Can the deputy district governor resign to sell coffee?

Author: Southern Weekend Reporter Zhang Xueyan Southern Weekend Intern Min Zhenqi

From: Wuxi, Jiangsu 2015-11-05 10:20:08 Source: Southern Weekend

As a resigned deputy district chief, Gu Jianwei himself has become one of the biggest selling points of entrepreneurship, often interviewed by the media. He said: This is a gimmick, there are pros and cons. (Photo provided by interviewee/picture)

Wuxi, a city with a population of 6.5 million and a traditional manufacturing industry as its economic pillar, is striving to become the object behind "Internet +". Like most second-tier and third-tier cities, it is submerged in the hustle and bustle of national entrepreneurship.

At the age of 40, Gu Jianwei, deputy district chief, chose to resign and start a business.

In his choice, it is not a complete disappointment with the system, but more a yearning for a better future outside the system.

Gu Jianwei's choice is cooler than most civil servants who go to sea.

He opened a 3W cafe and decorated it into the most fashionable LOFT industrial style.

Every day, three to five entrepreneurial teams lined up to ask him for advice, from the post-70s to the post-90s, asking about everything from how to sell vegetables with Internet thinking to how to open cinemas with Internet thinking. "Civil servants go to sea tide" and "innovation", in a middle-aged man's body skillfully meet.

Until three months ago, he was Wuxi's youngest department-level cadre and deputy district chief of Wuxi's core Urban area, Beitang District. It took him 17 years to get from street clerk to this position. Now, he "mixes" the entrepreneurial army with the attitude of "entrepreneurial mentor".

His cafe, he says, is "so handsome it has no friends."

Why quit?

On the evening of October 27, 2015, four high school students were having a dinner together. In addition to Gu Jianwei, there is also a businessman, two department-level cadres, one organization director and one in charge of investment promotion.

The topic is a logistics project. Several people warmly communicate, along with comments on Wuxi's Internet logistics market. The head of the organization ate his vegetables until someone mentioned "party fees." His eyes lit up, he put down his chopsticks, waved his arm and said,"You don't pay party dues, that's because you're not aware enough!" Next, the dinner became a party discipline lesson.

At 40, Gu Jianwei still looks like a dreary middle-aged cadre. Shirt, suit, leather shoes, old Coach briefcase, no expression, smooth speech. His conversation was full of "machinations", always mixed with words such as "life","era" and "world", and he also liked to hang the slogan of "mass entrepreneurship, innovation" on his lips. He also often listens to the Central People's Radio, which is said to bring him "positive energy."

"He hasn't changed at all." One of my classmates said.

In that year's college entrance examination, Gu Jianwei was the best in the town, but also the farthest. A top student at Peking University returned to Wuxi to work as a street clerk in Chong 'an District. His classmates were no less surprised than he resigned this time.

In 1998, Gu Jianwei graduated from Peking University with a bachelor's degree in political science. That year, Jiangsu Province resumed the selection and transfer mechanism, from colleges and universities to large-scale selection of outstanding youth enrichment to the grass-roots level, the election can be exempted from civil service examination. The Jiangsu Provincial Party Committee Organization Department came to Peking University and found forty or fifty Jiangsu students to hold a selection meeting. The slogan was "Go to the grassroots, go to the front line, go to the main battlefield." As a result, no one signed up.

As the head of the league school, Gu Jianwei became one of the last three selected.

"You don't understand society better if you don't go to the main battlefield." Gu Jianwei, in his early twenties, made a decision that he still thinks is "most in line with his own values of life":"We Peking University people hope to tie our destiny with society, which is the core of a great spirit."

Of the two Peking University graduates who returned to Jiangsu with him, only he lasted the longest.

Interestingly, that year was also later regarded as the "real rise of China's commercial Internet" year, Zhang Chaoyang launched Sohu, Wang Zhidong founded Sina, Ma Huateng founded Tencent. Liu Qiangdong also went to Zhongguancun to sell computers this year and started his business.

Gu Jianwei rushed to his "main battlefield", a street office with 30 to 50 people. Except for him, all of them were former employees of state-owned enterprises aged 40 to 50.

"We think government is very backward and traditional; young people are confident that we should and can push for change in the governance system." Gu Jianwei once used his professional knowledge to elaborate a questionnaire on community building. The leader said it was good, but he soon realized that it was not necessary. "The reality of society is, what leaders say, I do."

In 17 years, Gu Jianwei worked in tourism and demolition. After arriving in Beitang District in 2012, he was in charge of investment promotion, enterprise service and investment and financing, during which he also experienced several official earthquakes. He simply said,"That's how politics works."

