在今年的巴塞罗那移动通信世界大会（Mobile World Congress）上，华为（Huawei）以浩大阵势出席，令人难以忽视。每位与会者一下飞机，映入眼帘的就是这个中国电信巨头的电子广告。到了会场，华为的大型展台不是一个，而是两个——其中一个展示面向消费者的华为手机和平板电脑，另一个展示面向各运营商的华为电信设备。华为还在加大力气宣传一款新设备——Ascend P2，宣称它是“全球速度最快的智能手机”。

    但在这样庞大的声势之外，许多人仍在质疑华为能否吸引消费者，能否和苹果（Apple）以及三星（Samsung）等业界重量级选手展开有效竞争，能否突破美国政府设下的障碍，将通信网络基础设施产品出售给美国电信运营商，特别是在北美市场。同时，虽然华为以开放和透明自称，但它的组织结构对外界来说依然是雾里看花（创始人任正非从不和媒体打交道，三名轮值CEO每半年轮换一次）。在本次大会上，华为轮值CEO郭平罕见地接受了《财富》杂志（Fortune）的采访，介绍了这家公司最近推出的产品，与众不同的管理制度，以及华为宏大的美国及全球市场计划。本次采访由翻译协助完成，部分内容摘录如下：

华为的管理结构与众不同。它是如何运作的？

    我想可以先向你介绍一下这个轮值制度是怎么建立起来的。那是在2004年，美世（Mercer，纽约一家咨询公司）帮我们组建了高级管理团队。他们最初建议由任正非先生担任董事长。但任先生不希望这样安排，也不想成为这样的董事长。他希望这个职位由各位高管轮流担任。2004-2012年期间，他也是这么做的。也就是说，以前有8个人轮流执掌大权。后来到了2012年，有3个人成为轮值CEO。这个管理角色主要有两项责任，第一是为财务业绩负责，第二是负责处理紧急事件和化解危机。其他7名高管作为一个团队共同决策，比如提升高层管理人员或调整薪酬结构。任期结束的轮值CEO会回到这个7人团队中参与集体决策。

那么每个决策都是由集体共识驱动的吗？

    不同的问题有不同的决策机制。一些问题可以由轮值CEO自行处理，一些问题要获得多数人同意，还有一些问题需要提交董事会审批。所以我们每个月都要召开董事会全体会议。另外7名高管也是董事会成员。

谁负责制定公司的愿景？是任先生吗？

    任先生会出席每个月的董事会会议。他也是董事，但不是7人高管决策团队的成员。因此，我们的2013年经营目标和业务计划需要得到董事会批准。也就是说，董事会、7人高管决策团队和轮值CEO各有各的责任和权力。

    Huawei's massive presence at this year's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona couldn't be missed. Conference-goers were greeted with the Chinese telecom giant's electronic ads as soon as they stepped off the plane in the Spanish city. The company set up not one but two sprawling booths at the show -- the first to showcase its line of consumer handsets and tablets, and the other to display its telecom equipment products for carrier customers. The company also made a big splash with a new device, the Ascend P2, which it touted as the "world's fastest smartphone."

    But for all of the noise Huawei made at this year's mobile confab, many -- particularly in the North American market -- remain skeptical about the company's ability to hook consumers, effectively compete with heavyweights like Apple (AAPL) and Samsung, and get past the U.S. government's efforts to block it from selling network infrastructure equipment to local carriers. And, despite its claims of openness and transparency, Huawei's corporate structure remains obscure. (The company's founder, Ren Zhengfei, never talks to the media; its three "rotating CEOs" shift power every six months.) In a rare interview, Huawei's acting CEO Guo Ping sat down with Fortune at Mobile World Congress to discuss the company's recent product launches, its unusual leadership arrangement, and its global ambitions -- U.S. market included. Here is an excerpt of the conversation, which was conducted with the help of an interpreter:

Your leadership structure is unusual. How does it work?

    I think first of all I can introduce to you how we came to this system of rotating. I remember that in 2004 Mercer [a New York-based consulting firm] helped us establish our executive management team [EMT]. Their initial proposal was that Mr. Ren would be the chair of the EMT. However, Mr. Ren did not want to work like that and he did not want to take such a chair position. He wanted the other members to rotate and chair the EMT. So that's what we did from 2004 to last year. So in the past there used to be eight people rotating as chair of EMT, and now in 2012 three people became the rotating CEO. There are two major responsibilities if you are a rotating acting CEO. Number one is he or she is responsible for the financial results and number two is to take the lead in emergencies or crisis handling. The other seven people [on the EMT] make collective decisions as a team, for promotion of high-level managers or changes in salary structures. And after one's term as a rotating CEO, he or she will still be in this seven-person team and participate in this collective decision-making.

So is every decision consensus driven?

    For different matters there are different mechanisms to make decisions. There are some matters where the rotating active CEO can make decisions by themselves and there are some matters where if the majority agrees they can pass. And there are also some other matters that need to be submitted to the board for approval. So we have the all hands meeting for the board every month. And these seven people [from the EMT] are also members of the board.

Whose responsibility is it to set the vision of the company? Is that Mr. Ren's role?

