man's falsification of virtue" into three levels, one of which is more serious than the other.

The first layer comes from the words of Confucius and Yang Huo in The Analects of Confucius:

"Bullying the weak and fearing the hard. For example, villains or thieves! " He is strict in appearance and strict in righteousness, but he is like a thief because of his self-knowledge. Although the surface is brave, but the heart is really flustered and scared, this is not true. )

The second layer is from Confucius' words in Mencius:

"Hometown, thief of virtue!" My hometown uses virtue as a means to gain others' praise for myself, and makes its name and honor with the falsehood of virtue. ) The third layer also comes from The Analects of Confucius and Yang Huo:

Confucius said, "Listen to his words and abandon his virtue! It is caused by the right or wrong of speech, a value judgment based on good and evil on the surface, which seems to be based on virtue and divides good and evil, but in fact it is false virtue, with the purpose of hurting people and showing their own goodness from the evil of others. )

The above situation can be divided into three levels: stealing morality, stealing morality and abandoning morality. "Stealing morality" is the first kind, which is relatively light. It only regards virtue as a superficial thing between people, but in fact it does not exist in the heart. In this case, people will not be mistaken for virtuous people, so the degree of hypocrisy is the least.

"The thief of virtue" is different. Because virtue is regarded as a means, people think that people are virtuous, so "thief" is used to describe this behavior. Virtue can be used as a means to get praise, so there is no "lust infighting", and the degree of hypocrisy is of course deeper.

The third kind of hypocrisy is caused by right and wrong in "hearsay, smearing". In other words, if moral behavior is ostensibly propaganda, it is actually aimed at hurting people. Therefore, it is a hypocritical act to show one's own virtue by ignoring others' E Lai. This kind of behavior, knowing "evil deeds", regardless of whether the other party is hurt or not, is not desirable, so Confucius said it was "abandoning morality".

Hypocrisy depends on the heart.

The dinner was held on March 4 this year, with about 30 people, presided over by the author. Attending and having participated in the conversation are: President Lu in education, Mr. Luo in entertainment, Mr. Tian and Mr. Peng in culture, Mr. Chen in finance and Mr. Zheng in law.

Author: Now education is also a business activity, isn't it? Tonight, we want to discuss some hypocritical business practices. As a start, let me briefly look at hypocrisy from the perspective of using Confucianism and Taoism. Most of the hypocrisy of Confucianism is that Mencius quoted Confucius' thoughts, while Confucius said less directly and more indirectly, such as villains and gentlemen. Mencius said in "Dedication": "Hometown is also a thief of morality", that is, using morality as a means to win praise from others. It seems that some villagers have achieved a high status and hope that someone will praise themselves. The other is "hearsay, moral decay." In terms of speech, hypocrisy is caused by right and wrong. On the surface, it depends on whether you did it right or wrong. Hearsay is a famous idiom, but I believe Confucius has a deeper meaning (see the last section for details).

Another sentence, I believe many people have heard: "I asked", three years of mourning has been a long time. If a gentleman is not polite for three years, the courtesy will be bad; If you don't have fun for three years, have fun. The old valley has gone, the new valley is rising, and the time has passed. Confucius said, "How can a woman be safe if she eats rice and dresses in brocade?" ? ..... "(The Analects of Confucius. Yang Huo) Basically, what I want to say is: filial piety, three years is enough, can it be less? Finally, he scolded Confucius and said that he had no "heart". This shows whether it is hypocritical. Hypocrisy can be judged by the authenticity of "heart". In fact, the three kinds of hypocrisy mentioned by Confucius are hierarchical. I think the most important thing is the third one, because the third one shows whether you have a heart. Knowing what you are doing, the wrong behavior shows that you really have no heart. Mencius said, "It is a good teacher to suffer from others. This is greed for vanity, which means that all of us who are teachers may be greedy for vanity. Because most people think that teachers are lofty, some people want to be respected before they become old teachers. In fact, teachers are vain, and I am one of them. Laozi said, "The Tao is barren, and there is benevolence and righteousness. Wisdom comes out, and there is a big fallacy. This sentence is similar to Mencius'. Laozi believes that without righteousness, no one will flaunt it. In other words: filial piety or other virtues are for people to see. If everyone does not talk about benevolence and righteousness, there will be no real falsehood and fallacy, so no one will deliberately say "I will worship my father now" to show that he is a dutiful son; No one publicly beat gongs and drums to tell others that he is donating money. He is a great person. Unfortunately, it is difficult for us to find what I call "the heart of inaction". For example, when UGC talks about grades, universities will involuntarily perform and compete. I don't approve of this practice. He thinks that if everyone has this idea, the world will be in chaos. Everyone is fighting for the first place, and the world will be in chaos, so they are jealous of each other and trample on each other. Didn't Jin Yong tell this truth in the legendary swordsman?