On his way, another director at the dinner was a witness throughout. He said it was also a history of blood and tears. "At our age, it's not easy to do this position. To put it bluntly, it can be said that it is a glory to the ancestors."

When he heard that Gu Jianwei resigned, he was surprised and even envious. Although he himself knows that the road ahead is long,"leadership positions are limited"; the image of civil servants is often demonized by society, which makes him somewhat aggrieved. "You really have to give up, or you have to make a big decision."

But civil servants going to sea is nothing new. In 2014, the number of civil servant applicants nationwide dropped by 360,000 compared with the previous year, and in 2015, it dropped by 100,000. Zhaopin.com recruitment "2015 spring talent flow analysis report" shows that after the Spring Festival in 2015, the job-hopping rate of civil servants increased by 34% year-on-year, the most popular transformation direction is real estate, finance and the Internet.

After hesitating for a few years, Gu persuaded his family and submitted his resignation in early 2015.

In his resignation letter, he wrote: "As a civil servant who is no longer young, I hope to stand with young people."

It's called incubation, but it's real estate.

"He did a better job than me.""If I made this product, it would definitely fall off."

That night-October 29 entrepreneurial salon, every young entrepreneur to share their own projects, Gu Jianwei came to the stage, will open the first support, said these two words.

All the entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs present that night added up to less than 30, and the chairs were not full. However, Gu Jianwei was still fully engaged and excited.

He said,"I'm too old to be young. In front of young people, we surrender. So I didn't choose a new project to start a business. I thought forget it. I might as well serve the business."

The resignation incident brought him attention. Since the opening of 3W Coffee, he has been frequently interviewed by the media. He also deliberately observed how various media reprinted reports about him and how they started the headlines. Although some media reports upset the family, they protested. He tells entrepreneurs who come to him for advice: "if you have something to sell yourself, sell yourself."

"It's a gimmick, but there are pros and cons." He knew very well that, like most officials who went into the sea, he would attract a lot of speculation. Some people speculate that he was "forced" to leave by the eight regulations, or to launder money. In recent years, Wuxi officials have fallen one after another, which is also easy to find and link together.

He needed a win more than clarification.

Wuxi Maker Space Incubator Co., Ltd., founded by Gu Jianwei and served as the general manager, has created two "crowd-creation spaces" and two more are being planned. The cooperation with Beijing 3W Coffee has helped his brand road. The company has ten shareholders, each holding 10% of the shares. He chose an entrepreneurial direction for himself: entrepreneurial services.

"Don't think about it. I want to buy shares." After receiving Gu Jianwei's inquiry, Yan Jianou nodded hurriedly.

He is the CEO of PanAsia China, a local Internet leader in Wuxi, and Gu was his direct official. The two of them were only 500 meters away from each other's offices. Gu Chang called and the two of them met and chatted for a while. However, it is not the duty of a deputy district chief to communicate with entrepreneurs in the industry, and it is not helpful for career.

"I don't think he looks like a leader." Yan Jianou said that he took the initiative to meet Gu Jianwei, an official, in 2011, but Gu never talked about politics, only about industry. In his view, Gu's entrepreneurial direction maximizes what he has accumulated over the years in officialship-contacts, resources and knowledge. He is fit to do this."

"Creative Space" is a new concept proposed by Premier Li Keqiang in January 2015. Following the trend, Wuxi City Government issued a notice on "Action Plan for Building Mass Innovation Space in Wuxi City to Promote Mass Innovation and Entrepreneurship (2015-2020)" in October this year, specifying "supporting measures such as accelerating industrial and commercial registration process, loans, fund support and tax preference." Gu Jianwei smelled this business opportunity.

Yin Xueyan, deputy general manager of Jiangnan University Science and Technology Park, told reporters at Southern Weekend that Wuxi has more than 40 incubators as entrepreneurship platforms, most of which have government background and uneven levels. Such incubators with government background are usually channels for attracting foreign investment, with the goal of introducing tax sources and solving employment. "It's called an incubator, and its essence is 'technology real estate'."

One entrepreneur complained to Southern Weekend reporters: "Their most frequent service is to collect rent." In Wuxi New District, he rented the office space of one of the incubators. The rent was even higher than the market price. Only when the annual turnover per square meter reached a certain target could he get subsidies."This is completely contrary to 'incubation'."

"In terms of Wuxi's size, there is no need for so many incubators." Yin Xueyan said, Redundancy is easy to cause resource dispersion, Even unnecessary vicious competition; And really can create value for entrepreneurs, May be few.

From officialdom into the business sea, Gu Jianwei has not completely completed the task of role conversion. Entrepreneurs who have dealt with him for many years still like to call him "Gu Qu"; entrepreneurs who come to him for entrepreneurial information now call him "Gu Zong", while some younger ones call him "Gu Teacher".

