Connie He
Brewing a pot of tea and watching the curled tea leaves slowly stretching out in the water is the perfect way to enjoy tranquility in a bustling world. Connie loves drinking tea, especially enjoys a tea ceremony in nature during spring or autumn. While watching tea leaves dancing in the water, taking a deep breath to enjoy the unique fragrance of tea, and then taking a sip. This is the moment where Connie gains inner peace and recharges.
Lei Lei, November 30, 2021
The week before our interview, Connie had just shared with Bühler’s Generation B how her role at the company has transformed through the years. As a business newcomer, she started off as an administrative secretary, and from that, via the positions of Head of the General Manager’s Office and Assistant to the President, she made her way up to becoming HR Director. The shift of roles might have seemed effortless from the outside, but Connie knows how much hard work has gone into it. “When facing major transitions, I have been faced with many dilemmas and felt hesitant, but it just made me work harder, that’s all I could do.” It is indeed a rare thing to be able to always keep up with the times, and when someone can do it, it is not just something that happens by chance. Behind every step forward lies a lot of sweat and hard work. “It’s just like that saying, behind all the ‘effortless’ success is a lot of silent hard work,” Connie says.
Connie He is Human Resources Director at Bühler Asia Pacific. She is an elegant and intellectual woman and has been working for Bühler for nearly 20 years. Within the company, she goes under the name ‘Sister C’ because she is like a senior sister in the family. Over the past 20 years, she has grown together with the rapid growth of Bühler in China.
“Ten years ago, when I was offered to be promoted from Assistant to the President to HR Director, I was very hesitant about taking on this huge challenge. After analyzing and weighing my strengths and weaknesses and thanks to the encouragement of my boss, I finally decided to leave my comfort zone and accept the challenge. Looking back, I am glad I was brave enough to take this step,” Connie says.
Self-assessment and self-reflections are what the excellent self-explorer Connie keeps emphasizing. “After having worked for some time and faced different challenges, I felt it important to assess and look at myself to clearly see my strengths and weaknesses. I know that I should take advantage of and rely on those strengths to develop myself,” she adds.
Today, as Connie, calm and composed, sits in front of us, happily talking about challenges from the last ten years of her career, it is obvious how proud and happy she is about having made those brave decisions. “What has made me who I am today is that I have spared no effort to utilize my strengths, I have faced my weaknesses, and continued to learn new skills. What is important for me is to complement strengths with my team and learn from and grow together with my team. Growth is a process of continuous changing from ‘comfort’ to ‘self-adaptation’. When faced with changing environments, you need to constantly improve your ability to adapt, and expand your comfort zone. Thus, you can cope with the changing world and live in harmony with yourself at the same time,” she says.
“Of course, it is also necessary to maintain a growth mindset, stay open and curious, constantly take yourself out of your comfort zone, and acquire new strengths by constantly putting in hard work in areas that you are not familiar with or good at in the process of handling challenges,” says Connie, as her gentle eyes revealed a great smile.
In addition, Connie tells us that it is important to have a daring mentality to seize opportunities in different fields. Of course, a lot of preparation goes into this behind the scenes, because being prepared is the prerequisite for being calm and composed. Talking about the time when she just joined Bühler, Connie says: “Early in my career, setting a role model for myself played a great role in my growth.” When she mentions the topic of discovering role models and making use of the power of role models, her eyes light up. Indeed, the glittering days of the past are always worth cherishing.
Gigi Teng was her first role model in Bühler. “I met Gigi, who used to work in the Beijing office, when I started my job. Gigi was always elegant and calm, spoke great English, and was very insightful. She played an important role and was trusted in the communication between China and Switzerland. That is who I want to become.” Listening to Connie’s memories of the past brought us right back to those passionate days.
Like many young beginners, she had no idea what kind of person she would like to become in the future. “But I definitely knew what types of people I looked up to,” Connie says with a rising tone while making an upward gesture. “As soon as I found a role model around me, someone with both great knowledge and personality, she would become a lighthouse, a benchmark, and a motivation for me to push ahead. The way role models work is that we want to emulate them. They are ordinary people around us, and what they do and say have a direct impact on us,” Connie emphasizes.
What embodies a person’s growth? There was once a psychologist who said that a person can be considered to have ‘grown up’ when they no longer require themselves to be perfect in the eyes of others; they learn to give and take, stay true to themselves, and give full play to their potential; they do their best. This is a description of Connie.
“This is rock tea (a special type of oolong tea), right,” asks Connie. Knowing that Connie likes tea, we prepared some to drink during our chat. She is a tea master, and just by smelling the tea, she can accurately tell what the variety is. Just as tea leaves processing themselves into their own unique flavors, Connie is constantly looking for the meaning of life.
“Life is a journey through which you constantly try to seek your purpose. The sooner you find out what are most important things to you in your life and identify the ‘true self’ you want to become, the sooner you will be able to gain composure, which makes you less likely to get lost in a changing environment nor due to the way how you are treated by others,” says Connie.
“I remember a professor from CEIBS talking about the 4Cs of the true self. I couldn’t agree more. As many of my colleagues call me ‘Sister C’, the 4Cs left me with a deep impression. The first C is clear cognition (Clear), you need to clearly know who you are, what your values are, and where your happiness comes from; the second C is consistent behavior (Consistent), you should be consistent in being yourself and in the way you treat others and yourself, whenever and wherever; the third C is a caring attitude (Caring), you should care about yourself and at the same time develop empathy to care about others. I firmly believe that what goes out comes back; the fourth C is the power of being choiceful, that is by constantly seeking excellence, you can make optimal decisions and create the best possible environment for all at times to make decision,” says Connie. Deeply touched by Connie’s words, we couldn’t help but give her a round of applause.
Connie is such a gentle girl with a broad vision. From her story, we saw each of her steps in Bühler, which were firm and composed. As the sunlight outside the window lit up her face, we could see her face brimming with confidence, filling us all with inspiration. As our interview finished, Connie hurried to the next meeting. We wish her all the happiness in life!
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