Previously, living expenses were directly deposited onto poor students’ campus cards. Now Pei Qian was considering that while this money wasn’t enough to build an elementary school, it would be no problem to provide some targeted resources to existing elementary schools.
For instance, providing each elementary school student with a bag of milk every day wouldn’t be an issue, right?
Or distributing necessities like rice, oil, fish, meat, and vegetables to children from poor families during mid-term and final exams each semester. This way, more impoverished families might change their minds and send their children to school.
Just for these daily necessities, families would have to ensure their children completed the nine years of compulsory education, because if parents wanted to continue receiving these benefits, they needed to make sure their children stayed in school.
Although Handong Province was considered an economically strong province, and Jingzhou City had developed rapidly in recent years, there were still many shockingly impoverished families in many remote rural areas.
Therefore, there was no need to worry about having nowhere to spend the money—no matter how much the charitable budget increased, it would never be too much.
However, Pei Qian hadn’t figured out the other two methods for a spending spree.
One was what kind of cross-cycle project could burn money the fastest, and the other was where to spend the 10 million yuan allowance (converted from 100,000 yuan out of his own pocket) to minimize its impact on which industry.
As he was considering this, there was a knock on the door.
Looking up, he saw Meng Chang had arrived.
“Mr. Pei, you wanted to see me?”
Meng Chang tried hard to read something from Pei Qian’s face but failed.
Meanwhile, Pei Qian was also observing Meng Chang’s expression.
It seemed… Meng Chang’s emotional adjustment was good?
Although his commission had vanished, Meng Chang didn’t seem particularly dejected, which was a good thing.
It seemed that Pei Qian had been overthinking. After so many rounds of tempering and refinement, Meng Chang’s psychological resilience had become as strong as his own, capable of withstanding even greater blows.
But the commission method still needed to be changed.
“I called you here mainly to discuss changing the specific mode of commission with you.”
“This is the new agreement after the changes. Take a look.”
Pei Qian handed over the new agreement that had been prepared earlier.
Meng Chang was stunned for a moment before reaching out to take it.
After briefly flipping through it, his eyes widened slightly, showing a surprised expression.
“This…”
The new agreement had many words, but the actual changes weren’t many.
Simply put, it gave Meng Chang a “revival armor.”
The new agreement stipulated that if within a month, before the 15th, Meng Chang’s first promotional plan failed and he didn’t receive a commission, then he could continue to work on a second plan. The second plan wouldn’t be affected by the previous one, except that the maximum commission would be reduced to 100,000 yuan.
Of course, if the first promotional plan didn’t fail, everything would proceed as before, with a maximum commission of 200,000 yuan at the end of the month.
Taking this month’s situation as an example, Meng Chang was originally supposed to work on “The Successor,” but its popularity had exploded.
According to the original agreement, no matter what he did in the second half of the month, the result would be the same. Because “The Successor” was so popular, no matter what he did for the next project, it would be impossible to reverse the overall evaluation, and thus he wouldn’t get any commission.
But according to the new agreement, it didn’t matter if “The Successor” exploded in popularity. He could still create a new promotional plan in the second half of the month.
As long as this plan didn’t have any effect or generate popularity, he could still get a commission, although the maximum amount would be reduced to 100,000 yuan.
Pei Qian’s consideration was that this “second chance” would give Meng Chang an extra life. On one hand, it would prevent Meng Chang from ending up with nothing at the end of the month, and on the other hand, it would make the best use of talent and resources.
Under the original agreement, after the failed promotion of “The Successor,” Meng Chang would just lie idle at home with nothing to do for half a month, which would certainly be a huge loss for both Meng Chang and Pei Qian.
Meanwhile, as Meng Chang read the agreement, his mind was racing, trying to understand Mr. Pei’s intentions.
“This new agreement undoubtedly makes it easier for me to get a commission.”
“The upper limit hasn’t changed, but the lower limit has greatly improved.”
“But what does this mean? Could it be that Mr. Pei saw how difficult it was for me to earn a commission, so he’s lowering the difficulty for me?”
“That can’t be right.”
“Although I didn’t get a commission for ‘The Successor,’ I maximized the Pei-style propaganda method with my operations. Mr. Pei couldn’t have missed that, could he?”
“Now it’s not actually difficult for me to get a commission, so why would he want to lower the difficulty for me?”
“Hmm, there must be some other reason!”
Meng Chang began to brainstorm.
“Previously, if a promotional project failed at the beginning of the month, I would slack off for the rest of the month. But according to the new agreement, if the plan fails at the beginning of the month, I can still create another plan in the middle of the month.”
“Is this hinting that I should take on more responsibility now?”
“Combined with the fact that he previously gave me the authority to allocate promotional funds, Mr. Pei’s attitude becomes very clear!”
Meng Chang understood—this meant Mr. Pei valued him even more!
