pjbooks Chapter 497 Another Campus Recruitment
Chapter 497 Another Campus Recruitment
This decision seemed a bit radical at the time, but Lu Ran had done the math.
TUTU has several projects to advance simultaneously over the next six months.
With the launch of projects for "Honor of Kings" and "PUBG Mobile," there will be more and more external collaborations for AI engines, and the existing team is almost insufficient.
Once this group of people joins, they can be immediately assigned to various project teams to fill the most needed positions, without requiring a long adaptation period.
The week that eleven people started working, there were some new faces in TUTU's office area.
Some people were walking around the corridor with their employee badges on, some were asking senior employees in the break room if they could take whatever they wanted from the snack area, and some were standing at the entrance of the arcade for a while, observing the machines inside.
On the first day of work, everyone behaved properly, but by the third day, some people started picking things out of the snack shelves.
One of them stood in front of the shelf for a long time, and finally took a bag of Tang Monk meat, saying, "I used to eat this when I was a kid. I never thought I could still buy it now."
Once, when Chen Mo was passing by, he saw a newly hired technical team leader squatting in front of the snack shelf looking for something. He went over and asked, "What are you looking for?" The man didn't turn his head and said, "I remember there was Peking duck noodles, but I can't find them." Chen Mo pointed to the bottom shelf for him. He squatted down, found a bag, and when he stood up, he said, "Thanks, Mr. Chen," and then tore open the package and started chewing.
Lu Ran didn't say anything when he saw this scene in his office, but he noticed that the technical team leader's lips were curled up when he was chewing noodles.
Just like the middle-aged employee who was holding Mimi Shrimp Chips in front of the snack shelf that day, he was peeking very high.
Some of the eleven people who arrived early have already been assigned to project teams and started working.
Zhao Yiming mentioned it briefly at the weekly meeting, saying, "Those new recruits got up to speed faster than I expected," and "People from Tencent really do have solid fundamentals; we don't need to teach them from scratch." Old Wang added from the side, "There's one backend architect who fixed a performance bottleneck in one of our modules on his third day here, and after the fix, the interface response time was reduced by half."
After these messages spread in TUTU's internal groups, some people who initially had doubts about the approach of "recruiting eleven people at once" all felt that it was the right move after seeing the actual results.
After listening to the report at the weekly meeting, Lu Ran didn't say much, only asking, "Has Tencent responded?"
Chen Mo shook his head: "Not for now. After their attempt to poach Zhao Yiming from us was rejected, those headhunting firms quieted down and stopped contacting us. Our counter-poaching efforts, while numerous, mainly targeted lower- and mid-level employees; we didn't touch their core teams. They might notice, but they're unlikely to react strongly."
"Then let's keep this pace," Lu Ran said. "Continue the contact. We still have many areas where we're short-staffed; we'll bring in another batch next month."
Zhou Mingzhe glanced at him: "Need to make up for it?"
"We need to hire more." Lu Ran leaned back in his chair. "We're about to launch three new projects simultaneously, each with its own independent team. Plus, we need to continue expanding our external collaborations for the AI engine. Our current 300-plus people aren't enough. We need to bring in at least a few dozen more before the end of the year. Tencent has the deepest talent pool; if we don't poach from them, who will we take?"
The meeting room fell silent for a moment.
Some people were taking notes in their notebooks, some were drinking water, and some were leaning back in their chairs listening.
No one raised any objections.
The hiring of this group of people is just the beginning.
What we really need to do is to fully utilize these people's abilities in the future, and put them into a larger and more complex framework than they are now.
Lu Ran knew that this business was still expanding, and as AI technology was applied to more and more industries, TUTU would only need more and more professional talents.
Lu Ran informed several senior executives to prepare for the final campus recruitment drive of the year.
Zhou Mingzhe was called into Lu Ran's office on Thursday afternoon.
When he walked in with the cup of tea, he saw a map of China on the computer screen in front of Lu Ran, with two red circles drawn on it, one in the capital and one in the city of Shenzhen.
