1990: Starting from Baojia Street

Liu Hangxing was also very motivated and said immediately, "I'll call Chen Hongheng now. He should be in the office today."

Zhou Yan nodded in agreement, and then Liu Hang made the call.

After a while, the call was connected. Liu Hang exchanged a few simple greetings with Chen Hongheng, and then brought up the topic of work.

Liu Hang roughly said that they had a position that was more suitable for him, but he didn't go into detail, only saying that if he was interested, he could talk to the boss.

After listening to this, Chen Hongheng said decisively: "Of course I am willing."

After leaving his original company, Chen Hongheng opened his own company in Shanghai, but the development was average. Although there was business and he could make a living, it was far from his previous plan.

Now he also recognizes a fact, that is, no matter how much experience he has in this field, it is useless because he still needs resources and connections.

Zhou Yan's studio obviously has both resources and connections, which is a good platform for him.

Therefore, after Liu Hang finished speaking, he agreed to further communication without any hesitation.

Liu Hang was a little surprised to hear Chen Hongheng agree so quickly. He glanced in Zhou Yan's direction and said, "Then I'll let the boss talk to you directly."

"Ok, no problem."

Liu Hang covered the microphone and said to Zhou Yan, "Boss, you can talk to him now."

Zhou Yan nodded, walked over and took the microphone, "Hello, I'm Zhou Yan."

Hearing Zhou Yan's voice, Chen Hongheng smiled and said, "Hello, Mr. Zhou, long time no see."

Zhou Yan and Chen Hongheng have not been in contact since they were in contact because of the collection produced by Shueisha. It has been quite a while indeed.

Zhou Yan didn't exchange pleasantries with Chen Hongheng, and went straight to the point. "Our studio is now planning to set up a literature department to handle the book business for me and several other writers, so we are in urgent need of a talent who understands publishing, and Liu Hang recommended you to me. Since you are willing to work in Yanjing, let's not beat around the bush and discuss the conditions directly. There is not much work in the literature department at this stage, and the salary will definitely not be very high."

Chen Hongheng pondered for a moment and said, "Mr. Zhou, I don't really care about the salary. What I care about more is the purpose of your establishment of this literature department. If you say it is just to handle copyright matters for you and several other writers, then I'm sorry I can't go there."

Zhou Yan is very famous, and he must have a lot of book copyright business. However, no matter how much business he has, the department cannot be expanded by Zhou Yan and a few other writers alone.

If the only goal was to ensure a stable income, there would be no need for Chen Hongheng to go to Yanjing to work. Wouldn't it be better for him to continue running his own company in Shanghai?
Although the company is developing slowly, it is constantly improving and will definitely be better than a sluggish department in the future.

Zhou Yan also understood that Chen Hongheng was very ambitious and looked down upon small-scale actions.

This is understandable. If Chen Hongheng was not an ambitious person, he would not have jumped from his previous company and started his own company.

Zhou Yan thought for a moment and said, "If you are really capable, this department will be handed over to you, and you will decide how it develops. I want to know how much you know about the publishing business. Can you tell me about your specific work experience? In addition, if you really take charge of the literature department, what plans will you have? You can also tell me about it."

Chen Hongheng did not get into Zhou Yan's rhythm. He asked Zhou Yan, "Before we talk about this, Mr. Zhou, I want to ask you first, what is the cooperation model between our studio and writers? Are we acting as writers' agents?"

"Well, probably."

"Mr. Zhou, I'm not trying to discourage you. In China, the functions of a writer's agent are divided among the writer, the publisher, and some copyright agencies. Under such circumstances, the prospects for a writer's agent are not good, let alone setting up a special department. The domestic publishing industry is not mature enough, commercialization is insufficient, and the revenue is not high. It's hard for writers to make money, so why should they share money with us? Mr. Zhou, what do you think are the advantages of our studio? How can we make a breakthrough in such a bad environment?"

Hearing what Chen Hongheng said, Zhou Yan curled the corner of his mouth. This guy was really interesting. He was testing him in his words.

