Headquarters Units Teaching 'Methods and Techniques' First When Providing Assistance to Subordinate Units, Giving Grassroots Units Tools in Hand and Confidence in Mind
The PAP Handan Detachment Upholds the Principle of Precision to Raise the Level of Construction Assistance—— Headquarters Units Providing Assistance Must First Teach 'Methods and Techniques'
■ Zhang Zhenya, Li Xianghui
"The company's achievement of third place overall in the quarterly evaluation rankings is inseparable from the forward-deployed guidance and assistance of the headquarters!"
Recently, the Handan Detachment of the PAP Hebei General Corps organized a phased work summary meeting. Looking at the freshly released evaluation rankings, Liu Ce, company commander of a certain company, could not conceal his delight.
"The company has few 'four-capable' (四会) instructors, the quality and effectiveness of training organization is low, and the results of several training evaluations have been unsatisfactory," Liu Ce said. At the end of last year, the company ranked near the bottom in the year-end evaluation, and the officers and soldiers felt somewhat unable to hold their heads up. Some units within the grassroots detachment, like this company, were affected by factors such as personnel, experience, and resources, and were left to "feel their way across the river by touching the stones" on their own, with no improvement in overall grassroots construction.
"When the grassroots has difficulties, the headquarters must proactively step forward." The detachment Party committee leadership analyzed and concluded that, to raise the level of overall grassroots construction, the headquarters must first strengthen its own capacity to provide assistance. To this end, they studied and decided to reinforce the headquarters' awareness of proactive action, direct quality resources toward grassroots units with obvious shortcomings, focus on precisely addressing actual difficulties at the grassroots level, and provide strong support for building a hard-and-capable grassroots force.
Assistance must begin with strengthening the backbone; strengthening the foundation begins with strengthening the Party branch. The detachment regularly organizes activities such as "Company Commander's Forum" and "Political Instructor's Forum," inviting the commanding officers of advanced units to share their experience on how to run good company affairs meetings (队务会), enliven educational sessions, and resolve conflicts among officers and soldiers, and organizing participants to visit and learn from advanced companies.
Shi, the political instructor of a certain company, drew on their experience to guide squad leaders and backbone personnel in transforming company affairs meetings from "one person speaking" to "everyone deliberating," encouraging young soldiers to boldly speak their minds, thereby improving internal relations and reducing resistance to political education. He also combined this with the company's actual conditions to establish a "growth micro-profile (成长微档案)" for each soldier, recording each soldier's interests, special skills, and ideological trends, and planning individual growth paths and formulating assistance measures on a one-person-one-plan basis.
In response to the reality that some remote posts are far from the headquarters, the detachment selected headquarters cadres to form a "circuit service team (巡回服务小分队)" to regularly deliver courses and instruction. A detachment leader paired with a remote company for assistance discovered through on-site work alongside the unit that, while the company's cadres were familiar with the content of the Outline for Grassroots Construction of the Military (《军队基层建设纲要》), they had not been able to effectively translate it into working methods. He guided the company in establishing a "weekly plan chart for building the unit in accordance with the outline (按纲建队周计划表)," breaking down and subdividing routine work with responsibilities assigned to specific individuals, strictly organizing operations in accordance with the Party Constitution, the outline, and other regulations, driving all work onto a fast track, and effectively stimulating the enthusiasm and initiative of officers and soldiers in participating in construction efforts.
Changes on the training ground were also quietly taking place. At the beginning of the year, many grassroots companies reported shortcomings in UAV operations. The detachment headquarters rapidly coordinated with manufacturer technicians to come to the unit and deliver instruction, organizing training backbone personnel for concentrated "tempering." At the same time, they allocated dedicated funds to issue UAVs and simulation equipment to grassroots companies, and organized technical backbone personnel to compile UAV training lesson plans covering multiple combat-realistic subjects including reconnaissance and search, target positioning, and night flight.
The company where Liu Ce serves was one of the beneficiaries. Staff Officer Zhou of the detachment's operations and training section went down to the company with the newly compiled lesson plans and training equipment, personally instructing training backbone personnel in operational essentials, and leading officers and soldiers through the progression from simulated training to actual flight operations, tackling each subject one by one. In a recently organized guard force skills competition, Liu Ce's company, on the strength of its outstanding performance in the UAV reconnaissance subject, captured two individual first-place finishes and a top-three finish in the overall team score.
"The headquarters' precision assistance delivered methods, personnel, and support, and left behind the invaluable experience of scientifically conducting construction work," Liu Ce explained. The "training data analysis method (训练数据分析法)" taught through headquarters assistance allowed the company to leave behind the crude, undifferentiated training organization model of "cooking everything in one pot"; the "routine work implementation flowchart (经常性工作落实流程图)" issued by the headquarters compiled daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly required tasks into cards and wall charts, allowing cadres and backbone personnel to conduct construction work by following the chart and implement tasks against the schedule, keeping all work in good order…"These practical and hard-hitting methods have now become our 'signature skills' for grassroots construction," Liu Ce said.
"Providing assistance is not doing everything for them, and still less is it replacing them—the key is to teach the grassroots 'methods and techniques' (招法)." The detachment leadership explained that the headquarters delivers methods thoroughly, cultivates backbone personnel well, and puts support in place, with the ultimate goal of ensuring that the grassroots has tools in hand and confidence in mind. "Only when each company can train, manage, and build on its own does assistance achieve its greatest effect."