By Marie Cheng

President and Chief Executive Officer of Nissan & Renault Carlos Ghosn has visited Tsinghua SEM on April 18, 2008 and delivered a speech titled “Managing Cross Cultures - Renault Nissan Alliance”. Vice President of Tsinghua University Xie Weihe and Associate Dean of Tsinghua SEM Yang Bin held talks with Mr. Carlos Ghosn, who is also member of the Advisory Board of Tsinghua SEM.

After the applause subsided, Mr. Ghosn began by expressing his personal enthusiasm for speaking to students.  Referencing his own education, he stressed the importance of student contact with industry professionals.  “[When I was in school], people coming from real life and real experience came and shared with us some of what they were being confronted with; I always find it very interesting.”

Speaking directly to his experience at Nissan & Renault, he espoused the importance of mutual understanding and purposeful collaboration between two companies that have such different histories and cultures; furthermore, he pointed out how Nissan & Renault’s success has led into new ventures.  He quoted China’s Dongfang in 2002 during Dongfang-Nissan partnership talks, regarding why Dongfang specifically sought Mr. Ghosn: “We know that you will respect the Chinese management of Dongfang, and we know you will respect the identity of Dongfang, and we know that you will give a good purpose for this partnership between Nissan and Dongfang.”

For the latter 40 minutes of his talk, Mr. Ghosn proceeded to open the floor to questions and allow students to lead the discussion.  Among the many gems of wisdom that the ever-confident CEO told students were the following pieces of advice about cross-cultural management:

·         Respect for identity is the most important element in M&A and collaborations.  “Make sure that somebody who is different is not considered threatened.”

·         In multi-group or multicultural collaborations, give people a reason to want to work with people who are “different” from themselves.  “Make sure there is a purpose.”

·         “Management is about: how do you make people do things that they don’t want to do, or they don’t like to do, and still be motivated about it and feel good about it.  That’s real management.  And that’s what you’re all going to be facing in your career.”

·         “Management” is not managing when business is going smoothly.  You don’t have to manage during those times!  Real management is the management of business when times are tough.

·         Failures of some kind will always happen; they are inevitable, and you cannot expect that you can go through life and work without any mistakes.

·         The most important, most difficult, most dangerous decision in management is selecting people, especially in cross-cultural situations.

Carlos Ghosn’s motivating speech to the Tsinghua student body passionately communicated the need for bold and mindful leadership, and the power of respect in global business practices.  The Tsinghua MBA student body thoroughly enjoyed Mr. Ghosn’s visit and look forward to his return next year.

 Mr. Ghosn was born in Brazil on March 9, 1954. He graduated with engineering degrees from Ecole Polytechnique in 1974 and from Ecole des Mines de Paris in 1978. He is the president and chief executive officer of Nissan Motor Co., Ltd., a global automotive company with more than 200,000 employees and $89 billion in revenue. Mr. Ghosn joined the company as its chief operating officer in June 1999, became its president in June 2000 and was named chief executive officer in June 2001.

In May 2005, Mr. Ghosn was named president and chief executive officer of Renault S.A. in addition to his current responsibilities at Nissan. As head of the Renault-Nissan Alliance, Mr. Ghosn is responsible for two separate companies with combined annual global sales of 6.2 million vehicles.

 Mr. Ghosn currently serves on the board of directors of Alcoa, the Advisory Board of Tsinghua University School of Economics & Management.