Obligaciones en torno a los encargados del tratamiento

Stars Are Burning Out?

One day I greeted Zeinal Bava, the CEO of Portugal Telecom, and his colleagues in Beijing and offered dinner at the Chang An Club. During dinner, Mr Bava mentioned Huawei and Ren Zhengfei. He said Ren had

once asked him a question: “Why had Portugal lost its prominence in most of the world and confined itself to a small corner in Europe?” This question shocked CEO Bava and his colleagues. Yes, in the 16th cen- tury Portuguese adventurers and navigators reached almost every part of the world, and a large proportion of the world’s territory belonged to Portugal, a small country of several million people. Most Portuguese stopped adventuring after they had come to enjoy a luxurious life with the gold and silver they had gained from Latin America. Rulers and ordinary people of the empire had turned speculative and lazy. Navigation and industry withered and eventually died out. The wealth that had flowed in like water flown away just as quickly.

Italian clocks and watches are famous around the world. In public places in Venice, Florence, and particularly Rome, clocks are seen every- where, in shops, hotels, cafés, churches, and street squares. They look exquisite and elegant. But people are often surprised to find that those clocks are not precise, and some do not swing at all. They are mere dec- orations, and time turns out immensely abundant for the Italians. But the question is: Had the Italians really taken time so lightly? If you visit the Colosseum built 2,000 years ago, the churches and museums that have been cherished for centuries, the mercantilist city of Venice, and if you see the water taps in Rome that have been used for 2,000 years, you will be amazed by the achievements of this country, and you cer- tainly wouldn’t think that all these achievements could have been made if people had viewed time in such a frivolous way.

In 2003, Ren Zhengfei predicted that Europe would be ruined in the end by its welfare culture. He was also prompted to ponder: Would Huawei fall in comfort as well?

The crisis began in Iceland, spreading to Spain and Portugal, and then to Greece and Italy. France, Germany, and the United Kingdom were also subject to doubts. Among them, Greece is especially tragic. This ancient country, famous for its history and myths, produces half the GDP per capita of Germany, but their welfare system is at par with Germany. In other words, Greece does not create wealth as a member of the Eurozone, but rather consumes wealth without restraint. As Adrian Vrettos wrote in “Live in Greece,” SDX Life Weekly, 47th issue of 2011.:

The people [in Greece] are consuming as if Doomsday is coming. Thanks to low labor cost, most families have their own housemaid or laborer. …For many people, there is no difference between an office and a café. They drink

expensive coffee, 4.5 euros a cup, in their office while lazily talking about some implausible business. For the people of Greece, life is easy if other people do all the jobs for them. Meanwhile, they spend or waste trillions of euros. This is the Greek lifestyle. They care first about themselves, then their families, relatives, friends, and then. …

Now, Greece is near bankruptcy. Its sovereign debt is 140 percent of its GDP. But Greece is not the only failing country in Europe; the whole continent is near collapse. As of the end of 2011, the national debt of Italy amounted to 1.9 trillion euros, which was 120 percent of its GDP. The seemingly strong country of France also had a total debt of 1.7 tril- lion euros.

After decades of peaceful and stable development, Europe appears prosperous, but this prosperity has been sustained by debt in most coun- tries, except Germany and the United Kingdom. The people have been spoiled. Laziness has become a common character over the last one or two generations. When the crisis comes, will they give up the free lunch they have enjoyed for decades?

Recent times have been witness to strikes, demonstrations, and even radical and violent protests. The old continent, once separate before being united, is being torn apart. Will the situation become more dangerous? The answer is yes. Europe will inevitably slip into the quagmire of tur- bulence because the people have a strong faith in welfarism and have acquired a natural resistance to the puritanical values of drive and hard work. Europe may have hope if its people regain their traditional spirit, but the collective unconscious inclination toward comfort is irreversible. Collective unconsciousness would not change into reason unless there is a devastating change or revolution. Angela Merkel, a German Chancellor, spoke quite frankly at the coalition parliament in October 2011:

Nobody should take for granted another 50 years of peace and prosperity in Europe. …We have a historical obligation: to protect by all means Europe’s unification process begun by our forefathers after centuries of hatred and blood spill. None of us can foresee what the consequences would be if we were to fail.

