Young innovator breaks migrant stereotype
Print Edition
When Hu Zhenqiu left his small hometown in Anhui Province 12 years ago, he set off in search of a better life. Little could he have imagined that one day he would be working in Minhang and receive the title of “National Model Worker.”
His path to success was not unlike other migrants from inland rural communities. After graduating from senior high school, he followed many of his classmates to Yangzhou in Jiangsu Province.
“I harbored a dream of achieving big things, but that notion was quashed very quickly in Yangzhou,” said Hu. “I found that city people there didn’t take migrant workers seriously. They thought all we were good for the lowest type of manual labor.”
In 2007, Hu managed to get a job at the Shanghai Shenzhou Vehicle Energy Saving and Environment Protection Co in Minhang, and his life took a turn for the better.
Hu became a welder, working on vacuum sweepers. That was about the extent of his talent. He didn’t even know how to read an engineering plan. But he had curiosity and that prompted him to seek more knowledge.
“I believed learning more things would stead me well in my job,” he said.
He signed up for a beginning business management course, taking classes on weekends. At work, he asked senior colleagues to help him read drawings. He used lunch breaks to study.
“It really wasn’t very easy at the beginning,” he said. “Sometimes I had to ask them to repeat their explanations until I could grasp what they were trying to teach me. I was lucky to have colleagues who were very patient.”
Hu was a frequent visitor to the company’s library, borrowing books on vehicle technology.
“The books were pretty hard because I didn’t have basic knowledge,” said Hu. “I had to study everything from scratch, and it was difficult to stay focused sometimes.”
He read and reread texts, copying down information that he needed to master. At the time, he had no aspirations except to become a better welder.
But opportunity knocks for those who are prepared. In 2009, the company initiated a new bonus system that rewarded employees who came up with new ideas on how the company could operate more efficiently. Invention was encouraged.
Hu and other three colleagues formed a team, trying to improve the inlet function of the sweepers.
“The cleaners we make are for industrial use, which are very different from those used on the streets,” said Hu. “Back then, there was design defect in the inlet, and the defect affected the market price.”
After hard research and experimentation, and failures that almost caused the team to throw in the towel, a breakthrough came.
One evening, on his way home, Hu saw a street sweeper parked curbside.
“Though our products are different from that sweeper, I wondered if maybe there was something to learn from it,” he said. “So I went to have a look.”
His instincts were correct. The design of the inlets on the chassis of the street sweeper struck him like a bolt out of the blue. He rushed back to the company workshop to try out his new idea.
The result was a design that significantly improved the efficiency of the company’s sweepers.
That was a turning point in Hu’s life. No longer content just to be a good welder, his old dreams of achieving something big were revived.
The next two years Hu gave full tilt to his technological creativity. He ended up with seven patents and completed more than 50 projects of technological improvements.
His new assembling technique for the sweepers saved 60 percent of the labor required on each sweeper, saving 5.6 million yuan (US$896,000) a year for the company.
A new model of street sweeper he designed was selected for use on cleaning elevated roadways during the 2010 Shanghai World Expo.
His achievements did not go unnoticed. Hu was named an “Outstanding Migrant Worker of Shanghai,” one of the “Top 10 Worker Inventors” and a “Shanghai Model Worker.”
Looking back to his life, Hu said he is glad that he has been able to break the stereotype of migrant workers being second-class citizens.
“In a society valuing creativity, everything can be changed,” he said.
Hu said he plans to continue his studies. He has signed up for a college courses in his spare time, hoping to receive a diploma some day.
“I think I have found my place in Shanghai, and that will never change now,” he said.
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