    Mr. Ren will be present in every month's board meeting. He is a member of the board. But he's not among the seven-person decision-making team. So when we had the business objectives and business plan for 2013, they needed to be approved by the board. So there are different obligations and authority for the board, for the seven-person decision-making team and also for the rotating CEO.

人们经常把史蒂夫•乔布斯当作前瞻型CEO的典范。和苹果这样的企业相比，华为在组织结构方面有哪些优势和劣势？

    我们的管理模式相当新颖。实际上，它来自一本书中的想法。这本书叫《会飞的水牛》（Flight of the Buffalo），作者是美国人（詹姆斯•比拉斯科和拉斐尔•斯特耶）。书中的理论和迁徙鸟类如何飞越大西洋有关——它们总是排成人字型，但带头的并不总是同一只鸟。也就是说它们会更换位置，轮流带领整支队伍飞越海洋。我觉得，不管是我们提到的苹果，还是其他公司，它们都有各自的管理结构。

这种轮值CEO制度是华为的长期安排吗？还是说这仅仅是一个接班人计划?

    我刚才说过，我们去年才启用这项制度。我觉得我们需要更多时间来观察它的效果。

你说过贵公司希望更加透明。你们正在采取哪些措施来提高透明度和开放度？特别是针对美国而言？

    一直保持开放和透明是我们的既定政策。人们可能不知道，从2000年开始我们就一直和毕马威（KPMG）合作。毕马威是华为的全球审计机构，负责审核华为的财报。你可以从华为网站上下载去年和前年的年报。我们也召开年度分析师会议。在我们的年报中，你可以看到华为的治理结构、董事会成员，包括其简历，还能看到我们的业务增长近况和其他重要信息。华为不是上市公司，但我们决心遵循上市公司的准则和标准。借这个机会，我想来进一步解释一下我们为什么没有上市。在中国，股东人数超过200名的公司没办法上市。我们知道中国政府正在着手制定非上市公司规范。据我所知，美国证券交易委员会（SEC）在谷歌（Google）的股东人数达到500名时曾要求该公司上市。中国的公司法仍在制定中。但就未来而言，我们不排除任何可能性。现在华为的员工股东已经超过6万名（最新数据：根据华为提供的信息，该公司现有7.42万名员工股东）。

我之前的印象是华为所有的员工都是股东。这么看来贵公司15万名员工并不人人都是股东？

    对。但所有股东确实都是员工。

并非所有员工都持股，但所有股东都在华为上班？

    实际上，期权就是我从美国引进到华为的。我曾在美国见过两家咨询公司。他们告诉我们，初始阶段每个人都可以当股东，因为我们需要有现金流。因此，在华为转入发展阶段后，只有那些骨干和关键成员才会成为股东。我们还把员工分为不同的类别。你会发现工程部门员工的持股比例非常高。现在，我们自我定位是正处于第二阶段，发展阶段。

那么接下来是什么阶段？

    接下来将是成熟阶段，但我们希望自己一直处于发展阶段。（财富中文网）

    译者：涛

Steve Jobs is often used as an example for a visionary CEO. What are the advantages and disadvantages to your structure versus a company like Apple?

    Our management model is quite new, but actually it comes from an idea from a book written by an American author, called Flight of the Buffalo [the book was written by James A. Belasco and Ralph C. Stayer]. The theory of that book is about how migrant birds fly across the Atlantic Ocean -- they always fly in a V-shape but the lead of the team is not always the same bird. So they change and rotate to lead the whole team across the ocean. So I think for every company whether we talk about Apple or others they have their own different governing structure.

Is this rotating CEO structure seen as a long-term arrangement for Huawei, or is this just a succession plan?

    Like I said we only started this system last year. I think we need more time to observe how it works.

You've said that you want to be more transparent. What steps are you taking to be more transparent and more open, especially when it comes to the U.S.?

    It is our established policy to continually be open and transparent. You might not know that since 2000 we have been working with KPMG; they are our global auditor to review our reports. And you can also download our annual report for last year and the year before last on our site. We also have our annual analyst meeting. In the annual report you can also find our governance structure and also our members of the board, including their CVs and also an update of our business growth and other important information. We are not a listed company, but we are determined to follow the criteria and standards of a listed company. I would like to take this opportunity to say something more about why we are not listed. In China, if a company has more than 200 shareholders there is no solution for a company like that to be listed. And we know that the Chinese government is also taking initiative to establish regulations related to non-listed companies. I know that when the number of shareholders of Google (GOOG) reached 500, then the SEC required them to go public. So in China the company law is still in the process. But for the future we do not exclude any possibility. Now we have more than 60,000 employee shareholders. [Update: According to Huawei, the company now has 74,200 employee shareholders.]

I was under the impression that all employees were shareholders. So not all of your 150,000 employees are shareholders?

    You are right. It is true that all of the shareholders are employees.

Not all employees are shareholders but all shareholders are employees?

    Actually I was the very person to introduce the stock options from the U.S. I visited two consulting firms in the U.S. They told us that in the initial phase everyone could be shareholders because we needed to have the cash flow. So when the company shifted into the development phase only the mainstay, key members of the company would be shareholders. And in Huawei we have different categories of employees. If you look at engineering groups they have a very big percentage of the shares. So now we position ourselves in the second phase, the development phase.

And what's the next phase?

    The next phase will be the mature phase, but we hope that we are always in the development phase.