The prosperity of a company depends on its people. On November 1, 2017, a staff meeting of the headquarters was held by CIMC Vehicles (Group) Co., Ltd. in Shenzhen. It is announced on the meeting that the “one office and the three centers,” namely the  CTO Office and Modular & Digital Design Center, Production & Automation Center,and Digital Business Process Center under its umbrella, are established. This means that the company has taken further actions on the organizational transformation in its upgrading to digital technologies.

While making proactive planning on global digitalization, CIMC Vehicles also steps up its efforts in nurturing outstanding specialists to address the severe shortage of “craftsmen excelling in digital technologies” in the future and maintain its world-leading role in the next industrial revolution.

Mr. David Li, General Manager of CIMC Vehicles, said that science and technology constituted a primary productive force and digital technologies were “the engine for us to realize profitability in the future.”

During the first three quarters of 2017, CIMC Group continued its fast growth regarding road transport vehicles with the revenue of RMB 14.655 billion, increased by 40.01% year on year. Such sustained growth of revenue is realized through “two transformations,” namely the shift to a digital company and to an agile organization. “This is an agile organization as well as a high-end one with the technical director at a level-10 position equaling to the chief commander of an army. The job of the director is to select the subject for innovation, coordinate and give instructions, and help engineers achieve spiral development,” said Mr. David Liabout this newly created organization.

“We have chosen people born in the 1980s like Derek Li, Alex Shu, and Harvey Zhang as team leaders. This move has demonstrated the trust we have in our people and our determination to allow the young specialists to exploit their talent and shoulder the mission of digital upgrading.” Shen Jianwen said that “We have the confidence to develop this organization into a ‘military academy’ which constantly provides interdisciplinary personnel to our management and better support the rolling out of our global operating strategy.”

CIMC Vehicles had a difficult start for its digital transformation. Harvey Zhang , who has been back from Japan, once felt “a bit frustrated and confused.” After much deliberation, he decided to remain at CIMC Vehicles. “It is my original aspiration to serve my country with technologies and the development of ‘Made in China.’” He said that “Our generation must take on our responsibility and dare to dream. I will use my learning and experience to do something practical for China’s manufacturing industry.”

Digitalization is increasingly the direction for the development of the manufacturing industry in the future. “Innovation and upgrading are enabled by transformation. Without the transformation of the organization, your company will definitely decline or be destroyed.” Mr. David Li argued that the organizational structure and culture of CIMC Vehicles created in the traditional manufacturing industry must be transformed.

“We have been managing our technical team in an administrative way for quite some time. Our technical personnel develop projects in a top-down manner with each team member keeping to his/her own position and focusing only on his/her job but not the result. Over time, they will be increasingly isolated and only work to amuse themselves and posture before their supervisors and peers but not for the growth on the market. Besides, the technical personnel at the headquarters literally have no contact with the plants and there is hardly any cross-divisional and cross-business cooperation on projects. Therefore, our technical team gradually turns into something like a pool of stagnant water. To overcome the cultural obstacles of the company and effectively drive forward the transformation and upgrading, we must make the stagnant water flow first and restructure our organization.”

Mr. David Li stressed that the adjustment of the organizational structure meant that the leadership has to be passed on and improved. This will be greatly helpful for the company to enhance productivity and the employees to find the opportunity for personal development and salary increase. He said, “With the expansion of our business, we are in an urgent need of interdisciplinary technical specialists and management personnel for our team.”

 “We still need more time to build an agile organization. However, we have realized gradual progress and involved more and more colleagues into our action so that they can have greater opportunity for personal development and become the backbone of the team. We hope that, within three to five years, we can have a number of elite personnel who can take over the positions above Grade 7 in our management team at the headquarters and our core subsidiaries,” added Flora Mao , HR Manager.