Chen Shiling, General Manager of Shanghai Yongqing Housing

As the general manager of Shanghai Yongqing Housing, Chen Shiling is the witness of Yongqing's growth. It has been more than 20 years since he joined Yongqing Housing in 1991. He believes that the reason why Yongqing can stand out in such a competitive real estate intermediary industry in Shanghai depends on the quality of service. The service quality is ultimately achieved by employees, so in the final analysis, it is also due to Yongqing's establishment of a unique talent selection and employment strategy.

Only newcomers

"As far as Yongqing Housing's employment philosophy is concerned, Yongqing likes to employ new people without intermediary experience, and must have a college degree or above. At present, 80% of Shanghai Yongqing's salesmen have college degrees or above, and 50% have bachelor degrees." Chen Shiling explained that the original intention of employing college students is to improve the quality of intermediary practitioners as a whole, Secondly, college students are relatively good at management, and their ability to accept and comprehend is relatively good in training.

In Taiwan before, Yongqing, like many intermediary enterprises in the mainland, only focused on personal experience. Chen Shiling said, "In the early days, the housing agency market in Taiwan was not very standardized, and people didn't attach much importance to brands, which is similar to the situation in the mainland now. But the good times are not long. In the hot market, this extensive model is still feasible. Consumers don't care much about your service, as long as they find a house. However, in the downturn of the market, customers will be more picky and will continue to meet more and higher demands of customers. "

At the end of the 1980s and the beginning of the 1990s, Taiwan's bubble economy emerged, with house prices plummeting by more than 30% in half a year, transaction volumes shrinking sharply, and real estate intermediaries closing down shop in large quantities; Some subsidiaries of the consortium and individual operated subsidiaries were seriously injured in the recession, withdrew from the market, and the market shrank rapidly; However, companies that previously emphasized corporate brand image and service quality have grown against the trend and become prominent in the industry.

In 1991, Yongqing made a great adjustment in talent strategy in a timely manner, and began to recruit college students who had no work experience. The purpose was to improve the employment threshold from the source, change the market's impression of the low quality of intermediary practitioners, and establish its own brand.

However, with such employment logic, Yongqing must bear the risk of no performance of new employees. First of all, college and undergraduate students have high starting salary requirements. Chen Shiling said that at present, the base salary of employees recruited by Yongqing Mainland is no less than 3000 yuan (RMB, the same below), which is nearly 1000 yuan higher than that of peers. The starting salary for a salesperson who graduates from a university in Taiwan is 10000 yuan. Secondly, because the newcomers have no experience and ability, the company needs to pay for the early expenses. As the first batch of college students recruited after the personnel adjustment, Chen Shiling still remembers that he did not open his first order until six months after the company.

"Of course, college students are not always employed, but also depends on the concept of service. Affinity and communication ability are also very important. Affinity can make customers feel like a spring breeze, and good communication ability can help customers trust your professional ability."

In Yongqing, newcomers usually receive intensive training for three months. The content includes the teaching of housing agency courses, tutoring of seniors, demonstration drills and discussion of various topics; In addition, there is the training of management ability to cultivate the talent of management cadres; In the future, if you are promoted to director or store manager, there will be extra advanced professional training.

Since entering the mainland in 2005, Yongqingda has rented several floors of Grade A office building in Xujiahui Business District in Shanghai for seven years, and the rent paid every year is millions of RMB. "Most of the area is used to train employees", which highlights Yongqing's emphasis on introducing corporate culture and strengthening service training at the cost of money.

It is difficult for the same industry to find new comers

"We hope that the incoming colleagues can agree with Yongqing's concept, because technology can be educated, but the concept determines whether you agree with this company or not.". "This is why we choose employees who have no intermediary work experience, because they are like a piece of white paper. They will be what we render."

In terms of management style, Yongqing absorbed Japanese team culture and service spirit. Chen Shiling introduced that Yongqing's corporate culture is gratitude, sharing and teamwork. "We don't advocate individual heroism and individual combat, but we prefer team combat. In an equal and harmonious environment, employees will have more room to play their subjective initiative." Yongqing's internal employees implement the "seniority and brotherhood system". When new people come in, seniors will help each other selflessly, and businesses will also help each other, without any interest involved.

Colleagues will not fight with each other in order to win customers. A harmonious team environment will help to alleviate the work pressure of employees to a certain extent. Chen Shiling said, "The pressure of real estate agents is more than that of ordinary business people.". The reason is that the amount of buying and selling houses is much more than that of other goods. The buyers and sellers are careful and hope to get their own benefits. The employees of housing agencies are sandwiched in the middle, as if sandwiched biscuits are very uncomfortable. Especially when the market is not good, the salesmen are depressed, and the business pressure is also great. In order to help employees release pressure, the company will also occasionally give them a holiday, organize outings or other recreational activities.

