If you were to ask what the hottest job is these days,

The answer is undoubtedly: investment promotion officers.

With chartered flights scrambling for orders trending online and the hit TV series *The County Party Committee Compound* airing, people are gradually gaining insight into the daily work of investment promotion and investment promoters.

Investment promoters could never have imagined that their profession and colleagues would make it to the top of the trending list in this way.

Art is inspired by life. Right here among us, those ordinary, unassuming investment promoters—who fly to four or five cities a week to meet with businesses—are back in the spotlight!

From trains to high-speed rail: a leap in speed

Over the past three years, pandemic restrictions forced much of their work online. Now that policies are gradually easing, everyone is scrambling to reclaim the “lost” three years.

Investment promoters have even drawn upon military strategies and tactics, employing moves such as “capture the king to subdue the enemy,” “lure the enemy by feigning retreat,” “standing in the snow outside Cheng’s door,” and “removing the firewood from under the pot.”

Investment promotion is like a martial arts secret technique—speed is the ultimate advantage.

In the TV series *The County Party Committee Compound*, there is a scene where County Magistrate Guangming repeatedly contacts an entrepreneur to attract investment. Just as he is about to close the deal, the entrepreneur is suddenly poached by a neighboring county.

Such situations are not uncommon in investment promotion. After enduring great hardship to finally secure a business, an investor might lose the deal to another region in the blink of an eye, leaving them with no recourse but to “swallow their bitterness in silence.”

In the past, the multi-tiered approval process for a single project could take weeks or even months. Sometimes, a delay in taking action meant missing out on promising projects.

As business environments across the country have improved, the time required for project settlement and construction has shortened significantly, and the pace of investment promotion has accelerated considerably. This means that investment promotion efforts must be faster, more decisive, and more precise than ever before.

In Wucheng, Dezhou, Shandong, it took just seven days to “snap up” a new energy project with an annual output value of 4 billion yuan.

When the news of the project’s potential location first broke, the park’s director was still on a business trip. He immediately rushed from his destination to meet with the company while instructing his colleagues to prepare materials, presenting six available plots directly to the company.

The investment promotion official’s well-prepared approach put the company’s leadership at ease. Addressing the company’s concerns about talent recruitment, Wucheng’s investment promotion team also presented feasible solutions, allowing the company to appreciate their pragmatic and down-to-earth approach.

It is worth noting that this new energy project had initially been in contact with first- and second-tier cities and had no intention of locating in a county town. However, in the face of strong competition from other investment promotion teams, Wucheng County ultimately secured the project with lightning-fast speed.

Today, many top officials in counties and townships can no longer sit idly by; they are actively joining the front lines of investment promotion.

A few days ago, I came across an article from Shangrao City in Jiangxi Province detailing the daily schedule of a township leader. Out of 22 districts, leaders from eight were out on investment promotion missions—either hosting business delegations or coordinating work at industrial parks.

If you can’t beat them, join them

Economic development isn’t a battle fought in isolation; when investment promotion shifts from individual efforts to collective collaboration, it reduces “internal competition.”

Guangming County, featured in *The County Party Committee Compound*, has almost no large enterprises, yet neighboring Jiuyuan County leads the city in investment attraction and even occasionally “swoops in” to snatch away projects that Guangming County has worked hard to secure. It has even gone so far as to bring in scavengers to Guangming County just to pass inspections.

Beyond competing for investors, there is also a struggle for the city’s premium resources. Yet these advantageous resources often gravitate toward stronger regions, which undoubtedly compounds the difficulties for weaker areas.

Mei Xiaoge (Secretary of the Guangming County Party Committee) shifted her approach: since they couldn’t beat them, they would join them. If they couldn’t compete with Jiuyuan County, they would form an alliance for mutual benefit.

In fact, when you think about it, attracting investment through business networks, establishing “enclave” projects, and even the act of investment promotion itself are inherently about mutual benefit and win-win cooperation.

As Yi Lianhong, Secretary of the Zhejiang Provincial Party Committee, stated, “We must eliminate the mindset of ‘keeping the best for ourselves’ and be willing to offer our best resources and projects to attract investment.”

This approach also seems to align more closely with the policy direction of a “unified national market,” breaking down local protectionism, preventing vicious competition among regions for investment, and establishing fair and orderly market competition.

The “joining” mentioned here refers not only to win-win cooperation but also to learning and emulating best practices. Take, for example, a thriving hotpot chain from Jiuyuan County that expanded to Guangming County: simply obtaining a business license took over a month of back-and-forth—the disparity is evident.

When selecting a location for investment, companies often adopt the mindset: “If you agree, I’ll come; if you can’t deliver, I’ll leave—there are plenty of other options.” This is understandable; no industrial park is indispensable to a company.

But for industrial parks, the situation is different. Missing out on a single project could mean losing the opportunity to establish a critical link in the industrial chain—or even the chance to build and strengthen the chain itself.

Change and progress are essential, and the fastest way to achieve them is by focusing on enterprises. In 2020, the investment promotion department in Yangpu, Shanghai, had staff members making 110 calls a day to reach out to companies, identifying their challenges, and helping them resume operations during that difficult period.

Every region is like a large reservoir; it cannot be opened up all at once, nor can it be opened up immediately. Therefore, we should start by making changes in the details.

As soon as the plane lands, it’s not just a matter of hundreds of millions

from the Jiangsu-Zhejiang region to overseas destinations have returned to China, delivering immediate results.

Companies are not only bringing back orders but also deepening their understanding of international markets. One entrepreneur noted that traveling abroad made the future shifts in product trends strikingly clear: customers now place greater emphasis on value for money, and small-batch, customized orders are bound to increase.

Another company had planned to build a factory in Germany—its largest market—even before the pandemic. The plan was temporarily shelved due to the pandemic, but this recent visit has drawn the company’s attention to Poland, located right next to Germany.

Labor costs in Poland are lower, and the company can also leverage the overseas warehouse networks established by other Chinese firms, such as JD.com and Alibaba.

Not only did the companies secure new orders and identify new directions, but local investment promotion officials also seized the opportunity to travel to various countries to visit target enterprises. Some foreign companies even stated outright, “If we plan to go on an overseas business trip in the future, Zhejiang will definitely be our top choice.”

As early as 2020, Yiwu sent a delegation to Henan to help local companies secure orders. Despite facing challenges such as pandemic restrictions along the way, the Yiwu investment promotion team successfully brought back orders from buyers and even invited them to visit Yiwu in batches.

This scene is reminiscent of years past, as if the investment promotion officers who once ran tirelessly for projects have returned!

In Closing

With the easing of pandemic restrictions, an increasing number of regions have begun taking the initiative to secure projects and drive development.

If the past three years felt like investment promotion professionals were operating under a massive net that restricted their potential, that net is now disappearing, and the investment promotion professionals we know and love are making a comeback.