Bava, however, was confident and optimistic. He said, “Portugal is a dif- ferent country. We are a more resilient nation. Our young people are more aggressive.” When we bid farewell to each other after dinner, he gave me a souvenir: A plate imprinted with an atlas of Portugal as it was

300 years ago. The atlas covered more than half of the world, including Macau of China.

Sleep Is Guilt

On Thanksgiving Day 2008, every American was enjoying their turkey at home. Few imagined that the rope around their necks was beginning to tighten. The news headlines talked about the Portuguese on strike, pro- testing against the austerity policy. At that time, crisis had hit Italy, France, and other parts of Europe, and was threatening to reach the United States. Did America have the necessary immunity to fend off the epidemic?

The United States was not any better off. It was suffering from mount- ing debt, excessive liquidity and welfare, and a declining real economy. The United States was caught in the most difficult situation they faced in the 21st century. To make things even worse, it was showing its military power throughout the world.

It does not mean, however, that the United States is slipping from its edge. It is still able to strike a balance between economic recovery and social welfare. It is still the leader of high-tech sectors, such as IT, renew- able energy, nanotechnology, and medical equipment. Although its gov- ernment is “poor,” its businesses are rich. The dollar, legal tender of the United States, enjoys predominance in the global money market. All this means that the United States will emerge from the financial crisis ahead of other Western countries.

In addition, no one can ignore the hard work of the American people and the creativity of the entire country. In 2000, Ren Zhengfei recom- mended an article to his colleagues in Huawei titled “Sleepless in Silicon Valley.” One can truly understand from the article the core competitive- ness of the United States. The article says:

All those programmers, software developers, salespeople, and project man- agers believe that if you fall asleep you will fail and drop out. Supported by their great expectations, and stimulated by big cups of coffee, they have been able to stay awake before their PCs, focusing their eyes on their fluorescent screens until 4, 5, or even 6 in the early morning. They have never spent such hours on their comfortable beds. This is the price they have had to pay for playing in the international market that spans different time zones. They have a new starting point each day, and they are fervently pushing the fron- tier of Internet technology forward.

It is the uniform lifestyle of about 200,000 hi-tech workers in Silicon Valley. Almost all of them stay up late. In traditional industries there are two or three shifts a day, but in hi-tech parks, the car park would be still crowded until 3 am. Some hi-tech workers may stay home at night, but they are typically connected to their office system with their PCs.

The hi-tech sector, like sports, belongs to young people, but that also depends on how fast the people age. Statistics show that most hi-tech work- ers are single, male, under the age of 35. Some try to squeeze as many prod- ucts from their brains as possible to get more from their employers before their minds turn slow.

Of interest is that the mattress culture is not a unique creation of Huawei. It has precedents in Silicon Valley. For instance, the same article says:

At first, Netscape arranged rooms with carpeting in the office, where its employees used to sleep when they worked late at night. The company later called it off and encouraged people to go home and sleep in their own beds. But the employees kept asking the company to set up the rooms again. Similarly, at Huawei, has anyone heard complaints about the mattress culture? Today, mattress pads of different colors are still found under desks in Huawei offices.

“Sleep is guilt,” said Bill Owens, a four-star admiral in the US Navy, who served as the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Deputy Chief of Naval Operations for Resources, Warfare Requirements, and Assessments; Commander of the US Sixth Fleet; and senior military assis- tant to secretaries of defense Frank Carlucci and Dick Cheney. After he retired from the US Navy, Owens had a stint with Nortel as its CEO and the Vice Chairman. He joined AEA Holdings in 2006 and now chairs the firm’s Asia operations.

