Words Upon Release

One chapter note

In the blink of an eye, this book is about to go on sale.

At first I thought I would need three hundred thousand words before release, but to my surprise the readers really came through!

We hit the reading target and finished the recommendation run, so the book can go live before two hundred thousand words.

I am truly grateful for everyone’s wholehearted support. I am deeply moved!

A few words about the book itself: the opening is indeed not particularly dazzling. You can tell from the recommendation data that it did not pull readers in very strongly.

Some of the early plot design was not quite reasonable, and there were problems with the prose as well. The style was a bit old-fashioned, the character interactions were awkward, and so on. I will pay attention to all of that going forward.

Also, please feel free to criticize me more when you have time, so I can know where the weak points are and learn and improve faster. If I ever really make it to the top someday, everyone here will have played a part, and each of you will get a starting red envelope of ten thousand. By the way, please leave your criticism at the end of a chapter, not in the review section, so you do not affect the friends who are here to read.

Now, the awards ceremony begins!

If this book can meet you all, Editor Sulfur Star deserves half the credit. I submitted it to other editors before and was rejected; if he had not rescued the manuscript, it would probably have been cut long ago. He gets first credit, and he deserves it.

The friends who tipped, kept reading, collected, and voted for the book account for forty percent. Without your encouragement, I would not have been able to keep going this long.

Every time I got stuck and did not want to write, it was your favorites, your reading, and your votes that gave me new motivation!

Thank you, brothers. If you can click subscribe in a moment and support the first-day subscription, I will be even more grateful!

The final ten percent belongs to me, the one who has been grinding away at the keyboard and even bought a new computer just for this.

Sigh, I do not want to play the pity card, but to write better, I really have spent everything I had saved. Given the current economy, everyone knows how hard things are in every industry. The author is just an ordinary wage earner too, carrying a heavy mortgage, earning very little, and still having to support a family. Because of my profession, I cannot even take on other part-time work. I can only rely on writing to save up a little pocket money to help make ends meet. The more I say, the more it sounds like tears, so I hope you brothers can support the first-day subscription in a moment and give me a reason to keep writing.

Waaah!

I am endlessly grateful!

OTZ OTZ OTZ

I will not say more. Everything is hidden in the first three words of this book’s first chapter!

A quick note on the update schedule after release: once it goes on sale, each update will be a larger chapter of four thousand words.

Today, on the first-day subscription, I will drop a full ten thousand words!

After that, there will be one large chapter on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and two large chapters on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday. That should guarantee an average of more than six thousand words a day. Splitting the updates into two parts gives the author a chance to catch his breath, after all I am a working stiff, and sometimes I have to travel for work, so production may not always be that high.

The goal is five hundred first-day subscriptions, though I do not know whether we can reach it. I hope you brothers will give me some support, go for it, charge ahead!

I will kneel here first and give everyone a bow.

Also, after release, every additional five hundred on the average subscription count will trigger ten straight days of explosive updates at ten thousand words a day.

In short, the more support everyone gives, the stronger my motivation becomes!

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That is all for the remarks. What follows is a little personal content written in gratitude for everyone’s support. If you only want to read the story, you can just click on the next chapter to support the first-day subscription. But if you are in college or have just graduated, I recommend reading on as a reference.

I checked the reader profile analysis in the author dashboard and found that readers aged eighteen to twenty-four account for forty-nine percent.

Most of you are only two or three years younger than I am, and many are facing, or about to face, the crucial turning points of graduation and employment.

Speaking of jobs, in recent years work in the public sector has become very popular, so let me combine my own experience to share a few of the things everyone cares about most regarding public-sector jobs.

1. How do you know whether you are suited to public-sector work?

2. How do you choose a position?

3. How do you prepare for the exam?

4. What are the benefits and treatment in the public sector?

First, a few clarifications:

1. Everything here is based on my personal work experience and information gathered from conversations with colleagues in other systems. It is certainly incomplete, imperfect, and may even contain inaccuracies. Please treat it only as a reference.

2. By "public sector" here I mean the narrow sense of the term: jobs obtained through open, unified recruitment examinations organized by national, provincial, municipal, or county-level organization and personnel departments, with official staffing status. This includes administrative posts, public employee equivalent posts, fully funded institutional posts, partially funded institutional posts, and self-supporting institutional posts. It does not include state-owned enterprises, banks, elementary schools, middle schools, hospitals, or certain monopoly industries. These are also part of the public sector in a broad sense, but their recruitment methods and exam content differ from those mentioned above, and I am not very familiar with them, so I will not discuss them here. If any experts are reading, please feel free to clarify in the comments.

1. How do you know whether you are suited to public-sector work?

If your family’s financial situation is at or below the local middle level, and by middle I mean middle, not middle class, and your chosen major leads toward work that is physically demanding, dangerous, or has poor prospects, then public-sector work is a very good option.

Of course, public-sector jobs do place some limits on the individual: no overtime pay for overtime, no side jobs, although writing is fine; in special situations you must be among the first to step forward; passports must be handed in; you must be careful about what you say on public platforms; in some regions you are not allowed to drink on workdays, and so on and so forth. If you have a flamboyant personality, enjoy traveling abroad, or have a particular fondness for certain entertainment venues, then there is no doubt that a public-sector job will make you miserable, and I would not recommend it.