"I plan to push forward with campus recruitment during this last wave." Lu Ran closed the map and leaned back in his chair. "It's almost June, graduation season is approaching for universities, and fresh graduates are all looking for jobs. This is the last window of opportunity to recruit a large number of people; if we miss it, we'll have to wait until the second half of the year."
Zhou Mingzhe sat down opposite him and placed his teacup on the corner of the table: "What are your plans?"
"Zhao Yiming and I will go to Beijing, and you take Chen Mo to Shanghai. We'll recruit fifty people each, mainly for technical positions, with a few additional roles in operations and product. We can use the Beijing branch office directly, and Wang Huabing can help with venue and process coordination in Shanghai. We'll do recruitment presentations at universities, collect resumes on-site, and conduct interviews—it'll be very efficient."
Zhou Mingzhe thought for a moment and asked, "Fifty? Isn't that a bit too many? Can our current training system handle that many people?"
"Yes. Zhao Yiming has already set up a training framework for new employees. After joining, they will undergo two weeks of intensive training, and then be assigned to various project teams to work on projects. The technical positions will mainly focus on AI engine-related areas, with specific roles divided into front-end development, back-end architecture, data analysis, and machine learning. The operations and product positions will be located in the Chengdu and Guangzhou branches, which are currently short-staffed."
Zhou Mingzhe glanced down at his phone and jotted down a few notes, then looked up and said, "I'll talk to HR and ask them to prepare the materials in advance. Which universities are in Beijing?"
Lu Ran scrolled through the notes on his phone: "In Beijing, prioritize Beijing University of Science and Technology and Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications; these two schools have high-quality graduates in computer-related majors. In Guangzhou, consider South China University of Technology and Sun Yat-sen University, which are also strong in science and engineering. You decide on the specific schedule first, and make sure it doesn't clash with other large companies' recruitment presentations, otherwise the students' attention will be scattered."
Zhou Mingzhe nodded, picked up his teacup, stood up, walked to the door, then turned back and asked, "By the way, what are you planning to talk about during the presentation?"
"Introduce the company, its product portfolio, and its technological focus. The emphasis will be on the AI engine and the upcoming new games. Most of these graduates will be assigned to AI-related project teams; we also need staff for *Honor of Kings* and *PUBG Mobile*. By clearly explaining these two areas, interested graduates will naturally stay."
Zhou Mingzhe replied with a "Okay" and went out.
For the next few days, the HR department staff were extremely busy.
The promotional materials needed to be redesigned, the display stands needed to be remade, the roll-up banners needed to be reprinted, and even a new batch of canvas bags with the "TUTU Technology" logo had to be ordered.
The administration department helped coordinate meeting rooms and interview rooms for the two branch offices, and even the directional signs in the corridors were set up in advance.
On Friday night before their departure, Lu Ran and Zhao Yiming went through the presentation slides one last time in the office.
Zhao Yiming was responsible for explaining the technical aspects, while Lu Ran was responsible for explaining the company's overall direction and product system.
The two of them went through the process twice in front of the projector, keeping the time under an hour, leaving time for questions and collecting resumes.
After Zhao Yiming finished his third presentation, he leaned back in his chair and said, "The last time I gave a presentation at a university was three years ago at my previous company. Back then, I talked about how to optimize database query performance. Now I'm talking about AI engines and game development automation. It feels like I'm a completely different person."
Lu Ran turned off the projector and closed his laptop: "It's not just a change of personnel, it's a change of era. Many companies are still teaching recent graduates to use technology stacks from ten years ago when they go out to find jobs. We're teaching them things that won't become widespread until next year; just standing here and talking is an advantage in itself."
The next morning, Lu Ran and Zhao Yiming took the high-speed train to the capital.
Colleagues at the Beijing branch had arranged the venue for the presentation in advance. It was a large lecture hall at a university next to the branch office building, which could seat about two hundred people.