Bill Owens only sleeps three to four hours a day; the rest of the time he often travels between the Eastern and Western Hemisphere. As a Navy admiral, Owens once spent 2,000 consecutive days on a submarine in the deep sea. There he was considered god, as the captain kept watch over 100 soldiers around-the-clock, and was responsible for telling them whether it was day or night. Since retiring from the Navy, he has been spending his time at the same tempo, although he is now engaged in a different battlefield. Business is battle; this is likely an unquestionable truth in Owens’ eyes, as he said in a puritanical tone, “Work is life.”

150,000 Solitary Fighters

In 2007, Jason Matheny, Open Source Indicators (OSI) program manager of the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA), wrote an essay titled “Reducing the Risk of Human Extinction” for Risk Analysis magazine. Matheny writes:

In one billion years, the sun will begin its red giant stage, increasing ter- restrial temperatures above 1,000 degrees, boiling off our atmosphere and eventually forming a planetary nebula, making Earth inhospitable to life. If we colonize other solar systems, we could survive longer than our sun, per- haps another 100 trillion years, when all stars begin burning out. We might survive even longer if we exploit non-stellar energy sources.

This is incredible imagination and crazy optimism. This is the blend of crisis awareness and fantasy, without which the human race would not have gone so far. This is also the source of all the courage we need to face uncertainties in the future. Do you say that stars are burning out? Well, let’s exploit nonstellar energy sources!

Facing the upcoming global recession, Ren Zhengfei is also cautiously optimistic. He believes that recessions are circular, and they are unlikely to hit the whole world at the same time. This means Huawei would still have enough space and opportunities for survival and expansion. At this point, Huawei has built up its presence in every corner of the world and has enough resources and courage to cope with any crisis. Of critical importance is that Huawei’s culture of dedication will remain a tremen- dous boost to its continued operation.

Just imagine 150,000 people from different family, education, national, and religious backgrounds with different personal characters and beliefs, all running together toward the same goal in all five inhab- ited continents of the world under the leadership of a handful of Chinese entrepreneurs who represent a common set of core values. This is rarely seen in the commercial history of China.

Huawei has now more than 30,000 foreign employees, so it is a ques- tion whether they can understand the core values of the company. Ren Zhengfei said:

People often say that foreigners cannot understand the culture of Huawei, but I just wonder why. Customer centricity is one of our core values, and it

is a universal value as well. This idea was first put forward by foreign com- panies. They insisted on developing solutions according to customer needs because they won’t get any contracts if they fail to do so. So our foreign employees should understand the idea better. Why can’t they understand it? They should be able to understand the message that dedicated people are our foundation as well. The idea is also very simple. Why are they paid more? Because they work and contribute more to the company. This is the common balance: more work for more pay. Recognition of hard work and contribution is the message we try to get across, and I see no reason why our foreign employees cannot get it.

In short, customer centricity is a basic common sense and a truth; it is also a basic human logic to value hard work. How about the recent European economic and social crisis? Did it not arise from the Europeans’ excessive welfare and their comfort and laziness?

Germany, of course, is part of Europe, but its situation fares much better. This is a nation of discipline, efficiency, order, diligence, and social cohesion. The whole country has a sense of urgency and precaution against crisis; this is their cultural gene. It explains why it has been able to produce a number of great thinkers, musicians, scientists, and entre- preneurs. Even more impressively, Germany boasts an excellent balance: rich companies, rich government, and a welfare system that matches its national power. As a result, the country has become the only safe haven in Europe, and together with the weak France, a savior for the whole Eurozone.

In Greek mythology there is a god called Sisyphus, who was con- demned to an eternity of hard labor. His assignment was to roll a great boulder to the top of a hill. Every time Sisyphus was about to reach the summit, with the greatest of exertion and toil, the rock rolled back down again. Sisyphus then had to start it all over again and push it up again toward the summit. The tenacious man kept moving on with a heavy yet measured step toward the torment for which he would never know the end, yet he never gave up.

This Greek myth tells a universal law: We are always caught in the paradoxical balance of glory and pain. This paradox exists in every coun- try, every nation, every company, every family, and every individual.