Stanford GSB: Stanford Business June 1997

Spreadsheet One The Big One That Got Away Do It, But Don't Expect to Do It All Top Teachers Named Lady Luck Is a Hard Worker *Pick Your Battles	Spreadsheet Two Good Fortune Beckons Executive Programs Challenge Change Soon to Be a Familiar Face Growth Key Topic in London	Spreadsheet Three It Pays to Set Standards Road to Bali Center Seeds Entrepreneurs Throwaway Computers Almost as good as being there Sorry, No Vacancy
A Closer Look: Eric Schumacher	A Closer Look: Ron Sandler	A Closer Look: John Scully
For The Record: The Class of '97

Spreadsheet Two

Good Fortune Beckons
After 1997, what comes next for Hong Kong? Hong Kong tycoon Gordon Wu has a simple, one-word answer: 1998.

"I am so optimistic about Hong Kong," the ebullient chairman and managing director of Hopewell Holdings Ltd. told GSB students May 8. "There is nothing to fear. There will be absolutely no change." A few minutes later Wu amended that. "Hong Kong will be even more prosperous," he said.

If Hong Kong's experience with China is anything like Wu's, the former British colony has good reason to be optimistic. Wu made his first overture to China in 1979 when, he recalls, "It was like walking into a time capsule." His first business venture was a 1,200-room hotel, opened in 1983 in Guangzhou, complete with a 3,000-seat restaurant, which locals told him would never fill. They were wrong, of course. "To this day it is the most profitable hotel in China," Wu says. Since then, Hopewell has extended its China holdings to include two superhighways, a massive belt-way around Guangzhou, and two power stations. This in addition to extensive holdings elsewhere in Asia.

Asia, with 3 billion people, is the Wild West of the 21st century, says Wu, advising Americans that "your future lies in Asia." But, he warns, "You can't succeed if you come in the second quarter and expect to improve your fourth quarter results. Americans are quarter-by-quarter driven. To do business in Asia, you've got to be patient." He cautions patience for human rights as well. "They will come with prosperity," he said.

To Chinese students in the audience, particularly those from the People's Republic, Wu's advice was almost as succinct as his prophecy for Hong Kong. "Go home to China," he said. "The opportunities
are there."

Illustration by Michael Klein

Executive Programs Challenge Change
Over the past several years , changes in the retail environment have been tangible. Next year, retailers and manufacturers will be able to sit down with each other to address these changes in "Store Wars: Meeting Challenges in the Packaged Goods Industry," one of two new-for-'98 executive programs that will meet the challenges of change in two very different industries.

The other program is "Managing Technology and Strategic Innovation," which is designed for managers in high technology--an area that not only can't avoid change but thrives on it. Both programs will be interactive and will feature a mixture of faculty lectures and case discussions.

"Store Wars," May 14 to 19, will be led by Rajiv Lal of Stanford and Marcel Corstjens of INSEAD. The GSB's Charles O'Reilly will direct "Managing Technology and Strategic Innovation," February 15 to 20. For further information, phone 650-723-3341, fax 650-723-3950, or e-mail executive_ education@gsb.stanford.edu.

John Lyon

Soon to Be a Familiar Face
John Lyon , formerly assistant director for MBA admissions, has graduated to the Alumni Office, where he is now assistant director of alumni relations. Lyon is responsible for managing the operations of nearly 50 alumni/ae chapters worldwide as well as all special conferences and programs offered by the office. International alums may already know Lyon. In the Admissions Office he was responsible for evaluating international applicants and represented the School at corporate presentations in the United States and abroad. Lyon came to the GSB after five years at the Stern School of Business at New York University, where he served as associate director for admissions and chair of the admissions committee.

Growth Key Topic in London
Economic growth and change can be painful, but discovery and change are necessary for economic gain, Paul Romer, GSB professor of economics, told the audience at Stanford's spring alumni conference in London. "If we had not tolerated disruption in the past, we'd still be traveling in oxcarts," he said.

Technological growth can cause companies to fall behind and fail, costing workers their jobs. But "trying to resist change by protecting ineffective firms, impeding flows of goods and ideas, and making high income an entitlement instead of a reward will cause an economy to fall even further behind," Romer said.

Romer said governments must resist demands from the electorate to shore up failing firms and guarantee that workers keep their current jobs. Instead, governments must give individuals confidence and encourage the belief that economic change brings opportunity. Nations that can foster this process of "creative destruction" can count on sustained economic growth, Romer said.

Growth--for instance, a net gain of .5 percent to 1 percent compared to the past century--allows individuals to improve their personal economic status without having to make someone else worse off, he said.

The two-day conference, sponsored jointly by the Business School's and the Univer-sity's alumni associations, drew 250 people from 21 countries. At a Friday night dinner, Percy Barnevik, chairman of ABB Asea Brown Boveri Ltd., was recognized by the GSB's European alumni with the European Business Leader of the Year award. Barnevik is an old friend of the Business School. He was a doctoral student at the GSB and currently serves on the School's advisory council.

The speed with which emerging markets are growing today is four to five times faster than during the Industrial Revolution, said Barnevik. Emerging markets pick up the existing development and leap ahead with it. "It took England 55 years to double its per capita growth during the Industrial Revolution," he said. "The United States made the same leap in 40 to 45 years. A while later, Japan did it in 30 years and Korea in 13. Now China is expected to do so in 9 years."

Percy Barnevik (left)
was named European
Business Leader of the year
at a London dinner hosted
by Dean Spence.
Photograph by Graham Trott