It is this loose, free and shared corporate culture concept of the company that prevents colleagues from colluding with each other due to mutual competition, so that other intermediary companies can't find the right ones.

"Every month, there are cases where employees refuse to accept red envelopes from customers. Once, there was a customer who wanted to give the employee a red envelope of 20000 yuan because our employees helped him sell 100000 yuan more. If the employee didn't accept the red envelope, he would buy a gift instead. Even a chocolate bar can't be accepted by employees, which is the company's rule."

"Service beyond customers' imagination is always Yongqing's pursuit of service." With good service reputation, Yongqing has established its own brand image in Shanghai's real estate intermediary industry. In 2012, Yongqing Housing, with only 37 stores, ranked sixth in the ranking of real estate intermediaries in Shanghai.

Insist on stable direct marketing

It has been more than 7 years since Yongqing Housing came to Shanghai for development in 2005. It has experienced acclimatization when it first entered the mainland. "The processes and systems are different, and even the transfer procedures are different. The difference in customers' consumption habits makes mainland consumers buy both good and poor services, which makes Yongqing, a company that emphasizes service, suffer a lot and its costs remain high." Chen Shiling said that the sales service fees of Taiwan's real estate agents are six points (6% of the sales amount), while the mainland only two points (2%), The differences in charging standards and the maturity of the consumption environment have forced Yongqing to make adjustments based on the actual consumption environment of the mainland, cancel some service projects that have been quite mature in Taiwan, and make prudent exploration in following the customs in Rome and emphasizing brand service characteristics. ".

In the past seven years, the mainland real estate industry has experienced several ups and downs of regulation policies. "Due to the differences in the institutional environment, the mainland market is affected by government policies at a fast and obvious speed, and the policies are the same regardless of size. The situation that the policy dominates the market is still the biggest challenge for us to operate the mainland market so far. We have to be careful when formulating development strategies. When the market is booming, many peers rush to expand blindly. Once the market declines, they shut down in large quantities. "

Chen Shiling believed that such a tidal fluctuation mode of operation would do great harm to both enterprises and industries. "Yongqing will not expand on a large scale with the improvement of the market, nor will it close its stores when the market is depressed." At present, all of Yongqing's 37 stores are directly operated. Chen Shiling said that the reason for not operating the franchise system, on the one hand, is that it is difficult for local franchisees to regulate and control the service level, and whether they can receive payment after joining is also worrying. On the other hand, according to the laws and regulations of the mainland, if a franchise store goes wrong, the headquarters must bear joint and several liabilities. In addition, the amount of real estate transaction funds is huge, and there are many risk factors. Therefore, Yongqing has always emphasized the performance of a single store, stuck to the principle of "prefer lack to abuse", steadily focused on the development of direct stores, and did a good job in service and quality. Even if the performance of the store is not very good, Yongqing will not simply close it, but will carefully find out the reasons, analyze and improve, and give a loose turnaround time.

Despite many challenges and difficult survival, Chen Shiling is still optimistic about the future prospects of the mainland housing market. He believes that the mainland real estate intermediary industry chain is not yet mature and is still in the primary extensive stage. The real estate intermediary has not yet formed a strong brand effect, which is a good opportunity for Taiwan's intermediary operators who already have brands. "With the maturity and development of the market, mainland consumers will gradually improve the service and quality requirements of real estate intermediaries, and then Yongqing's brand effect will be highlighted."

"Now it is more important for us to do a good job in talent training. Only when we have enough talent reserves will we consider expanding our scale. This is responsible for the company, but also for customers."

According to relevant statistics, the scale of real estate intermediaries in Shanghai has reached tens of thousands in 2012, with hundreds of thousands of employees. Facing the highly competitive real estate intermediary market in Shanghai, Yongqing, with only 37 stores and a team of brokers of less than 400 people, was able to break through the tight encirclement, ranking the sixth in the single store score, making the industry look up with admiration. How did Yongqing do it?

Japanese Service Culture VS European and American Performance Concept

Chen Shiling believes that Taiwanese enterprises have different management models and strategies due to their different industries. Japanese style management, focusing on team decision-making and collective responsibility; Emphasizing seniority and mentoring to lead new people; Exquisite service, strive to move customers; Market development tends to be conservative and prudent; At present, such management mode is mainly concentrated in the service industry and traditional manufacturing industry. Yongqing is a typical enterprise that inherits and develops Japanese management style.

American style management pays attention to individual decision-making, and individualism is prominent; Emphasize ability but ignore seniority; Pay attention to performance, efficiency and competitive awareness; Market development is more adventurous and radical; This kind of management mode is currently widely used in emerging industries such as electronic high-tech.