Before, when Meng Chang didn’t have a good grasp of the Pei-style propaganda method, Mr. Pei only gave him one project per month.
After all, with limited abilities, it was already good enough to do one project well.
Even if he failed early, Mr. Pei wouldn’t assign new projects, which was probably to give him enough time to study and reflect properly.
But now that Mr. Pei saw Meng Chang had made significant progress and could easily handle two projects in a month, he changed the terms of the agreement to allow him to earn more by working more!
Although doing two plans meant an increased workload, Meng Chang wasn’t alone—he was now the head of the advertising and marketing department with a group of subordinates.
He only needed to come up with ideas, and his subordinates would execute them. This amount of work wouldn’t tire him out.
Moreover, this meant Meng Chang’s application of the Pei-style propaganda method could be less rigid.
Previously, he had to time everything, ensuring that popularity didn’t explode before the end of the month, but would explode the next month.
But often plans couldn’t keep up with changes. Sometimes popularity had to explode by the end of the month, resulting in a halved commission.
What if, due to various reasons, popularity had to be ignited by mid-month? Wouldn’t the commission be gone?
Although Meng Chang didn’t care about this commission anymore, clearly Mr. Pei did care—he didn’t want to see Meng Chang work for nothing.
So, with this new agreement, Meng Chang could more freely choose when to ignite popularity. Earning commissions and generating popularity would no longer be completely conflicting goals; he could try to balance both.
In short, this was a reward from Mr. Pei for seeing Meng Chang’s progress in learning the Pei-style propaganda method.
The game had been upgraded!
Realizing this, Meng Chang was very happy and handed the agreement back: “Alright, Mr. Pei, I completely agree, of course!”
Pei Qian took the agreement and, seeing Meng Chang’s attitude, nodded silently.
Yes, that’s right, I also thought you would happily agree.
Because you absolutely have no reason to refuse!
“Well, then there’s nothing else. Go back and prepare the plan for the second half of the month.”
“Of course, if you feel tired and don’t want the commission for the second half of the month and want to rest, you can choose not to do it. This isn’t a mandatory requirement.”
Meng Chang nodded quickly: “Yes, Mr. Pei, I understand.”
He had to admit, Mr. Pei was quite considerate of his subordinates.
Meng Chang was about to leave when he suddenly remembered that he had a question to ask, so he stopped.
“Oh… Mr. Pei, I have a question I want to ask.”
Pei Qian looked at him: “Go ahead.”
After hesitating slightly, Meng Chang said, “Hypothetically, I’m just saying hypothetically, if one day I pay off all my debts, can I still stay at Tenda and continue as the head of the advertising and marketing department?”
Pei Qian was stunned for a moment, slightly confused.
What did Meng Chang mean? Why would he ask such a question?
Could it be that Tenda was such a good place for him? Did he want to stay that badly?
Oh, I understand—it’s about earning more commission, right?
Clearly, a monthly commission of 200,000 yuan was quite a substantial income for Meng Chang.
So far, Meng Chang had already tasted the sweetness of commissions.
Working at Tenda, he could earn high commissions just by creating reverse promotional plans. The working hours were also extremely flexible—he could come when he wanted to come and not come when he didn’t want to. Where else could he find such a good job?
Therefore, Meng Chang must have appreciated how good Tenda was and didn’t want to leave.
His previous ambitions had probably been completely worn away; now he just wanted to retire comfortably at Tenda.
The reason he asked this question was mainly because he was afraid that once he earned enough commission to pay off his debts, he would have to leave, and then he would never find such a relaxed and comfortable job again.
So he wanted to stay and continue earning commissions easily even after paying off his debts.
After considering for a moment, Pei Qian said, “If you’ve paid off your debts, of course there’s no need for you to stay at Tenda.”
Saying there was no need was actually saying “don’t stay at Tenda.”
Pei Qian’s words had two layers of meaning.
The first layer was: Meng Chang, you’re so capable, since you’ve paid off your debts, of course you should go out and make a comeback. Even if you might temporarily feel like being a slacker now, someone like you will definitely become ambitious once your debts are cleared. By then, this slacker mentality will probably change.
So, I definitely won’t keep you, because with your personality, I couldn’t keep you even if I wanted to.
The second layer was: if Meng Chang really paid off his debts, then Tenda wouldn’t need him anymore.
Why?
Because by the time Meng Chang had earned so much commission, it would mean Tenda had already done many failed projects and burned a lot of promotional funds. By that time, Pei Qian would have already achieved his goal and become the richest man through losses!
By then, Pei Qian would be financially free and retired.
In other words, Pei Qian wouldn’t need to think about how to lose money anymore, and Tenda would develop normally.
So what would Meng Chang be needed for?
Therefore, the day Meng Chang paid off his debts would basically be the day he and Tenda parted ways, because neither would need each other anymore.
Meng Chang was shocked—Mr. Pei’s attitude couldn’t be clearer: Once your debts are paid off, you can leave!