Author | Zhang Fujun, ICBC Hebei Branch
From ‘Abacus’ to ‘Iron Keyboard’
In 2023, we celebrate the 40th anniversary of the founding of the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China. As a veteran employee with 37 years of service, her growth journey is vividly remembered, and her story is long and rich…
The ‘Three Iron’ Goals of Bank Employees
In August 1986, I graduated from Zhangjiakou Financial and Trade School and was assigned to work at the Zhangbei County Branch. At that time, the county branch had just separated from the People’s Bank, and the staff was quite tight. I was placed at the accounting counter, responsible for bookkeeping and interest calculation for over a dozen accounts without having the chance to intern in other specialized departments. I can say that I grew alongside the grassroots county branch through thick and thin.
At that time, there was a saying in the banking industry that every employee must remember: “To work in banking, one must achieve iron accounts, iron funds, and be an abacus master.” From the very beginning, both the diligent and responsible senior staff and the experienced mentors who taught me how to prepare daily account statements repeatedly told me, “We generations of bankers regard the ‘Three Irons’ as our lifeblood and lifelong pursuit. You young people are knowledgeable and learn quickly, but achieving these ‘Three Irons’ in practice is not an easy task; you must practice diligently in your spare time.”
I observed closely, and indeed, whether it was the loan officers collecting interest or the tellers handling accounts; whether they were seasoned employees with over 30 years of service or fresh recruits, they all practiced writing vouchers and solving abacus problems after work, tirelessly. My neighbor, Master Tan, consistently ranked among the top in the abacus competitions held by the higher-ups every year. Although I studied business management in school and had reached level six in abacus skills, I felt inferior when I saw their speed and accuracy. Thus, I resolved to practice diligently. Taking advantage of my single dormitory conditions, I practiced three different versions of simulated vouchers daily, covering addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. Hard work pays off; within two years, I reached the national level two standard, ensuring the accuracy and timeliness of bookkeeping, interest calculation, and accounting. The senior staff happily patted my shoulder and said, “Good job, young man, achieving ‘abacus mastery’ in less than two years shows promise.” To be honest, my advancement from level six to level two was achieved by spending weekends traveling back and forth between Zhangbei and the Zhangjiakou Abacus Association, a journey filled with its own hardships.
As I became proficient with the ‘abacus’, I suddenly realized that numbers were no longer dull symbols but beautiful notes dancing on the abacus, playing enchanting melodies. Most joyfully, the business development of the county branch was rapid; when I first took over the bookkeeping, the deposits I managed were only in the eight-digit range (over 100,000, including jiao and fen), and loans were in the nine-digit range. In just three years, deposits reached the nine-digit range, while the loan amount remained the same, but the leading digit increased. Of course, the operational efficiency also grew longer on the bank’s ‘big abacus’.
Replacing with the ‘Iron Keyboard’
Just as I was thrilled with my abacus skills, computers gradually replaced the abacus. Later, the higher-ups changed the technical competitions from manual interest calculation to computer-based calculations, and statistical projects began using unified software. Watching the contestants swiftly flipping through papers with one hand while skillfully dancing on the keypad with the other, I was once again deeply impressed. While admiring the rapid development of ICBC, I began to utilize my spare time, taking advantage of my colleagues’ overtime, to sneak into the computer room (at that time, there was only one 286 PC in the entire bank, and outsiders were generally not allowed in). I first familiarized myself with the keyboard functions and then mastered the basic commands of DOS. As I learned, I even figured out the reporting program. When a colleague was transferred from the statistics position and no one could take over the reports, I volunteered and was fortunate to become the new owner of this ‘treasure’. After months of diligent study, I not only quickly reported various statistics but also developed several analysis reports, using CCED to create the payroll for the entire branch, thus achieving the first automated payroll in the branch. That year, the branch’s statistical reporting work won first place in the entire jurisdiction, and I was also recognized as an ‘Outstanding Statistician’ by the provincial management information department. From the upgrades in office equipment at the branch, I saw the development direction of ICBC; future settlement and daily operations would no longer be possible without keyboards. Thus, in 1992, I eagerly enrolled in the Computer Science program at the Hangzhou Financial Management Cadre College of ICBC, embarking on a new learning journey.
Two years of specialized study deepened my understanding of keyboards (computers). At that time, the curriculum was still at the beginner level, covering single-board computers, DOS, UNIX, and dot-matrix printers. However, after observing and interning at various ICBC branches in Hangzhou, I felt that the pace of development at ICBC was accelerating. Automated devices like ATMs and POS systems were gradually becoming widespread, providing convenience to customers while saving a significant amount of labor.
After graduating and returning to the bank, although only two years had passed, computers had already become ubiquitous in all specialized departments. Even the logistics department’s typing and printing had adopted WPS and Word, and the original 286 ‘treasure’ had long been replaced by brands like Great Wall, Lenovo, Founder, and DELL, being ‘mercilessly’ relegated to the ‘cold palace’. Operators no longer needed to memorize commands; with a user-friendly interface, they could access any program with a click of the ‘mouse’. As ICBC’s business scope expanded, the number of digital forms increased, necessitating more employees with ‘iron keyboard’ skills. To cultivate more high-quality talent, competitions in business technology were held regularly from the headquarters to the grassroots branches, and the ‘weapons’ of the contestants had completely transformed; the ‘abacus’ honorably retired, replaced by the ‘iron keyboard’.
Indeed, it is because ICBC has many ‘iron keyboards’ that its various businesses can grow exponentially, and after the stock reform and listing, it can achieve even more remarkable results. With the proliferation of ‘iron keyboards’ and the establishment of a modern operational network, it is only natural that ICBC has become a top global bank and a preferred choice for customers. As the saying goes: “The abacus built ICBC, and the iron keyboard accomplished ICBC.”
“By observing a leaf, one can know autumn.” From the transition of ICBC from ‘abacus’ to ‘iron keyboard’, I have witnessed its magnificent and vigorous growth journey and understood a simple yet profound truth: no matter what work one does, as long as one keeps pace with the times, is willing to put in the effort, and is not afraid of hardship, one will become a ‘blacksmith’.
END