These are some opinions about hypocrisy that I have found subjectively in The Analects of Confucius, Mencius and Laozi. In short, whether it is hypocritical or not depends on whether there is a sincerity. Two things have happened recently: one is the sale of Lehman's debt, and the other is the privatization of PCCW. You can think about whether this is similar hypocrisy, and I hope you can discuss it.

H: The topic is quite interesting-hypocrisy. If we say hypocrisy, we mean that it is true and false. What is true and false? How to judge? In real life, what do you use to communicate, communicate and build relationships? I think the connotations of Confucianism, Taoism and many China cultures are all about mind, nature and truth, on the contrary, falsehood. But I don't quite understand this division. In other words, from the Confucian point of view, a good name is not allowed, because a good name is a fake good, and you should not let people know when you do good things. In Taoism, what you know in your heart is impossible for others to know. So, what you think, whether good or bad, is wrong. So, can such a division establish social relations? What is the actual social relationship? Is it really like the Confucian saying that when everyone is true, I just talk about (cultivate) myself, even if "people don't know, people don't care" (people don't know that I am good and don't get angry)? Or, like Taoism, it does not adopt Confucian standards, and even Confucianism's heart, nature, benevolence and righteousness are considered false. Under such circumstances, how should social relations, social business, politics, economy and even family ties be established?

External performance and the establishment of interpersonal relationship

Interpersonal communication and relationships must be externalized. After externalization, we ask others for approval and feedback, but for Confucianism and Taoism, there will be mistakes in understanding during the interaction. These interactions and relationships are externalized, and their hearts will be incorrect, because you want others to know, recognize, agree with and even seek fame and reputation, and hope that the human feelings you have done will be rewarded. Human society, from small farmers to industry, commerce and even information, is the expression of external people. What is a "performance" that no one has seen? Is it an expression that cannot be expressed? Because performance is externally shown to people. People evaluate you, give you grades, and draw a pig or a white rabbit to show your achievements, don't they? This is counting. Only in this case can the interpersonal network be established. In today's network information age, events such as Edison Chen are even more hypocritical. Hypocrisy starts from the heart, then shows it to others layer by layer, and then gains the approval of others. But in the information age society, the substantial things have gradually disappeared, just like the derivatives in the financial market. When the core things slowly disappear, we don't know where to look. In other words, in the information age society, we are hypocritical, super hypocritical, right?

Author: Thank you! Let me briefly respond to Brother Hong's point of view. When it comes to externalization, what Confucius said is courtesy. Why build a ceremony? Do you want to reschedule the ceremony of Zhou? In Lao Zi's view, courtesy is hypocritical. However, from the Confucian point of view, ceremony is very important. With the standard of etiquette, external behavior will be controlled. Confucius did not advocate usage, but regarded ceremony as an important means to manipulate human behavior. But I'm not saying we should ignore everything. Laozi has a saying: "Doing nothing will do everything. It means: not doing nothing, but doing what should be done. There are many enterprises or schools in today's society. They do what they think they should do, not what they should do. Westerners learn from Laozi, so they say "do the right thing" (do the right thing). But when some enterprises pursue their goals, should they do what they should do? I'll give it to Mr. Zheng now and ask him to comment. He is very experienced in this field.

