[Excellence and Success] Chairwoman Tseng Shu-ling: The Resolute Woman Who Leads the Group
[KK SCHOOL Corporate Interview] Excellence and Success (2496-TW) Chairwoman Tseng Shu-ling: The Resolute Woman Who Leads the Group
2023/09/15 KK SCHOOL Knowledge Academy
💡Chairwoman Tseng Shu-ling — Profile
Tseng Shu-ling, originally from Hsinchu, started a home tutoring class together with her husband Chen Li (legal name: Chen Ming-chun) and has devoted herself to the tutoring industry for more than 40 years. She is a female business leader committed to nurturing talent and creating lasting value.
She currently serves as Chairwoman of "Excellence and Success" (stock ticker: 2496-TW), which encompasses ChenLi Education, EasyHe Enterprise, ChenLi Elementary School, and Liren Education, among other affiliated businesses. She commands great prestige in the tutoring industry and provides tens of thousands of students with quality learning opportunities and educational resources.
The Driving Force Behind ChenLi Education—Tseng Shu-ling
The cram schools clustered around Taipei Main Station are numerous, but the prominent "ChenLi Education" sign has long been a focal point that students and parents seek out by name. The key figure behind the brand — the person who has grounded its vision and driven its execution — is Ms. Tseng Shu-ling. She is not only the wife of Teacher Chen Li but also the driving force behind ChenLi Education.
ChenLi Education has passed its fortieth anniversary and today firmly holds the position of Taiwan's largest education group (Excellence and Success, stock ticker: 2496-TW). Working shoulder to shoulder with her husband Chen Li, Tseng Shu-ling has brought extraordinary achievements to ChenLi Education through her uniquely gentle yet resolute character.
From a Gentle, Romantic Literature Girl
to a Steadfast Business Leader
As a university student, Excellence and Success Chairwoman Tseng Shu-ling studied in the Department of Foreign Languages and Literature at National Taiwan University. Brimming with literary dreams, she read novels, attended art performances and films, and immersed herself in the world of literature and the arts. It was during this period that Tseng Shu-ling began dating Teacher Chen Li, then a student in the Department of Industrial Engineering at National Tsing Hua University. Chen Li loved to play guitar and explore new things, with an easy-going and passionate personality. A literary girl and a science-and-engineering boy — two people from entirely different backgrounds who seemingly had nothing in common — weathered life's storms together, built a family, and went on to co-found the highly successful tutoring brand "ChenLi Education."
Tseng Shu-ling laughs as she recalls that she always thought of herself as a quiet, well-behaved student from the liberal arts, never imagining that co-running a business with Teacher Chen Li would mean trading novels and literary history for financial reports and price quotations — gradually revealing her Capricorn nature of giving one hundred percent to everything she undertakes.
Meeting Every Challenge with Reflection and Change
After graduating from university, Tseng Shu-ling worked as an English secretary at a foreign trade company and as an English teacher before deciding to join Teacher Chen Li in building something for education. Starting with a small home tutoring class, she had to handle not only teaching but also actively market the school and recruit students, interacting with parents, students, and people from all walks of life. She candidly admits that all her growth happened naturally as she encountered problems and challenges; in order to build the brand well, she actively extended her reach and learning, transforming from an originally introverted and passive person into someone more proactive and adept at handling difficulties.
As word spread, the tutoring class gradually grew, with student numbers surging from hundreds to thousands. It was not until Teacher Chen Li strained his vocal cords from teaching and could no longer lecture that the two recognized the importance of educational succession. Riding the wave of the "community-based cram school" trend at the time, ChenLi Education made the decision in 2012 to reorganize as a company and enter the corporate ranks of the tutoring industry.
To manage the company, Tseng Shu-ling sat the entrance exam for the EMBA program at National Taiwan University and pursued continuing education. She studied proactively, enriching herself to meet every challenge, and thoroughly explored the capabilities required of a business operator — leadership, management skills, investment and financial management, business models, and more. Her existing industry experience allowed her to verify her own past experience and ideas while studying case studies, and her time in the NTU EMBA program greatly enhanced her business management expertise, enabling her to pinpoint the direction of corporate development with greater precision.
Complementing Chen Li: He Stays Romantic to the End; I Stay Pragmatic to the End — That's How Dreams Come True
Chen Li is known as a renowned mathematics teacher and is also deeply interested in educational innovation and investment, brimming with bold and avant-garde ideas — a visionary reformer. Yet without a rational, pragmatic partner to bring those concepts to life, they would remain just dreams. Tseng Shu-ling is precisely the key figure who turns those concepts into reality, advancing them from 1 to 100. With a vision that encompasses the big picture, she thinks about the long-term sustainable management of the enterprise and has led ChenLi Education from concept to practice, developing it into Taiwan's only publicly listed tutoring enterprise — Excellence and Success.
This complementary pair formed the perfect combination of "he conceives, she executes," allowing ChenLi Education to find balance between the innovator (educator) and the entrepreneur (strategist). Core members who have worked alongside Tseng Shu-ling for years all acknowledge her achievements: "Although Teacher Chen Li is the founder, without the headmistress (i.e., Chairwoman Tseng Shu-ling) working tirelessly behind the scenes, there would be no ChenLi Education as we know it today!" At the same time, Tseng Shu-ling is grateful to Teacher Chen Li for giving her the space to express her qualities and find her true calling in the field of education.
The Chairwoman's Daily Routine: Starting the Day with Morning Prayer,
Staying Energized Through Exercise
As the chairwoman of a group, Tseng Shu-ling faces different work challenges every day. She participates in various meetings, plans budgets, and formulates corporate strategy together with senior management. At the same time, she personally oversees the team, ensuring that all aspects of the company's operations proceed smoothly. Amid this busy and ever-changing work, Tseng Shu-ling has her own set of lifestyle habits to maintain peak condition.
Like most successful business leaders, Tseng Shu-ling keeps a highly disciplined daily routine. She goes to bed early and rises early, getting up at 5 a.m. for morning prayer to start each new day. Exercise is one of Tseng Shu-ling's ways of relieving stress: in addition to four yoga sessions per week, she occasionally uses a treadmill for aerobic exercise. This lifestyle helps her stay healthy and full of energy through a busy workload, laying a solid foundation for tackling daily work challenges and sustaining her passion and commitment to the enterprise.
Encouragement for Young People: Just Do It!
Chairwoman Tseng Shu-ling has transformed from a literature-loving girl in the foreign languages department into a successful business leader. She jokes that she is not particularly clever nor naturally charismatic as a leader. In her youth she never imagined she would dedicate more than forty years to the tutoring industry and become the chairwoman of a publicly listed company; nor did she ever expect that at 53 she would enter the NTU EMBA program to begin a new learning journey, exploring the essence of business management alongside like-minded industry peers. All these changes and challenges were achieved entirely through her Capricorn resolve and the courage to try — never afraid to explore the unknown, which is how she arrived at today's accomplishments.
She encourages young people: "When you meet a challenge, just do it!" No matter where we come from or what kind of starting point we have, as long as we persevere and dare to try, we can find our own place in this fiercely competitive world. Every attempt and every challenge is a precious experience that drives us to learn, grow, and become better versions of ourselves. Embracing this mindset not only helps in facing work challenges but also injects more momentum into one's career. Believe that everyone can find opportunities for continuous growth in their own life and create their own excellence and success.
💡Excellence and Success (2496-TW) — Profile
Company name: Excellence and Success Co., Ltd.
Founded: 1991/06/15
Listed: 2002/03/08
Market cap: NTD 1.075 billionAnnual revenue: NTD 702 million
Net asset value per share: NTD 41.31