Call it the legend of the sledgehammer. In 1985 the Qingdao Refrigerator Factory, a small collectively-owned enterprise in China’s Shandong province, was in trouble: sales were slipping, customer complaints were high and rising.
The new boss, Zhang Ruimin, a 36-year-old economist dispatched from the municipal government, decided to take a stand. Lining up 76 fridges found to be defective, he demolished one with a sledgehammer, then ordered the shocked staff to destroy the rest.