Public-sector work certainly gives a sense of accomplishment, but compared with other jobs, that sense of accomplishment is not so immediate, and the feedback tends to come with a delay. Sometimes you may feel you have done enough and done it well, only to be met instead with criticism from the masses, misunderstanding from your colleagues, or even discipline from the organization. All of that is perfectly normal. As the old saying goes, one must take the long view. In the public sector, subordinates must obey superiors, the individual must obey the organization, and stability and unity come before everything. If you lack that conviction, then public-sector work is not for you.

2. How do you choose a position?

Under normal circumstances, the higher the level, the better: province above city, city above county, county above township or street office. In some developed areas, this may be reversed, but that is a special case and not something I will discuss.

In terms of staffing status, administrative posts come first, then public employee equivalent posts, then fully funded institutional posts, then partially funded posts, then self-supporting posts. This ranking does not include certain monopoly sectors such as tobacco and power utilities.

For institutional posts, look at the level of the organization. If the organization is high-level and you have ambitions for advancement, choose a management post. If the organization is low-level, choose a professional and technical post, since the pay is higher. There is also a logistical post, which is for discharged noncommissioned officers, and I will not discuss that here.

At the county level, the platform matters more than the staffing status. For example, in a county-level core department with real power, such as the general office, organization, discipline, propaganda, or development units, an institutional post is better than an administrative post in an ordinary department. But such departments are certainly busy, so be mentally prepared. Working five days plus two, day plus night, is the norm.

Below the township level, it does not matter much. As long as you have official status and can get in, that is enough. Administrative pay may be a little higher, but not by much. And if you are already preparing for an administrative post exam, I would still suggest not choosing a township.

Regionally, if you are not tied to home, developed areas are definitely the first choice. If you cannot get into a developed area, then choose somewhere close to home. Of course, if you are applying in another province, it is best not to choose a township.

There is also the special recruitment track for selected graduates. Selected graduates all have administrative status. Compared with that, ordinary selected-graduate posts are only slightly better than township administrative posts. Unless you have no other choice, I still recommend taking the provincial exam and choosing a city-level department. Targeted selection and sponsored training are better than the provincial exam, so prioritize them, prioritize them, prioritize them. Important things are said three times.

For the national exam, unless you are confident of entering a ministry or national commission, I still recommend the provincial exam or city-level departments and above. If your only goal is to get in somewhere, then you can take the national exam. Reasonable minds may differ here, and my opinion is only for reference.

3. How do you prepare for the exam?

Exam information is posted on the official websites of the organization and personnel departments in each region.

For administrative posts, the national exam is usually around October each year. Provincial exams may be joint exams, some provinces recruit separately, and some hold two recruitment rounds. Most of them happen before graduation season.

Institutional posts are a bit more flexible. County-level and above departments can organize their own recruitment, so there are openings almost every month. Pay close attention to the official websites of local government departments.

If that sounds troublesome, just download the test app directly. I do not know whether the code words will get blocked, so I will use a substitute phrase for public exam preparation.

Preparation time: three months full-time, six months part-time. A long campaign makes it easier to feel pressure, so I do not recommend dragging it out.

How to study:

Written test:

The national and provincial exams are based on administrative aptitude and essay writing. Some special departments have professional tests, but I will not discuss those separately.

For administrative aptitude, study by module. Skip general knowledge and quantitative reasoning at first; for the rest, take online courses and practice questions. There are well-known teachers for almost every module, and you can find them on shopping sites. If you want to keep things simple, go straight for a premium practice package. I do not know whether that is still the price now, so I will use a substitute phrase for the brand name. For practice questions, I strongly recommend buying the five-thousand-question set. In the final month, make a push on general knowledge and quantitative reasoning.

Essay writing: read newspapers, read editorials, and write a lot. You must write plenty. Structure matters more than content, and ideas matter more than fancy wording. There are also courses for this, and you can listen to them. The ones by Zhang Xiaolong and the station master are both good.

For institutional posts, some regions use the same exam as administrative posts, while others may add a general public knowledge test. That is roughly similar to general knowledge, so just memorize more questions.

Interview: if it is your first time reaching the interview stage, I recommend signing up for an interview training class. If you can afford it, choose a small class.

There is actually a lot more that could be said about preparation, including some techniques for the actual exam. Because of space, I will not discuss them here. If there is a chance later, I will share them with everyone.

4. What are the benefits and treatment in the public sector?

Different departments, different regions, different departments in the same region, the same department in different regions, different positions within the same department, and even different people in the same position can all receive very different treatment, sometimes worlds apart.

The gap in treatment within the public sector is even greater than the gap between bronze and saint.

In general, except for some difficult county-level or township areas, most public-sector salaries are better than the local upper-middle level. Becoming rich and famous is unlikely, but making ends meet and living comfortably is not a problem.

In the end, public-sector work is just an ordinary job, the kind salaried workers do. Do not place any filter on it, and do not cling to any obsession.

Passing the exam is certainly good, but if you do not pass, do not force it. Every industry has its own place to shine. If you have studied full-time for five years and still have not passed, I suggest giving up.

There is actually a great deal worth discussing about public-sector work, but some of it is sensitive, so I will not say more here. After the book goes on sale, I will set up a reader group and share it with everyone there, including some good study materials I have used before.

Finally, if a few of you read this and decide to take a public-sector job exam and succeed, I hope you remember this sentence:

Write your essay on the earth. Answer your interview to the people. Hold fast to your original heart, and hold fast to your bottom line.

I have said so much, and it is all packed with practical knowledge. If I could have read such an article when I graduated, I would definitely have taken far fewer detours.

Life is hard, and writing is not easy. Brothers who have read this far, please click the next chapter and support the first-day subscription. That is not too much to ask, right? This humble public servant bows to you.

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