Do people believe you? You are the truth.

Lawyer Zheng: Hypocrisy is two problems, hypocrisy and kindness. What do I think of hypocrisy? Maybe I'm talking about my own industry-hypocritical legal definition. Looking back decades ago, when I was studying philosophy at Xinya College, a teacher, Tang Junyi, asked us a question all day: What is truth? What is the meaning and standard of truth? At that time, he taught in Sichuan dialect, which was not very standard. I can't hear clearly, which makes me confused. What is the meaning and standard of truth? This can be applied to this topic, the problem of hypocrisy. What is good in the eyes of the world? What is falsehood?

We are in the "World Hotel", and there are big scenes and bows every night. Who are these acts for? According to the standard of law, what is truth? What is the truth? It turns out that in the legal field, "justice should not only be done; Justice must be done. In other words, from an objective point of view, the truth is for the third party. It turns out that you are just, so what you said is credible. Therefore, the court will make a probability balance (weighing the possibility) to think that whoever is credible is the truth. When I believe that the police are telling the truth, I will ask the thief; What the thief said is credible. I am on the thief's side. But "who is the truth?" I still can't figure it out. So serious, whoever speaks beautifully and expresses well, when testifying, every sentence says, "To be honest ... that's how it happened, and whether you believe it or not, I will say the same thing." In other words, if your performance is accepted, you are the truth and you are the fact. When Mr. Tang Junyi asked this question at that time, everyone had different opinions, but now I can sum it up as: "Truth is an objective standard: it is how others see you; If others believe you, you are the truth. Author: Thank you very much. In other words, a subjective and objective standard. President Lu, what do you think of hypocrisy?

For whose benefit?

Principal Lu: Although today's topic is "hypocritical business behavior", in fact, education now is also a business activity. I saw a lot of hypocrisy in school. For example, in order to pursue better school reputation and achievements, schools often use many bad means. For example, there is a course that students don't like very often, but it is relatively easy, and the opponents are mostly second-and third-grade students. The school then forced students to choose this subject, because our Band 1 students have high expression ability and can get high marks. But in the conscience of education, I hope that what they learn and read is what they like. Because this is their favorite subject, they will play better. From this perspective, we think it is hypocritical. Of course, some people will say from the perspective of goodwill: "You don't know, I want you to get an A, and now that you have, is this a good deed?" Whether it is hypocritical or not depends on whether it is for the benefit of children or for the reputation of the school.

Take swimming as an example. Some students can't go to school because their grades are not up to standard, but because they are excellent swimmers, recruiting them can make them win glory for the school in the school sports meeting. A famous school has admitted a swimmer from the mainland, and every time, even in the fifth grade exam, he strives for good grades for the school. However, in order to enter Secondary Six, students must get a score of 14 or above in HKCEE before they can enter Secondary Six. In fact, the school was also preparing to admit him because of his outstanding military achievements, but in the end he was not admitted because he did not meet the minimum requirements. What does this mean? If the school can think of students, it should encourage them to balance the time spent and get the lowest score, so that they can have a better future. For example, the school should let him know that he needs to meet the minimum requirements before he can continue his studies. I think it is hypocritical for schools not to do so.

At the same time, many schools try their best to prevent the enrollment rate from being killed, which is also hypocrisy. You said a lot of grievances, and you can see a lot of things in school that you can't see in business.

Author: Now we have all heard it. If what we want to do, whether students, consumers or employees, is not for their benefit, but for some other special purpose, this is what you just said. Now, we can look at it from a financial point of view!

