Oriental Entrepreneur: Learning and thinking Zhang Bangxin's dream and greed

Three years ago, Zhang Bangxin was 30 years old, and someone especially seriously complimented him, "You look really young, about 40 years old?" "In the education industry for ten years, I am too old." He sighed. For him, the education industry is a very tired, very boil people of the industry. Ten years of immersion in the education industry revolutionized him and reshaped him.

Zhang Bangxin thinks he is a greedy person, can not do very detached not to see the stock price. "I am willing to teach students, and can not fully do the public good, and finally did an education enterprise." The first is not great, the second is unselfish, and the third is greed. ”

However, he also believes that his greed only stay in the enterprise to the level of big. "From my personal point of view, I do not want to learn and think about the market, at least not so fast, I hope that everything is ready enough to go on." But there are always some power to promote the early listing of enterprises, I can not block the people's resources. In fact, the listing is not the best choice for educational enterprises. ”

October 2010 study and think of the market, the management team is the youngest, the first team, the moment no two, very eye-catching.

But according to his idea, the ideal is to learn and think of a small and beautiful business, income and profit are good, moderate growth, very healthy. This coincides with Mr Yu's idea.

Mr Yu said to Zhang Bangxin: "The detours we have made, the mistakes we make, the loss of our eating, you will all experience as you grow up."

The pain of the Olympiad

Under the Beijing Municipal Commission of Education documents strictly prohibited Olympiad scores and small rise at the beginning of the hook, the study and think of the stock price fell. It is well known that learning and thinking is the start of the Olympiad. Some people look back on the history of the past, found that it is learning and thinking through the Austrian success of the number of Olympic models to promote the model, so that the enterprise in many private training institutions have sprung up.

Purely from the perspective of marketing, learning and thinking is a success, but in the public opinion, the training company started with the Olympic number is always with a bit of complex emotions: on the one hand, such courses can help students to enter the key secondary school, but the number of children and parents have been miserable.

It is impossible to have a strong demand for the Olympiad exam if there is no current small ascending mode which combines the admission of Beijing with the key secondary schools. Industry insiders said, even in today's education Commission has expressly banned the Olympic number, there are still some training institutions will be Olympiad training for the name of the continued to do. The uncertainty over the reform of the school-choosing mechanism has also left parents with a wait-and-see attitude.

The event of a halt to the Olympiad may be quite abrupt, but Zhang Bangxin's statement learned that the process of going to Olympiad was initiated three years ago.

Since 2009, there have been three curriculum reforms, the first time is the ICS system from the research and development to the on-line process, the study thought carried on the teaching research topic reform; the second was a year ago, the idea of education was changed; the third was to change the course syllabus after the Olympiad was halted, The off related to the Olympiad, complex problems, super problems, strange problems, this kind of super topic all removed.

"The direction of the overall reform is to make the curriculum more lively and interesting, and in the long run it will help to develop the children's learning ability and be useful to their children's future." "Zhang Bangxin said. In his opinion, the Olympiad belongs to such a kind of question, the knowledge point is isolated, the accumulation of knowledge does not have the effect to this kind of question, has not studied the words University professor also not to do. "We're going to take it out because it's going to hurt students ' self-confidence," he said. ”

"Does the Forbidden Olympics have any impact on us?" I tell you the truth, there is a certain degree of impact, but this impact is our curriculum reform brought, not because of the number of Olympiad, we suffered a certain loss. After the course reform, the parents who are unable to accept is gone, and the acceptable one remains. ”

Although the Beijing Municipal Education Commission will be a few years to stop the Olympic number of attempts, but from the effect of the calendar year, the Austrian number of training has become increasingly fierce trend. However, in this game, the capital prestigious Olympic training institutions Ren Wah School was written off, which makes all the training institutions are haunted.

"Learning to think Early Olympiad did well, but after doing well we were buckled up with an Olympian hat." Austrian number accounted for only 10% of our entire business, the positioning of the study and thought is the primary and secondary school training, characteristics of primary and secondary school science training. Just because of the history of the Olympiad to do a very successful call Us Olympiad number of institutions, make us very depressed. ”

Along with the curriculum reform, it is to learn and think about the change of educational ideas.

Mission Change

In the early stages, the mission of learning and thinking is very simple: the achievement of students ' dreams. "More tactful, in fact, is to help children test key secondary schools." "Zhang Bangxin said," Later we changed, think just help the child test key Middle School This is too vulgar, so from the study to the learning itself, is to make the process of learning simpler, more relaxed, happier, more efficient. ”

Last year's study and thought proposed that the mission change to "stimulate interest, cultivate habits, shape character", not only useful for further studies, but also to give children the benefit of lifelong education.

But it is difficult to really achieve this. Zhang Bangxin Remember very clearly, 2005 years of study and think of two classes, entrance examination classes and quality classes, the examination class reported 500 people, all the teachers are lined up, and quality class only reported 5 people. When the 5 students graduated, Zhang Bangxin gave each of them an award-winning certificate to encourage them.