The presentation is scheduled for 10:00 AM.
When Lu Ran and Zhao Yiming arrived, the classroom was already about half full, with almost all the seats in the front row occupied and a few scattered people in the back row looking at their phones.
Two roll-up banners stood at the entrance, one introducing TUTU Technology's product line and the other listing job openings.
A folding table was placed next to them, piled with flyers and registration forms, and two colleagues from the Beijing branch were distributing the materials.
Lu Ran stood at the back of the classroom and glanced at the young faces in the seats.
Most of them were boys, and girls made up less than 20%, but it was a little more than expected.
Some people were flipping through promotional flyers, some were searching for information about TUTU Technology on their phones, and a few others were huddled together, whispering about something.
The words "TUTU Technology 2025 Campus Recruitment Presentation" were written in chalk on the blackboard. The handwriting was neat and tidy, so it must have been written in advance.
The presentation started on time.
Lu Ran spoke for about half an hour, starting with the company's founding, then talking about the release dates and market performance of three products: League of Legends, Minecraft, and CrossFire. He also discussed the progress of the company's expansion into three overseas markets: Europe, the Middle East, and South America, as well as the technical direction and application cases of the AI engine.
He didn't use overly complicated vocabulary or present too much data; he simply explained step by step what the company is doing, why it's doing it, and what it plans to do next.
The audience listened quietly. Some were taking notes, some were taking pictures of the slides with their phones, and others were staring intently at Lu Ran's face.
After he finished speaking, he gave us time for questions. The first person to raise his hand was a young man wearing round-framed glasses sitting in the third row. He stood up and asked, "Mr. Lu, in the AI engine field, if I join the company, will I be doing support work or core R&D work?"
Lu Ran thought for a moment and replied, "The AI engine has already been implemented in multiple scenarios. We are advancing modules such as supply chain optimization, delivery scheduling, and recommendation algorithms. After joining the company, you will be directly assigned to a project team to work with the existing technical team on specific functional development and optimization. You won't just be doing some peripheral, auxiliary work."
After listening, the boy nodded, made a few notes in his notebook, and sat down.
The second person to ask a question was a girl with a ponytail, sitting by the window. Her voice wasn't loud, but her question was very direct: "TUTU is currently engaged in a business war with Tencent. Will this affect recent graduates? For example, will projects be suddenly halted or will there be layoffs?"
The classroom quieted down noticeably after the question was asked. All eyes were on Lu Ran, waiting for his answer.
Lu Ran didn't shy away from the question: "A business war is indeed happening, but the impact is mainly concentrated on channels and traffic, not on R&D. All projects currently underway are operating normally, and none have been halted due to external factors. Furthermore, TUTU has ample cash reserves after its last round of financing and has no plans for layoffs in the short term. The next round of recruitment is also clearly aimed at expanding our workforce. If the company were truly in trouble, I wouldn't be recruiting at a university at this time."
He paused, then added, "You can think of it this way: a company on the verge of bankruptcy won't bother with a snack area or a screening room, nor will it show you a movie for Children's Day."
Someone in the audience chuckled.
The girl with the ponytail smiled, nodded, and sat down.
The questions that followed followed one after another.
Some people asked about the specific arrangements of the training system, some asked about the frameworks and languages used in the technology stack, some asked about the overtime intensity of the project team, and some asked if they could apply for multiple positions at the same time.
Lu Ran and Zhao Yiming took turns answering questions, answering as many as they could, and asking the students to write down their contact information for later individual communication if they couldn't answer on the spot.
After the presentation, it was time to collect resumes. There was a line of about twenty people in front of the folding table, each holding a printed resume, and some even had a note attached to the cover of their resumes.
Lu Ran stood next to the line for a while and noticed that several people's resumes stated that they had made contributions to the open source community before, and some people even attached GitHub links and project demo addresses.
He wrote down the names of those people in his phone's notes app.
