Yu Minhong: firmly believe in the power of ideals

——Yu Minhong’s speech at the 20th Anniversary Celebration of New Oriental in the Great Hall of the People

Text / Yu Minhong

I am very happy to stand here today and stand on the stage of the Great Hall of the People. This reminds me of the time I walked through the bicycle from Tiananmen Square while I was in college. At that time I thought that one day I could walk into such a sacred auditorium. Later, the reform and opening up finally opened the Great Hall of the People to the people. I once visited the entire hall of the Great Hall of the People and some surrounding halls as a tourist. At that time, I thought, when can I sit in this venue for a meeting? Later I was named a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and qualified to enter the conference hall to attend the conference and listen to the speeches of the leaders of the country.

On another occasion, the 100th anniversary of Peking University was held in the Great Hall of the People. Wang Qiang and Xu Xiaoping, as invited representatives, also sat in the Great Hall of the People. At that time, New Oriental was still a very small institution. I sat here and thought, when will New Oriental also be able to celebrate his birthday in the Great Hall of the People? It was more than a decade ago, when I thought, about the 20th anniversary, we should be able to walk in. Today, we walked in and walked into the Great Hall of the People.

Perhaps, each venue can accommodate the 20th anniversary of New Oriental, but the meaning here is indeed different, because it proves the humble dream of a humble person, as long as it persists, it can be realized. New Oriental is a group. A great dream realized by humble people.

In our New Oriental, there are very few “official second generations” and “rich second generations”. Although some of us have become “rich generations”, they are still a minority. Every one of us has been born from the grass roots, and each of us has a fascinating feeling, but each of us has never forgotten that there are higher mountains to climb, and longer roads to go. On the higher mountains, we can see the better scenery of life. On the farther road, we can meet friends and opportunities that we have not met. We have walked all the way, gone for 20 years, and today we have achieved some success. These successes depend on our own efforts, but not all of them are based on our own strength. Therefore, we would like to thank you for giving us this opportunity. Although there are still many problems and problems in this era, please think about it slightly. In the history of China for two thousand years, which era can compare with today What is better? It was only during the Song and Tang dynasties that only a small number of intellectuals and bureaucrats could enjoy the prosperity of society. Today, although we have not enjoyed the prosperity of the whole society, because we know that there are still many places in China that need reform, there are interest groups and bureaucratic privileges, but it is no exaggeration to say that most of the countries with a population of more than 1.3 billion have already I can eat enough to wear warm clothes, and I can live a dream day. I think this era really deserves our thanks.

Secondly, we would like to thank every New Oriental who is not present here, because no individual can make great things. The reason why New Oriental has today is the result of the growth of our team. From me alone, to the last twenty people, one hundred people, one thousand people, today we have more than 30,000 employees and teachers, and everyone's strength together to make New Oriental together.

We are even more grateful to our students and parents for their trust in us, because it is their trust that enables us to collect a steady stream of tuition fees, so that we can pay each employee's teachers and enable New Oriental to go public on the American Stock Exchange. It has become the largest share of the world's training and education. All of this is the result of our joint efforts. No individual can do it by themselves. I think even if I have great ability, if I am still alone today, then New Oriental is still a small training institution, it may still be a small self-employed, and even I may have become a pyramid seller.

Of course, we also want to thank our family. Here I would like to thank my mom first, because my mom came to the scene as a meritorious person today. My mom's greatest credit is to give birth to me. The old lady’s biggest dream in her life is to become a “national leader”, but her biggest job is the captain of the women in our village. She also wants her son to be a talented person, so I have been reading and literate since I was a child, even though she’s own big word. Do not know a few. She not only cultivated a son with a good Chinese level, but also trained a person who changed the Chinese English teaching pattern.

Of course, I would also like to thank my father, even though he has been dead for twenty years. My dad gave me a huge amount of alcohol, which made me go all the way through the rivers and lakes in China. I rely on this amount of wine, and stand up again and again in despair, turning friends from all walks into friends, becoming friends, and finally letting them be because of New Oriental. Moved by the cause and helped New Oriental to grow together.

When I thanked my parents, I was also thanking our New Oriental parents. Although due to the restrictions of the General Assembly Hall, we can't let everyone's parents come over, but some parents come over, but it is a symbol to invite you to come, indicating the gratitude of Xindong to you. We are not doing enough. There are many imperfections in New Oriental, but you have born a good son and a good daughter. They are fighting for New Oriental and doing a good cause. Please believe that what we are doing is not a matter of selling people. We are doing this in a historical stage in China, even in the next historical stage.