"The domestic environment is indeed not good, but there are always some writers who can make money, and some writers have the need to expand outward. You also know this. The collections that Yu Hua and I have compiled are what you have previously handled. In addition, our studio is involved in music, movies, and TV series. The scope of business is wide, and we have the ability to help writers manage their works. This is our advantage."

Chen Hongheng was silent for a while, then said, "Mr. Zhou, can we talk in person? If possible, I will go to Yanjing to find you."

"No problem." Zhou Yan also wanted to talk to Chen Hongheng face to face.

There are many things that are not convenient to discuss on the phone.

"Okay, then I'll go check out the train tickets and go to Yanjing as soon as possible."

"Well, you can ask Liu Hang to reimburse the travel expenses."

……

After agreeing to meet and talk again, Zhou Yan hung up the phone.

Liu Hang smiled and said, "Boss, are you satisfied with him?"

He knew Zhou Yan. If he was not satisfied with Chen Hongheng, he would never let anyone come to Yanjing.

"Well, it's okay." Zhou Yan nodded.

Although the two of them didn't talk about too many details just now, Zhou Yan could tell that Chen Hongheng did have some knowledge and expertise in book publishing.

There are few people in China who understand book publishing because there are simply no private companies in this field. As Chen Hongheng said, the functions of domestic writers' agents have been broken down.

The most effective substitute for writer's agent is the publishing house.

Most writers will choose to establish a cooperative relationship with a publishing house, and the subsequent book promotion and copyright transactions will also be handled through the publishing house.

Since such talents are rare, Zhou Yan will certainly not give up easily.

Another thing about Chen Hongheng that attracted Zhou Yan was that he also had some understanding of Japan's book market. If their works were to enter Japan in the future, it would be much easier to let Chen Hongheng handle it.

"Boss, when will the new department pass the administration?"

This is the charter of their company. If you want to establish a new department, you must go through the administrative process. After the process is completed, it means that the department is officially established.

After the department is established, personnel, finance and other matters must be coordinated with the new department.

"No rush, let's wait until Chen Hongheng's matter is settled, but you can ask the logistics department to first build two rooms in Building No. 3 to serve as offices for the new department."

"Ok, I see."

After finishing his words, Zhou Yan was about to leave when he suddenly thought of something and turned back to ask, "How is the progress of the short film plan we made earlier?"

"We have prepared everything. We will send out a formal recruitment notice to several schools in three days."

For their studio's first short film, they plan to solicit suitable scripts from various schools.

Because it is aimed at schools, only students are eligible to submit. Once the script is approved, the studio will assist them in shooting the short film.

As for the specific investment amount, it depends on the internal evaluation results of the studio.

The higher the evaluation level, the more investment you can get.

“What’s the deadline?”

"It will take a month in total, and the deadline will be automatically set after one month." "Have the review team members been selected?"

"The selection team consists of eight people, headed by you, Boss, and the others are Huo Jianqi, Wang Xiaoshuai, Li Hong, Xiao Can..."

"Forget about Xiao Can. He is busy with his own movie. Don't assign him other work."

Liu Hang nodded, "There are also Gao Jinwen, Shen Yan and Tian Youliang."

"Well, let's add Liu Qing as well."

"No problem. The eight judges will be divided into two groups, and there will be two rounds of screening in total."

It is impossible for Liu Hang to let Zhou Yan spend a lot of time reading the scripts submitted by the students. He must conduct a round of screening first, and then let Zhou Yan review the scripts after they are published.

"Okay, let's do it."

……

Joey Wong stayed in Yanjing for five or six days, but she was not idle. Most of the time she went to visit the elders with Zhou Yan.

The Zhou family has many good friends in Yanjing. It was inconvenient to get around before, but now that Zhou Yan is in Yanjing, the contacts are gradually increasing, and it would be embarrassing not to visit them during the New Year.

Some even specifically called to invite him over to play, like Wang Junhua's family and Huo Siqi's family, who called to invite Zhou Yan and also invited Joey Wong.

In particular, Aunt Chen Lian from Wang Junhua's family specifically asked that Wang Zuxian must be brought over as a guest.

When Joey Wong left, she was still very resentful and said that she and Zhou Yan did not have a good time together this time.

