The Fiery Era: Becoming an Industrial Giant

Chapter 71 Private Funds Donate Again to Start Renovation Project [Seeking Monthly Tickets]

"College dormitories and factory buildings? They really should be built, otherwise the expansion of the factory will be affected."

After listening, Zhou Zhiqiang nodded and said, "This time, we should build at least three or four new factory buildings. If you ask me, we might as well just build a new factory nearby."

Our factory will definitely become the number one agricultural machinery equipment factory in North China, and sooner or later it will become a factory with tens of thousands of employees.

Their factory isn't in the city center; it's even a bit near the suburbs. Otherwise, Zhou Zhiqiang wouldn't ride his bike for half an hour to work every day and let the college students who come to help go home early.

There are still some places nearby that can be used to build a branch factory, and they are not far away. If their technical department wants to go to the branch factory, it is only a seven or eight-minute journey.

"The procedures for setting up a branch factory are too complicated. I estimate that we will wait until the production volume of small tractors increases before we start applying for it, since we need to communicate with the Municipal Bureau of Industry and the District Government."
However, we'll have to build a branch factory sooner or later. The number of workers at YTO is already twice ours, and we'll increase that number as well.

After a pause, Section Chief Lü lowered his voice slightly and continued, "Zhiqiang, do you know why our factory decided to build dormitories so quickly this time?"

Zhou Zhiqiang asked, "Isn't it so that the aid workers can get some rest?"

Section Chief Lü waved his hand and said, "Are we going to build dormitories just for a hundred or so people? Besides, they won't stay for long, at most a year or so."

If the factory director and party secretary build dormitories for workers from other factories just to save face, then our factory's workers will blockade the factory office building when they find out.

"What's that for?"

"It's because of the money from Deputy Director An. You know our factory's financial situation. If it weren't for the extra support, we would have been arguing for a long time over just one dormitory building, and the higher-ups might not have allocated any funds."

Section Chief Lü said with a smile, "With a wave of his hand, he contributed another 70,000 yuan to support the factory in building a dormitory."

"Zhiqiang, you didn't see it. The Party Secretary and the factory director were dumbfounded after hearing that. Deputy Factory Director An has already taken out nearly 130,000 yuan, almost using up his entire year's dividends."

"Zhiqiang, what do you think he's planning to do?"

What to do? Just follow Rongjia's example, what else can we do!
Their vision, influence, status, and everything else are inferior to the Rong family's.

Since that's the case, who else should we follow if not the Rong family? Should we follow others and go to the island? Or go to other countries? When it comes to exams, we definitely need to copy the students' homework.

Don't joke around. Moving the whole family at this time is not an easy task. You could say that moving out is like being skinned alive, and landing is like being skinned alive again.

"Section Chief, don't think too much about it. Someone is willing to pay, which benefits the factory and all the workers. We should just be happy."

After Zhou Zhiqiang finished speaking, he suddenly thought of Wu Xiaojun and Zhao Tiandong, whom he was supposed to bring to the factory, so he asked, "Section Chief, where is the collective dormitory to be built?"

"About a hundred meters east of the station, there's a run-down alley over there, I guess that's where it is."

Section Chief Lü casually remarked, "I reckon our factory will be preparing meals for dinner from now on, but the workers will probably have to buy their own meal tickets. It'll still be cheaper than eating on their own, though. We don't need to worry about water or coal."

"That's quite close. By the way, section chief, I've already found candidates for my two job openings."

Zhou Zhiqiang then brought up the matter: "Those from my hometown in the countryside have all helped me before. Is there any way to get them to come to the factory earlier?"

"If others ask, then yes, but if it's Zhiqiang, then it definitely is."

After smiling, Section Chief Lü continued, "You bring the people over, and then I'll take them to the personnel department to work as temporary workers in the factory."

When we officially start hiring, we'll convert temporary workers into permanent employees. It just means they'll have fewer months of seniority and internship time, and their wages will be a few dollars less. Temporary workers get twelve dollars a month, while permanent employees, as apprentices, get eighteen dollars and fifty cents a month—a difference of six dollars.

However, twelve yuan is enough for an adult's expenses in the city, and temporary workers can also buy meal tickets at the factory.

"Okay, I'll have them come to the factory in a while. Thank you, Section Chief."

"It's a small thing."

After discussing the job openings, Zhou Zhiqiang inquired about the support from other factories, and then took his lunchbox to the canteen for a meal.

Zhou Zhiqiang was delayed in the office for a while, and when he came out it was already lunchtime. He knew that if he rushed over now, he would have to wait in line, so he didn't rush over.

There's enough food now, so even if we eat later, we won't leave him any soup or broth.

After queuing up and getting his food, Zhou Zhiqiang found an empty seat and started eating.

Winter melon and radish stew with meat, although it only has some meat bits, at least it tastes like meat, and the winter melon and radish both taste good.

Zhou Zhiqiang was quite satisfied with the meal; it tasted much better than the old communal dishes.

As lunch was almost over, Zhou Zhiqiang suddenly remembered something. It seemed that the logistics department often purchased some unplanned supplies. It would be great if he could help buy some cured meat.

Cured meat products are hard to buy. Zhou Zhiqiang went to the pigeon market many times, but only bought less than two jin in total.

The purchasing department often deals with unplanned supplies, and they definitely have more connections than he does when he goes to the pigeon market. Zhou Zhiqiang doesn't plan to buy much either; now that his wife is pregnant, he wants to store enough cured meat for her to give birth.

However, Zhou Zhiqiang should talk to Li Zhaotian, the director of logistics, about this. He felt that Li Zhaotian was a deputy section chief and might give him some face.

After finishing his meal, Zhou Zhiqiang returned to the technical department to continue refining the machine tool blueprints.

Once the lunch break was over, he led the technical and maintenance teams to the workshop to disassemble the machine tools.

It wasn't about completely dismantling the machines, but rather doing the preliminary work for modifying the machine tools. Moreover, he was the one in the technical department who knew these machine tools best, so Zhou Zhiqiang had to direct the work.

"This is our previous machine tool, and these drawings are for the new machine tool. What we need to do now is to add multi-functional features to avoid the clamping process."
However, this only applies to this type of machine tool; other machine tools have their own modification methods.
And these gears and bearings—the precision must be extremely high. Anything I'm unsure about, I'll have to send to an eighth-grade technician for machining. Even the slightest deviation is unacceptable. If they don't meet my standards during inspection, they'll have to be sent back for rework!

After assigning tasks to the machine tool modification team, Zhou Zhiqiang had them work in batches.

When the afternoon came, Zhou Zhiqiang directed the movers to continue moving the required machine tools.

However, Zhou Zhiqiang felt that there was no need to directly modify some of the old machine tools. He suggested repairing them and selling them to small factories, since they wouldn't be needed in their factory anyway.

Their factory can place orders directly with the First Machinery Plant to produce a batch of specific machine tools; Zhou Zhiqiang has machine tool blueprints, but it requires some effort from the First Machinery Plant.

The factory is currently short of funds. Once a batch of small hand tractors is produced and sold to increase the factory's profits and make the factory richer, then we can start ordering new special-purpose machine tools.

　Asking for a monthly ticket!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)