He himself knows very well that government background does not bring all advantages.

When promoting an educational product, he explained that if he, as an official, went to a school to promote it and said,"Principal, you want to use my product", there would be no obstruction and he would not care about the competitiveness of the product itself. It will surely fall."

"Internet +", hope and difficulty

"Incubators have to make money, cafes have to make money, we don't do it without making money."

At the most recent board meeting on october 31st, mr gu told shareholders that revenues and expenditures were basically balanced. In the future, there are many ways to make money from services, and it will take time to test whether success can be achieved.

He is ambitious: he plans to package "incubator operation services" into products and sell them to incubators across the country; he also plans to be an equity crowdfunding platform and a private equity fund.

These creative ideas that can make people hear cocoons every day in Beijing's entrepreneurial cafes appear to be somewhat acclimatized in Wuxi. It was even difficult to understand.

A number of Internet industry insiders told Southern Weekend reporters that Wuxi's Internet entrepreneurship projects not only have a small base, but also lag far behind Beijing and other first-tier cities in terms of volume and level.

This can be found in people who drink coffee from Gu Jianwei's cafe alone: there are almost no computer bags for grassroots entrepreneurs, but all suits and leather shoes. The average age of visitors is not small.

Although Gu Jianwei is looking forward to more visits from young people, the reality is that Wuxi has a large number of traditional enterprises that want to complete their own "Internet +" transformation, and they have money but cannot find direction.

"Wuxi has deep industrial depth, Industry 4.0 is Wuxi Internet breakthrough opportunity." Gu Jianwei put this sentence on many occasions. When guiding entrepreneurial projects, he will also deliberately guide projects in the direction of integration with local traditional industries.

Xu Bin, director of the Labor and Employment Management Center of Wuxi City Human Resources and Social Security Bureau, said in an interview with the media that 11,900 people enjoyed various entrepreneurship support policies such as opening subsidies and small guaranteed loans in 2014. Among them, Wuxi's characteristics are reflected in the "Internet + traditional industry" model of e-commerce entrepreneurship accounts for a considerable proportion.

There are 11 vocational and technical colleges in this city, but there is only one key university-Jiangnan University. Relying on this only university resource, Jiangnan University National University Science Park, 70% of incubation projects come from Jiangnan University students.

In 2015,50 new start-up enterprises for teachers and students were added in the first three quarters of the Science and Technology Park. This is more than the previous year and a half. But for the whole city of Wuxi, it is far from enough. Only 4 incubators were selected in Wuxi, 14 in Suzhou and 11 in Nanjing.

"In the past two years, Suzhou and Hangzhou's (government) support has also risen. If I had to choose again, it might not be Wuxi." Under the guidance of Gu Jianwei, Liu Fei abandoned the original idea of "smart tourism" and instead focused on "intelligent equipment cloud services", which provide remote equipment monitoring for a large number of traditional enterprises in Wuxi to reduce maintenance costs.

Huang Qian (pseudonym), editor-in-chief of a local magazine in Wuxi, came to Wuxi from Suzhou in the 1990s. "Wuxi at that time", houses were being demolished everywhere, a scene of heat. "We're leaving Suzhou far behind." In her view, the political turmoil over the years has deeply hurt Wuxi's economy.

Yao Hao, who just graduated from the School of Industrial Design of Jiangnan University, is already a second entrepreneur. The current project is an entrepreneurial community and training platform called "Eighteen Creations". But he doesn't want to stay in Wuxi anymore.

A few months ago, the two men, 18 years apart, met. Gu Jianwei was very optimistic about Yao Hao, but Yao Hao had his own plans. "Teacher Gu will definitely have nothing to say in Wuxi. He can handle everything." However, his project is to go to the whole country. Wuxi is not a place where Internet entrepreneurs will fall in love with hard indicators such as capital, information and talents. He didn't think Gu Jianwei could be of much help.

He was also not used to Gu Jianwei's team having to report everything. "The administration is a bit thick."

"Wuxi has no entrepreneurial atmosphere, no talent, no target users." Yao Hao simply registered the company directly in Shanghai and soon planned to withdraw from Wuxi. When it comes to Wuxi's entrepreneurial environment, he has no confidence that "at most some small technology outsourcing companies can survive."

But in Gu Jianwei's view, Wuxi's Internet transformation, like his own career, is just getting started. That is where hope lies. "Everyone believes me because this era has arrived."

To start a semi-public incubator, the pressure of how to survive falls directly on his shoulders as a trader. Moreover, in order to raise capital for the shares, he also carried a lot of debt.

One of the shareholders asked for a success story, one that they had hatched and had been successful. "Even if you dig one up, pack it." Another shareholder echoed.