He tried to describe the outline of China's reform history through these thrilling stories. What Ma Licheng wants to explore is: Why did most gradual changes in the traditional history of China fail? Of course, when we read this book here, we look at these historical changes and figures from the perspective of enterprises or businesses: how many mistakes have been made in past dynasties, there are thousands of failures in the business environment; There are many kinds of impulsive and stupid tricks among historical figures, and there will only be more business people; How many times in history have you overturned the achievements of political reform, or even gone backwards sharply? There will be tens of millions of times in enterprises. I think, psychologically speaking, the difficulty of change is that it will inevitably touch the vested interests of some people, which will lead to strong opposition; It is easy to overthrow completely, because it first deprives people of their interests and makes them think that they have lost their interests. If they are lucky enough to lose less, they will be very happy. Enterprises that understand this truth, such as Huawei, often take the practice of resigning and re-starting their jobs when they need major changes. But thorough overthrow is not a method that can be used frequently, nor is it the most effective method. The truly lasting method is reform. In business, on the positive side, gradual reform can make enterprises develop steadily and retain employees; On the other hand, most enterprises can't survive a big failure, which means that at least half of the possibility of enterprise death and complete overthrow is a big failure. Yu Yingshi, a historian, once said that the history of modern thought in China was a "radical process", which can be partly attributed to the fact that "there is no status quo worth maintaining, only another force, that is, radical forces are desperately developing." This may be the ideological root of China's modern tragedy. For a long-term and relatively short-lived enterprise, the way out is to find a "status quo worth maintaining" and then make adjustments and reforms in this category. The most profound word in Ma Licheng's story of the changes of past dynasties is "compromise", and success or failure depends on it. Zhao Wuling and Wang's successful reform of riding and shooting is permeated with the spirit of compromise. Ma Licheng tells the story of King Wuling of Zhao's compromise like this: "In Baiyang's words, if you change your clothes, your interests will not be substantially damaged. King Wuling of Zhao gave a death order, didn't he? Instead, I went to the minister's house who didn't want to change clothes and tried my best to persuade him to lose his voice. The minister felt that the monarch personally came to my house, persuaded me for a day, gave me enough face, and agreed to put on a show. After doing these jobs, the matter of changing clothes will be pushed forward. " In this story, King Wuling of Zhao is the strong, and the compromise of the strong can often promote change. Most reformers are also strong in the change of enterprises, because it is difficult to start the change if they are not the chairman, CEO, major shareholders or people with actual influence. However, whether in history or in enterprises, reformers are relatively weak or influential. At this time, when thinking about change, we should pay attention to ray's point of view. He said that the success of the reform has two points. "First of all, we must have enough authority. If I engage in reform, it will infringe on your interests, and you can't resist me; Second, if the authority is not enough, there must be enough compensation. I deprived you of some of your interests and compensated you. " The failure of many enterprise reforms lies in the fact that enterprise leaders do not act when the situation is good, but act when they have to, the authority is weakened, the enterprise is obviously declining, and the opportunity is delayed. In a word, we can see the enlightenment of enterprise reform from the reform stories in China history: first, the best choice of enterprises is to gradually change on the basis of "the status quo worth maintaining"; Second, the time for change is when there is enough authority or exchange conditions, when it is prosperous, not when it is declining; Third, the core wisdom at the operational level of change is "compromise".