However, she will not stay in Taiwan for too long this time. She should be able to come to Yanjing again next month. By then, the weather will gradually become warmer and they will be able to go out and play more.

The day after Joey Wong left Yanjing, Chen Hongheng came.

Zhou Yan chatted with Chen Hongheng for more than an hour and finally settled the matter of the Department of Literature.

He will not only come alone, but also bring his team.

But his team is not very large, with only four people in total.

When Chen Hongheng proposed to bring the entire team along, Zhou Yan agreed without any hesitation.

Trust the people you employ, and don't employ them if you don't trust them. Moreover, the Department of Literature had just been established, so it was time to recruit people, and the recruitment was originally supposed to be handled by Chen Hongheng.

Since he can bring people here directly, this step can be skipped. Why not do it?

They were all Chen Hongheng's acquaintances, which saved the team time in getting used to each other and greatly improved efficiency.

The studio was also very efficient. After things were settled, before Chen Hongheng brought his team over, they had already completed the process of setting up the department and arranged the office for the Department of Literature.

When people from other departments of the studio heard that a new department was going to be established, they were very curious. Especially when they heard that the new department was the Literature Department, there was a lot of discussion.

When the TV drama department was established, everyone knew that the new department was mainly responsible for producing TV dramas.

But no one really knows what the Literature Department is going to do, and this new department doesn’t seem to have much connection with other departments.

Moreover, all the people in the new department were recruited from outside, and none of them were transferred from other departments.

Everyone is also speculating when this new department will be able to have business.

The last new department, the TV drama department, has not started work yet.

However, what no one expected was that the new department had already received business before the head of the department arrived, and all subsequent matters regarding Zhou Yan’s new book "Don’t Let Me Go" were handled by the Literature Department.

In addition, the Department of Literature also signed two writers, Yu Hua and Shi Tiesheng.

……

Chen Hongheng was obviously a man of great resolution and action. He went back to Shanghai and settled down briefly. Without caring about the rest of the team, he went straight to Yanjing again with his luggage.

After arriving at Yanjing, he spent half a day communicating with the Human Resources Department and other departments, and then directly took over the business of "Never Let Me Go".

His first job was to contact people from Yenching Publishing House.

Yenching Publishing House sent a special person to liaise with the studio. When the other party learned that Chen Hongheng was the head of the literature department, they were very surprised. They had never thought that Zhou Yan's studio actually had a dedicated literature department.

Then Chen Hongheng's professionalism surprised the other party again. This supervisor obviously knew more than the people in their publishing house.

What surprised the other party the most was that Chen Hongheng was actually considering the subsequent foreign language publication of "Never Let Me Go".

Liu Yang, who was responsible for the liaison with Chen Hongheng, was surprised at Chen Hongheng's professionalism, but he was also somewhat disapproving of his being too "forward-looking".

"Never Let Me Go" has only serialized the first part, and although the response has been good, it is still too far from considering entering the international market.

In his opinion, Chen Hongheng was just talking big.

After chatting with Chen Hongheng for a while, Liu Yang hung up the phone and said to his colleague sitting next to him, "Zhou Yan is indeed a big star. There is a special department responsible for the operation of novel publishing."

"Really? How is their department? Is it professional?"

“The professionalism is good, but it’s a bit too ambitious to start thinking about entering the international market so early.”

"Haha, that's understandable. Employees will definitely flatter their leaders. Besides, Teacher Zhou is already very famous internationally, so it's normal for them to think this way."

"Musical films are different from literature. Zhou Yan's works are very good, but..."

Liu Yang didn't say the following words, but the meaning was very clear. Zhou Yan was indeed famous in foreign countries, but that fame came from music and movies. Could this fame be transferred to literature?

Literature is always different from music and movies.

The person next door smiled and said nothing.

Liu Yang lowered his head and continued the work he had not completed before. However, he had just started working for a while when the president opened the office door and called to him, "Liu Yang, come here."

Hearing the president's call, Liu Yang stood up and walked over with a puzzled look on his face.

As soon as he walked into the office, he heard the president say, "Liu Yang, please contact the printing factory and print 300,000 more copies of Never Let Me Go." (End of this chapter)