A hypocrite in court

Manager Chen: I want to share with you a real financial example, which is also related to hypocrisy. Many years ago, a client mortgaged his building to us, but he also had an account in our securities company for speculation. Unfortunately, he lost in gambling and was unable to repay his debts, so we went through the usual procedures in accordance with all legal procedures and recovered his property. In the end, he not only refused to pay his debts, but also refused to hand over his property. So we decided to meet him in court. As lawyer Zheng said, it is the truth to see who performs well. Although we completely followed the procedure and had the IOUs and documents for the mortgage of the property, he even showed some documents in court, saying that the property had been sold to his wife at a very cheap price before we recovered it. So, we lost. Of course, we are not convinced and ask our lawyers to appeal. On appeal, the court held that his wife was a civil servant and a nurse, and it seemed that she would not lie. She hired a lawyer to defend her. In court, she pretended to be poor and said that she had divorced her husband; She also produced evidence that she had sold the house before repossessing it. Finally, the judge ruled in her favor and we lost.

I reluctantly wrote off the money in our records. Not convinced, I asked the lawyer if I could appeal again. The lawyer said, "if you appeal again, you may need to spend a lot of money to win, which is not worth it." Because even if you win, you may only get back hundreds of thousands, but you have to pay huge legal fees. 」

The lady won after a wonderful performance, but I believe she knows she is a hypocrite.

Author: On the other hand, enterprises may also be victims of hypocrisy. You should have taken it back, but because of what he did, he kept what should have been returned to others. This is also hypocrisy.

Chen: But I want to add that true hypocrisy should not be viewed from one angle. When it comes to death, people will do something purely to protect their own interests. That property may be more important to that lady than her survival. We represent a big group, and hundreds of thousands of yuan is not the same thing at all, so in the end, I have to swallow the reality.

Hypocrisy has different levels.

Author: In the book "Incompetent Son", there is a dialogue between Qu Yuan and Keiko. Keiko, a student of Qu Yuan, advised Qu Yuan not to remonstrate, but Qu Yuan said, "I will remonstrate no matter what, even if I die. Keiko said, "You don't need to do this. If you don't listen, close the door and do whatever you like! "! Qu Yuan said no, and said that he would try his best to do it. Finally, Qu Yuan threw himself into the river and died. That is, Keiko said inaction and Qu Yuan said promising. The problem is that Qu Yuan remonstrated, but he also committed suicide. Did the bad king see it? Many times, we have to have some other popularity interspersed among them to succeed or fail, right? Mr. Chen's lawyer is a good example. Is there ... Mr. Luo, can you share your experience?

Luo Sheng: We are artists. I believe there must be hypocrisy in the entertainment circle. Playing in front of the curtain, I believe hypocrisy is inevitable. Moreover, I think hypocrisy is very important in the entertainment circle: if there is no hypocrisy at the award ceremony, young people will have no motivation ... maybe there are some experts in human resources here. Hypocrisy is a motive and an important tool, but I don't know what the social comments are like. But I think everyone's values are different, which will affect whether others do it or not, express it or not, and even whether they want people to know about the handling of this matter.

Author: I agree with what Luo Sheng said just now. First, hypocrisy is necessary in his industry. Second, I also think that hypocrisy often does not necessarily hurt people; But some hypocrisy can ruin people. In other words: hypocrisy is hierarchical, some are serious, and some are not so serious. Having said that, when we say that hypocrisy is hierarchical, it doesn't mean that some hypocrisy is acceptable. But what are the acceptable conditions? The question is, where should we go? Brother Peng, what do you think?

Hypocrisy is the great capital of an enterprise.