Our era is an era of rapid change, from an agricultural society to a fast-based business-based society. In such an upheaval era, we can only stay in the countryside and the city can not move, to the time that we can travel all over China and the world, from a poverty to a time when even a piece of soap can not afford, to this material life is extremely rich The era. As I said earlier, although there are too many problems in this era, collusion between officials and businessmen and corruption are rampant, I believe this is an inevitable problem in an era of rapid progress. Therefore, I would rather believe that what is happening in this era is not a despair, but a hope, not a depravity, but a pre-progression fight. I believe that China will be even better in the next ten, twenty or thirty years. At that time, China had established a series of systems full of order and morality.

Why? Because I believe that there are some "firm beliefs" that will not change in people's minds. We firmly believe that the relationship between people is based on trust and integrity. New Oriental can do today, relying on mutual trust between the teams, the trust of parents and students in New Oriental, and the government's trust in New Oriental. But the establishment of all trust must be based on your own trust and on your own integrity. It is a tremendous force that can transform all negative energy around you into positive energy. I have been deceived by some people in my life, and I have indeed been counted by some people, but as of today, I am most proud of the fact that I still believe in every collaborator and every friend around me. Until the end he cheated on me. Therefore, I believe that since this is the most desirable thing in people's minds, the foundation of mutual trust in China will certainly be established. If we say that we don’t trust the Chinese government today, it’s because there are some corrupt officials, but we have also seen that the government is getting more and more serious about corrupt officials. If we say that we don’t trust each other, then we must It is our poor communication, and all these things will improve with the progress of society.

The second is that we firmly believe that people will work hard for equality of personality and every life with dignity. This is also the basis for our new East. One of the things I often emphasize in New Oriental is that there can be differences in roles between people, but there must be no personality inequality. As a boss, you can't bully subordinates. You must communicate with an equal, friendly, and kind mind when you work at the time of the conversation. People can criticize, but they can't be insulted. People can be harsh, but they can't be ironic. Most of the New Orientals have such an equal personality mentality, which is why we are new to the New Orientals as brothers and sisters. China's future progress must also be based on personal dignity and self-esteem. Dignity is to enable others to see you. Self-esteem means that you can see yourself. I hope that Chinese society will evolve into a society where people have dignity and self-esteem. If our entire Chinese society is temporarily unable to do so in this era of change, I hope that at least every New Oriental can do it. I am here to issue orders to you. If you find that any supervisor and supervisor are insulting your personality when dealing with your problems or talking to you, I encourage everyone to actively complain. I hope that New Oriental can exclude people who insult and disrespect people and who do not give self-respect. Of course, I also hope that everyone present here can be the first to respect people. The biggest problem in China's education is not discipline construction, nor quality education, nor college entrance examination. The biggest problem in Chinese education is that it has never been taught in education. We have never told our children since childhood. As citizens of a republic, they should What kind of respect for others and how to give self-esteem to others is the basis of human equality and freedom. I hope to start from the New Oriental.

Third, I firmly believe in the power of human progress. As long as we think about it from ancient times to modern times, we have experienced countless darkness. Human beings are full of killing, chaos, famine, disaster. The West also has the millennium darkness of the Middle Ages, but we can see that people all over the world from scientific knowledge to humanities. Knowledge is progressing, people are enjoying more and more rights, and people's living standards and respect between people are improving. Even if we see some bad things like this in China, we must believe that most people in this world are pursuing progress. We have seen the integration of the whole world. The tendency of globalization has brought the ideas, thoughts and progress of every corner of the world to us. We are no longer blinded and closed. China is no longer China, which was suppressed in humanity during the Cultural Revolution. Even if the current public expression is not enough, each of us can at least express our free voice in the circle of friends. Because I believe in the progress of the world, I believe in the power of growth. We have been pursuing our own growth, pursuing the growth of Chinese students, and pursuing the growth of every family in China. Through such growth, we are pursuing the growth of China, the growth of our nation, the growth of our motherland and the growth of our history.

Finally, I firmly believe in the power of ideals. The ideal does not have to be sublime. We don’t necessarily say that we have to be the UN Secretary-General. We don’t necessarily have to say that we have to be a Nobel Prize-winning scientist. Any one starts from humbleness, even if it’s bit by bit. The ideals are worthy of our respect. I have just said that my ideal is to start from humble beginnings, from a humble hope of a rural child to "unplug the roots of agriculture" and leave the countryside, and finally to enter Peking University; from wishing to become a qualified teacher of Peking University, to hope that I I can go abroad to study, and set up New Oriental after I failed to study overseas; I just hope that my family can have some living allowances. However, such an ideal grows a little bit, from the highest dream of only 300,000 RMB, to the end I have enough money to support my family, and finally bring New Oriental into a listed company; now my ideal has really turned into a hope for China’s education and Culture, for China's progress and development, contributes to China's transparency and fairness. Maybe all ideals have a humble beginning.

