In the interviewees’ understanding, harmony is precious is
functional for both internal management and external relations.
Internally, this notion helps firms avoid conflict and reduce the
management cost. Externally, it helps firms establish harmonious
environments that are advantageous to the firms.
For several interviewed executives, harmony took precedence over
the firms’ profit goals in some circumstances. This phenomenon
occurs particularly when firms are making a transition and change.
Having been developed in the planned economy, many firms must
change to fit the new market economy. To achieve this goal, firms
had to lay off some employees who did not meet the new require-
ments. However, it is difficult for the dismissed employees to accept
the firms’ decision and they usually are strongly against the manage-
ment and the firms, which in turn may harm the firms. Holding the
notion ofharmony is precious, some business leaders did not just
dismiss employees according to the depersonalized downsizing policy.
On the contrary, they did all they could to minimize the negative
impact of layoffs. For example, they communicated with these
employees and made great efforts, beyond their duties, to solve the
employees’ problems. Some executives offered the dismissed employ-
ees extra financial support, helped them find new jobs, or created
some temporary positions such as ‘‘assistants’’ for those managers
who had to leave their original positions.
Several leaders reported that harmony is especially precious for the
cohesion of the senior management team. They believed that man-
aging employees at lower levels should be based on rules; however, for
middle and senior managers, reliance on rule-based management
alone is not enough. In dealing with these people, the head of the
company should consider their feelings and respect them. The CEO of
a telecom company affiliated to China Network Communications
Corporation provided an excellent example. To maintain the cohesion
of the middle managers in the company, the CEO kept personal
communication with all subordinates so as to be aware of problems
they were facing, and he always took action to solve those problems.
Some leaders stuck to the ‘‘harmony’’ principle in developing
relationships with the external environment. They even developed
harmonious relationships with their competitors. They believed that
competition between companies could allow them to improve their
services and products, which could be beneficial for all of them. The
248 Zhi-xue Zhanget al.