Mr. Peng: Don't say anything clever. China culture is inseparable from good and evil. Maybe we look at it this way: China's cultural foundation is yin and yang and five elements. Yin and Yang are two sides of good and evil. If you remember Shuang Yutu, there is a yang in the yin and a yin in the yang. So, there is no absolute. No matter how kind we are, there are still some hypocritical ideas in our hearts, so Confucianism should say self-cultivation and cautious independence; Buddhism should be practiced without greed, anger, ignorance, slowness and doubt. The five poisons of greed, ignorance, slowness and doubt actually exist in all of us, including the great virtues and eminent monks now, and are only a matter of degree. Therefore, we don't have to curse the so-called evil too much. Since evil is not accepted in today's society, everyone who gets along with others must have a good face, otherwise people will shout and fight in the street, so hypocrisy is almost inevitable. It is in this world that we divide people into two kinds, one is a villain and the other is a gentleman. We use the Analects of Confucius to distinguish them-"a gentleman is righteous and a villain is profitable." Righteousness is for everyone, not selfish; Profit is selfish. If a person can be absolutely selfless, he can become a saint and a Buddha, so we can't accept the communication between people unless a few villains admit that they are real villains. I don't know if people in the Legislative Council are like this, but most people say they are gentlemen. In this case, hypocrites are everywhere. But we don't need to pay too much attention to this problem, because the so-called gentleman and villain are actually relative. Many times, people will change; You are a gentleman today. In another case, you want to be a villain, so under this change, you need to be truly conscious. For example, you can't treat a villain like a gentleman, because you will lose and you will suffer; However, for a gentleman, if you associate with a gentleman's friend, you will get a chance to appreciate each other. So don't mess with the relationship. Excuse me, I wonder if there are any Buddhists here? So I don't approve of people buying things and releasing them, because practice is not for releasing them, the most important thing is to cultivate their hearts. In other words, if you are a gentleman, you will feel that you are really nice. Regardless of Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, Christianity and Islam, all religions are basically doing this kind of good work.

There are many little people among us who mislead human nature, so it makes sense to say that business hypocrisy is justified. But we need to understand: what is business? Business talks, horses and chariots are mercenary. Therefore, from this perspective, there is no need to be harsh in business. However, if a commercial organization can sincerely serve its customers, then a gentleman's organization is admirable. They can also win more customers in this way. In fact, in this China wisdom and marketing, I often emphasize that this is the real internal competitiveness. But not many organizations have such ethics and long-term vision, so most commercial organizations don't need to be too hard on themselves, because most of them are despicable people, and it is hypocritical to say that they are good. Knowing this truth, we will know how to treat ourselves, when to adopt the strategy of villain and when to adopt the strategy of gentleman.

Author: Brother Peng means that everyone is fake. Basically, because you can't be the Great Sage, everyone can't be Confucius, let alone Laozi, so hypocrisy itself is very strong. Just now, Mr. Luo also raised this point. But the question is, can we do better as Peng Xiong said, and turn it into a big capital that can really attract customers? Therefore, not hypocrisy may be a great capital, and this capital, for doing business, may give enterprises great benefits-profits. From another point of view, this is Lao Tzu's spirit of inaction, that is, I am good to my customers, whether I make money or not. In the end, I made a lot of money, which is a reflection of Lao Tzu's spirit of inaction. ■

In response to the response of the Secretary-General of the UGC to the first part of my article published in issue 386, I would like to thank him for pointing out two mistakes and omissions. The first mistake mentioned in the article is that the associate degree was not proposed by Sutherland, but by Chief Executive Dong in his early years. In fact, the mistake first appeared in the manuscript of the monthly magazine. Later, it was found that there were mistakes and omissions in the manuscript. We made some changes and sent them to the monthly magazine again, but unfortunately we missed the deadline. In fact, our original intention has not changed: "Why didn't Sutherland, who is so rich in educational experience and insight, comment and correct the behemoth of associate degree in his report?" Is there another Gan Kun behind it? 」

The second mistake pointed out is actually not a mistake. The second part of the article published in issue 386 has clearly pointed out our understanding of the current university classification, so I won't repeat it. However, what we don't understand is why different types of universities use the same indicators and standards to measure their administration. Why would such an "advanced" organization do such an unreasonable thing? We put forward this model in issue 387, and those who are interested will know that it is a satire on UGC. We have always advocated "simplicity" and "inaction", and "e-cakes" are not made by wise people.