The afternoon interviews were arranged in the office of the Beijing branch. Lu Ran and Zhao Yiming each occupied a conference room to interview two groups of people at the same time, with each round lasting half an hour.
The interview focused on technical aspects, primarily assessing the candidate's grasp of fundamental knowledge and their problem-solving approaches.
Zhao Yiming prefers to have people write a small program on the spot, while Lu Ran prefers to talk about project experience first and then look at the code.
From 2 p.m. to 7 p.m., the two of them interviewed nearly twenty people.
There wasn't much of a break in between. Lu Ran asked a colleague to buy her a few sandwiches and two cups of coffee, which she ate during a break in the interview.
By the time I finished interviewing the last person, it was almost dark, and the lights in the office corridor were on.
Lu Ran organized the interview notes and discussed the evaluation results with Zhao Yiming.
The two of them agreed on about twelve or thirteen high-quality candidates, and the rest still need to be discussed.
Zhao Yiming leaned back in his chair in the conference room, rubbing his eyes, and said, "Several students have a really good foundation; their logic is clear, and their code isn't messy. Especially that guy with the round-framed glasses. I asked him to write a variation of a sorting algorithm, and he thought about it for about two minutes before starting to write it. He finished writing it in ten minutes and it ran successfully. He even added a few lines of boundary case handling himself."
Lu Ran also went through the names of the people he had met today in his mind, and he already had a rough list in mind.
There's another interview tomorrow, and the remaining people will be selected from that batch.
The second day went more smoothly than the first.
The students who came for the interview had a deeper understanding of TUTU than the day before. Some could even tell you the specific launch time and initial data of the European version of CrossFire, and others asked about the specific effects of the AI engine and the collaboration between Kuaishou and Douyin.
Zhao Yiming whispered to Lu Ran, "These people have done their homework quite well." Lu Ran replied, "Doing their homework well means they really want to come, which is much better than just joining in for the fun."
The recruitment drive in Beijing lasted three days, during which nearly two hundred resumes were received and more than sixty people were interviewed.
More than forty people ultimately confirmed their intention to be hired, which basically achieved the expected goal.
The remaining gaps can be filled in the next round.
Meanwhile, recruitment in Guangzhou is also progressing simultaneously.
On their first day, Zhou Mingzhe and Chen Mo held a short meeting at the Yaodu branch. Wang Huabing had already arranged the venue and materials.
The presentation was held in the lecture hall of South China University of Technology, at a time one day different from the one in Beijing, so that both sides could learn from each other's experiences.
The style of presentations in Shanghai is quite different from that in Beijing.
Zhou Mingzhe spoke a little slower than Lu Ran, but his tone was more steady. When talking about the company's development history, he had a kind of composure that said, "I am the person who has been here the longest."
Chen Mo was responsible for discussing the product and market aspects. His terminology was more business-oriented than Zhao Yiming's. He presented specific data on the European and Middle Eastern markets and also mentioned the overseas expansion plans that were about to be launched.
The students' reaction was more enthusiastic than expected.
The Q&A session lasted for nearly forty minutes, ranging from technical details to company culture, from salary structure to promotion path. Someone even asked whether the collaboration between TUTU and Kuaishou would affect the product's independence.
Zhou Mingzhe answered each question directly, just as he had done with Lu Ran in the capital, without avoiding any of them.
The interview process was equally intense.
The total number of resumes received in Shanghai was slightly more than in Beijing, but the pace of the interviews was better controlled. After each round of interviews, the interviewers had a few minutes to communicate and take notes, so that they didn't have to work non-stop until 7 or 8 pm.
After four days of recruitment, both sides compiled their data. The capital city ultimately confirmed the hiring of 47 people, while the city of Guangzhou confirmed the hiring of 53 people, which together met the expected target.
Looking at the summary table sent by Zhou Mingzhe, Lu Ran changed the "Number of Recruits" column in the memo to "A total of 100 people were recruited," and then added a note: "Starting in July, with unified training."
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