Personal Statement

Applied Program: MBA

How can the youngest member in his group exercise successful leadership of the group, either in the primary school, in university or in company? How can a successful physician turn into an equally successful enterprise management genius? Why does a senior manager of a major multinational company who commands half of the sales market in the most populous country in the world intend to relinquish temporarily his career in search for a formal MBA education in a prestigious American business school? The answers to all those important questions can be found in my case.

My strong creativity and leadership, including my organizational skills, are the answer to the first question. As I started my primary education earlier than average kids, I have tended to be the youngest member of my group, both in the classes from primary school to college, and in my company. However, this fact cannot prevent me from becoming the most outstanding person of the group, and hence its leader. I have created many “first’s” and “only’s”. In college, I launched the first Students Society of Psychology and within one year developed it into the third biggest students association on the campus. As the president of the departmental students union and with the assistance of other student officials, I launched the first departmental student magazine. I organized a series of lectures on mental health, the first of its kind on campus. While leading the students in my department and in my class to win honors in various fields, I managed to remain No.1 in my class in terms of scholastic performance, thereby becoming the only student in my class to have been awarded the dual honor of the Outstanding Graduate of the University and the Municipal-Level Student of Excellence of Beijing. In the medical research subsequent to my graduation, as the first practitioner of “ShenTian Therapy” in China, I made important achievements in the study of the effectiveness and the feasibility of this therapy in treating Chinese patients suffering from neurosis. As soon as I was made responsible for the marketing of medical products, it was I who first proposed the strategy of directly promoting the products to the drugstores, thereby enabling the drugs to find their way into the OTC market. In the face of those “first’s” and “only’s”, I have every reason to be confident in myself that I will do better in the future.

The answer to the second question can be traced to every progress and every achievement I have made. After graduation, I found employment with the Center of Mental Health of my Alma Mater. Within one and half years, my professional performance brought me the honor of Physician of Excellence for two consecutive years. I was unanimously regarded as the most promising young physician of the Center. However, I shifted my attention to the competitive business world where I believed my talents could be brought into full play. By relinquishing the comfortable conditions at the Center, I joined France’s largest medicine manufacturer in China—Servier International Pharmaceutical Company. In the 5 years that followed, my performance allowed me to be constantly promoted, from an average sales person, the senior sales representative, the sales director, the sales manager to the general sales manager at present, responsible for the sales of products in Northeastern, Northern, and Northwestern China.

Along this road, difficulties and challenges abound. However, by exercising the knowledge of psychology I learned at college and by summarizing practical experiences, I have always managed to gain insights into the real needs of my clients and enhancing the morale of my subordinates. A most important instance occurred in 1997 when I was just promoted to be the sales director in Beijing Region. The Beijing Municipal Heath Bureau was compiling “the Catalogue of Recommended Drugs” which did not include our chief product ACERTIL, which seriously affected its sales. In order to enhance the cohesiveness and the morale of my group, I organized some collective activities like basketball match. On the other hand, I decided that, while trying to maintain the existing sales volume of ACERTIL, we should promote, with every resource to our avail, the newly marketed product ALVENOR. The surprising result was that the sales of the new product increased at an alarming rate and within the first five months we finished the sales objective of the entire year, laying a firm basis for the completion of the overall sales volume of that year and also lessening the pressure on the sales performance of ACERTIL. Meanwhile, we did some very detailed work to enable ACERTIL to appear on the Catalogue by publicizing the positive image of our company and explaining ACERTIL’s outstanding therapeutic qualities to the relevant medical experts and government officials. As a result, ACERTIL became the third best selling drug among its similar products and our sales volume exceeded the pre-fixed objective by 48%. The surmounting of this major challenge indeed helped to develop me into an accomplished sales manager.

My 5-year sales experience and the professional trainings I have received from Servier International have allowed me to gain a deep understanding of the operations of a major multinational company. Instead of making me contented with what I have achieved, my initial career success has made me aware that, to scale new heights in the business world, it is advisable for me to further improve my management skills and professional expertise through a quality MBA program. Having graduated from a medical school, I have acquired my management experience only through practice, which is unsystematic and not theoretized. To understand the essence of the management science, I need to receive systematic and theoretical education in management, apart from extensive case studies. With such an education, I will feel confident about my future career objective—to establish my own medical company and to develop myself into a successful entrepreneur in China where rapid economic development offers unlimited business opportunities. In my future business plan, I will focus on providing advanced international medical technologies, products, equipment and services to Chinese medical organizations and hospitals.

The reason why I choose the University of San Francisco, which is situated in the famous and beautiful Silicon Valley, is that for a long time I have had a deep admiration for Dr. Heinz Weihrich and other renowned professors. I have read a series of works by Dr. Heinz Weihrich such as Management (9th Edition), Management Excellence: Productivity through MBO, Essentials of Management, An Asian Perspective, etc. I have benefited a great deal from those books in my past management practice and now I wish to benefit more from face-to-face exchanges with those masters and receiving their instructions. Furthermore, the courses offered by your university including Marketing, Finance, and Information Management will be most beneficial to me. I believe that to be able to complete my degree program in such a university which offers rigorous training and permits good student-teacher communications and exchanges will prepare me adequately for launching my own business in the future. I need this MBA education to enable me to create more “first’s” and “only’s” in my future career.