The world is so ever-changing. In the past, it took us a hundred years to change anything in one thing. We used 2,500 years to change China's feudal society. From the time I was born to the age of 18, my home was the few thatched cottages, the few creeks and the few dense trees, but the land trees were cut off because of the Cultural Revolution. The information we collected today is already the information that we used to collect in the past 100 years. The business model we encountered today that may have changed in a hundred years may be overthrown within a day. change. We have already seen that the bookstores that I like most when I was young are now gone. We know that people’s habits of buying books have changed. We can buy anything you want anywhere in the world without leaving the house. We know that the general store business model has changed.

Changes in the field of education are now coming. In the past two years, companies involved in education, whether traditional or high-tech, like mobile internet, Internet companies, have reached more than 3,000 in China, each of which can be a potential opponent of New Oriental. Every family has the potential to overthrow New Oriental. So today we see that New Oriental faces two fates: the first fate, we can continue to grow and continue to lead the development of China's training and education. But we may also be another fate, and we have been defeated by our competitors. Sometimes you don't know how you die, and you die. Many commercial amnesties still look back and see that their company has fallen apart when they are smoking and drinking.

New Oriental is now at the juncture of the best historical opportunities and is also at the corner of our own crisis. Can we win in this New East at this pass?

I am full of confidence in the future of New Oriental. I have four reasons to tell everyone why I am full of confidence in the future of New Oriental.

First, New Oriental is an upright cause. Any honest business is not easy to beat. We have been serving students and parents. Every penny we have is open and transparent. We have been doing things with our conscience. We have ideals in our hearts. We really do “good learning, high-mindedness and far-reaching”. New Oriental’s Although everyone is simple, despite unrealistic pride, even though they will quarrel for the sake of interest, we are essentially a group of very pure people. New Oriental is essentially one of the best training groups in China. With such a foundation, we have Have confidence in moving to the future.

Second, New Oriental is an institution that is transformative. As long as you think about it, how many institutions have changed from self-employed to a world-class listed company? New Oriental has undergone numerous changes, starting from self-employed, becoming a husband and wife shop, becoming a family system, becoming a friend partnership, becoming a Chinese joint-stock company, and becoming a world shareholding system. The company finally became a company listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Although New Oriental has a bureaucratic tendency, although New Oriental has fostered formalism and led to efficiency, I still believe that the heart of New Oriental is the heart of change, because I am willing to change, I am willing to take this spirit of change. Let's move forward together with everyone. We can break all the old rules, build new business models, and even overthrow the rest. The most fear is that we don't want to change ourselves. So please believe me, I am willing to change, I am willing to give all my energy and time, and even pay all my wealth and resources to contribute to the transformation of the New Oriental. I also hope that everyone in New Oriental can be at the forefront of change together. Work hard to bring New Oriental to the next twentieth anniversary.

Third, I believe that the transformation of New Oriental is that when I look around the team, I find that there is no such thing as a world full of ideals, passions, so full of new consciousness and creativity, and so united, equal and full of ridicule. team. I have traveled through many big companies in the world and have traveled through many big companies in China. I have found that the culture of New Oriental is really very good. Although we have all kinds of arguments and various kinds of quarrels, this kind of quarrel is also reproduced in the film "China Partner", which is based on Xu Xiaoping and Wang Qiang, but all these quarrels are for New Oriental. Development is to make us develop better, so the team spirit of New Oriental does hide the genes of the true vitality of New Oriental.

Fourth, I have read a sentence: Any organization that takes care of the growth and influence of young people will occupy the future. In China, we have not found any institution that is closer to the hearts of young people than New Oriental. Because New Oriental knows how to communicate with young people in the language of young people. People of my age, at Harvard, also use a lot of popular language on the Internet. The topic is "Build a 5B career with 4B spirit. Students are with us, students represent the future. When students leave us, At that time, we really lost the future. So we only need to do a little bit, we will serve the students in a down-to-earth manner, let the students face the New Oriental forever, and stand with New Oriental, let us provide students with better teaching resources and better teaching. Team, better teaching system and better education platform. Let us ignite the ideals of the students together. If the young children really want to be like our New Oriental teachers, they can worship like this in our program today. That New Oriental will certainly be in an invincible position.

All in all, we have to make progress, we have to change, we have to work hard, we have to serve our students better. New Oriental is here, the 20th anniversary is just today. The past two decades have passed, and our eyes have been looking to the next 20 years. I hope that in the next 20 years, we can really do a better job in the New Oriental. I hope that twenty years later, we are here. Most people can still come to the Great Hall of the People to participate in the celebration of the 40th anniversary of the New Oriental, and then the celebration of the 60th anniversary.

Thank you again!