"Many parents say they want comprehensive education, but when they do they have to see the results and they really value their children's studies and exams." Zhang Bangxin understood this point very well.

Almost all of the people who train the education industry have a characteristic that they rarely use the word "training" and are more willing to mention "education". The same is true of Zhang Bangxin.

"Some people despise us, you are a training organization, you are to increase the burden on students." But our own hearts think we are right to do this, and then do it. You look at teaching and research, there are not many training institutions in China like us to invest tens of millions of in teaching research and development. ”

Zhang Bangxin think that learning and thinking is a training institution, but also an educational dream of training institutions. "Even if I am positioned as an education, they say you are a training company and say so much." We still want to make a difference in education and hope to lead this direction. We are not Lei Feng, not do not collect money public welfare organization. But it does not mean that we cannot have an educational dream. We hope that the spread of knowledge between human beings can be rapid, efficient and convenient, and not to let students suffer in class. ”

One of the major characteristics of learning is the number of teachers from prestigious schools, of which more than 300 people graduated from Tsinghua University. "These Peking University, Tsinghua people still have a little sense of responsibility and mission, at the age of 20 or 30 so young decided to do the education, and many people are ready for the rest of their lives to do this thing, they must be a little ideal, to pursue something." ”

"A lot of people in the team want to spend their lives, often talking about tutorial schools and not being silly," he said. They said that when I was a child ten years ago, you taught me silly. ”

The idea is that as long as the curriculum is not over two-thirds, the unconditional refund system will return nearly 200 million a year. But he was steadfast in his heart, because he did not want to take advantage of others.

Manage marginal

In contrast to other education and training enterprises, learning and thinking in the expansion of the cautious attitude.

Zhang Bangxin concludes that this is to pursue the balance of results with a process imbalance. He thinks he can only consider one thing, between performance growth and teaching quality can only be two choice. Pay attention to the growth, the result will not grow, and pay attention to teaching quality can bring good reputation and reconciliation performance.

Perhaps this conservative attitude stems from the learning and thinking of the decision-making mechanism, the learning and thinking of the Executive Committee is composed of five people, each one vote to decide all major events. This lowers the speed of doing things, but prevents a person from patting his head and making no big mistake on a number of major issues.

Zhang Bangxin Frankly, in the expansion to the local, there is no strategic layout. Depends only on the faculty. However, according to Bao's description, expansion still has some skill. Because learn to think earlier use the website forum to do the promotion, to now the website has accumulated a large number of users, e degrees monthly clicks up to 3000多万次. Learning and thinking will send people to stare at the site of the user's complaints, once a certain place to complain and ask the voice of particularly many, then learn and think about preparing the team, first to kill into the city.

Even so, the pace of expansion in learning is slow in the industry. Only four cities have been expanded in the past year, and 13 teaching points will be closed this year. And some enterprises in the same industry can even expand to 100 cities.

But Zhang Bangxin only concerned about the company's health index, the industry's data is called "renewal rate." Not only do not have good teachers do not open the point, if the number of enrollment is full, but students are constantly changing, then can be inferred to rely on learning and thinking of the brand's unhealthy expansion.

"We in Zhengzhou, a class reported 15 people, the time to return to class 25, and 10 will not come in, then we consider expanding." But if one person is missing, or a group of students is changed, it will not expand. "Bao said.

But Zhang Bangxin also admits that he is still concerned about growth in the actual business process. "It means I still have greed, and greed, and I can't put my attention on growth entirely." ”

Because the education industry products with "non-standard" characteristics, the sale of people's services and McDonald's sales of hamburgers are not the same, can not expand indefinitely, because people are difficult to standardize, reach a certain boundary will slow down after. How broad the border can be depends on the company's ability to manage.

Zhong Zhixin, a U.S. stock analyst, has two types of expansion in the education industry, which is typical of both education and learning. Learning large trend in the national rapid distribution point, the first business to do to improve the teacher conditions, and grinding brand. While the study and thinking is not sure to sell, must be fully satisfied with the teaching conditions to open a point. Both models have their pros and cons, but the pattern of learning and thinking is clearly less risky.

"I can't stand in the way of other people's dreams and say this is a bad business." But the fact is, education is a seemingly beautiful industry, it seems to be profiteering, but in fact it is not such a thing. "Zhang Bangxin said. "Capital overestimated the ability of the education industry to reap the benefits, and it was easy to make money in the industry." But the fact that so much capital is invested in, the success of the exit is not much, most of the losses. ”

According to his experience, one reason the industry looks good is that small companies grow up very quickly in their infancy and seem to have a few people who can do business. But soon, such companies will be able to reach the boundaries of management, and then grow up.

Standardized teaching

After the listing, learn and think for a long time to keep a low profile. This is because Zhang Bangxin think the enterprise's internal strength has not practiced in place. After all, the company has been listed, it is impossible to do a small and beautiful enterprises, capital is also driving the study and think of expansion. To ensure growth and maximize risk aversion, there is only one way to go, standardized teaching.

Two years, learning and thinking in the ICS system to invest tens of millions, is to create a standardized teaching platform. Not only the teaching platform should be standardized, but also the teachers ' training should be standardized. Bao said that the majority of teachers to learn today is the strength of their own training, has no longer outside employment. New teachers also require 211, 985 university graduates, and the admission rate is only 3%.

Zhang Bangxin and Bao both like to go to classroom lectures, not only to the examination of teaching as well as the practice of enriching their own educational ideas. In order to realize the standardized teaching, the research and development team who think of it have unified courseware for teachers and even require teachers to standardize their classroom humor.

"We and the new Oriental students are not the same, the new Oriental education in the face of adult students, can distinguish jokes in the critical components, but we are facing the 6-18-year-old children, teachers tell jokes to speak positive." "Bao said.

At the beginning, learn to think that teachers must add some stories as a primer when preparing lessons, the course must be interspersed with some jokes, such a practice is very high demand for teachers. Bao Audit when found that some teachers were forced to get out of the way, a few words to confuse the past.

The team found that solving problems can only be standardized through teaching and research. 300 of people's research and development team for teachers to prepare a variety of solutions to the problem, and even jokes are ready to 3 for teachers to choose. The equivalent of a team to write a good script, the teacher only need to play a good role on the line.

The advantages of this kind of standardized teaching are more evident in the mind-building of the 3-6-year-old children. Ningbuyu, the head of the motorcycle, said that in the 3-6-year-old children's education, not as good as the business as the regional differences, national unity, can be highly standardized.

Unlike the secondary education, Mobby's teaching does not have a successful system to learn from. In the course of teaching and research, the team can break down the physics courses under the university and redesign a 24-level system for students to make personalized choices. The age group involved in the Mocha business does not have similar outline-related things as a standard.

It took more than two years for Moses to devote a lot of resources to building up his own mathematical thinking system. Teaching uses a lot of animation, touch screen, encourage children to touch. There are already a lot of early education courses in the market. But in Ningbuyu's view, that early-education course was like a variety of software, apps, and he was building an operating system.

The difficulty is that the knowledge of early childhood education adds up also not much, want to let the child sit in the classroom 200 hours course without feeling boring, each class should be independent and interrelated, need a set of knowledge system as support.

"To build a system, it is really difficult to study how this system is taught, and to do related courseware and course derivatives." "Ningbuyu said.

Education is the public good

Learn and think Vice President Bao once asked study and think founder of one of the Liu Yashu, originally want to enter the laboratory, why choose to do education? The doctor replied that he wanted to see why the one with the same seed would not grow well.

Zhang Bangxin The reason is simpler, he came out from the countryside, the family is not good, at the same time did 7 part-time jobs. "My parents are farmers, there is no five insurance, I have been worried that they are ill and have no money to cure." And I heard that Americans after the age of 18 are independent, and then let parents to support is a shameful thing, but my university four years or rely on parents to support. I can't afford a computer and I can't afford a girlfriend. ”

Today, Zhang Bangxin is still carrying a heavy burden. "Our responsibilities are immense, first and foremost security." We receive hundreds of thousands of students a year, even if the establishment of a strict system, to take more stringent preventive measures, there is such a large number of groups there is a possibility of security accidents, the probability of that. ”

In addition, the pressure also comes from the parents to the child learning effect expectation. "We are not like public schools, and children are not willing to learn, but at least they are compulsory and do not receive money." We can't, now 90% of the students in the class are in cram school, everyone is learning. Parents only look at the rank of the class, even if the children themselves compared with themselves may progress, but everyone to cram school after the ranking does not necessarily go forward. The parents came to me, we called the class, why did not progress? ”

Learning and thinking of development today, has passed the entrepreneurial stage, Zhang Bangxin also thinking about what education means to him.

"We do the system, do the Internet education, is to reduce the future of children to receive education and training threshold, although the strength is very small, but also want to achieve a fair share of educational resources." We hope to do the public good through innovative ways. In the future, a teacher may teach tens of thousands of students, and students buy an school course only need 50 yuan, this is the public good. Education itself is the greatest public good. ”

After the IPO, they and the new Oriental investors to Zhang Bangxin sent an e-mail, a senior South Korean analyst to judge, he believed that after Chus, in the next stage of China's economic development, the Chinese will be more willing to succeed in the domestic education system.

Xiaoping, in the famous letter to Mr Yu, also said that learning and thinking is the new Oriental of the 21st century.

But in the world, the education industry is likely to be the next industry to be completely subverted by the Internet. Zhong Zhixin that the lack of training industry in the country is willing to make a big investment in the Internet, because it has not been able to see the mode of making money. Zhang Bangxin also believes that online school impact offline business or the future of things, belong to the future "sweet troubles."

The new wave has come to see who can seize the opportunity.