Salzburg, in a hotel. Motterich, an executive of the Austrian Federal Railways, is giving a kick-off meeting to the technicians.

"Listen, the board of directors has made a decision that in the next year's time, we are going to connect the rail to Adenin."

There were not many Svens on the construction site, and Motrich didn't say anything official, and directly said the task.

He is only administratively responsible for management, not from a technical background, and has been in this project team for more than a year, but he is clear about the progress of the project.

Now the headquarters is very difficult to complete this progress requirement. But as a qualified manager, he knew he couldn't back down when it was difficult.

The board of directors has made a decision, no matter how difficult it is, he must try to complete it, it is a matter of attitude.

If he doesn't even have practical action, he shouts difficulties and can't be completed to the top, then where is his value?

Private businesses are all very realistic, and if there is no value, he can be a jerk. On this subject, his weight is not as heavy as that of the technicians below.

In this era, technicians are treasures, no matter which project they put on, they are indispensable talents, and the administrative staff is different, and there are a lot of them within the railway company.

Salvador, the chief engineer of the project, said politely: "Mr. Motterich, with our current construction progress, it would be good to be able to complete this task in two years, this is a pre-planned construction period, and it is impossible to complete it in advance!" ”

In the construction of this section of the railway, Motrich was nominally in charge of the overall management, but technically it was El Salvador who had the final say.

Motrich simply did not control El Salvador, or rather, did not dare to interfere indiscriminately. He is a smart person who doesn't understand it, but he doesn't understand, and he knows that blind command is easy to cause problems.

Now it is normal for the technical person in charge to oppose the sudden increase in the construction task. However, Motterich was not unprepared, and explained with a smile:

"Mr. Salvador, solutions are always thought up, if you don't have anything, you just ask, I am responsible for coordinating with the head office, but the work task must be completed on time.

In the days that followed, everyone was fortunate and sacrificed their days off. Please rest assured, the company will not treat you badly.

I would like to assure you that as long as you complete the task ahead of schedule, you will definitely get no less than your current salary.

No, just meet the deadlines. I'll go to the head office to apply for you, and if it's lower than that, I'll pay for it myself! ”

Motterich's performance was a success, and many problems in this world can be solved with money, and speeding up the construction schedule is no exception.

The two-year construction task should be completed in one year, there is no problem with the two-year salary, everyone still does the same amount of work, and the labor cost budget of the railway company has not increased. Now is the time for a shortage of people, and Motterich is fully sure that he will get the money down.

A pay rise could appease most technicians, but Salvador shook his head.

"Monsieur Motterich, no one doubts your character, the problem now is that time is too short, and we are already working from both ends to the middle.

If you want to increase the progress, you can't do it unless you split the current lot in half and divide it again from the middle lot. This not only requires an increase in labor, but also an increase in machinery and equipment, and our technical personnel are not sufficient, and the difficulty of management is greatly increased. ”

Motterich thought for a moment and said, "These problems can be overcome. As you must know, in order to speed up the construction process of the railway, the state has issued a law that will not levy any tax on the operation of the railway for ten years from the time the railway is established.

We started construction in 1849 and expected to be fully completed in 1854, which meant that we only had 5 years of duty-free operation.

The Federal Railroad is a publicly traded company, and the headquarters has had to consider the opinions of shareholders, and now everyone wants the railroad to be put into operation sooner.

If we can complete the construction of the roadbed in 1851 in Lot 5, then in 1852 the track can be laid, the relevant equipment can be installed, and in 1853 the trial operation can be carried out.

Being able to put it into operation a year ahead of schedule will inevitably bring a lot of profits to the company, and you will also get a good return. ”

"Profit" was only one factor, but more importantly, the Austrian government asked the railway company to speed up the construction of the main line, on the grounds that Austria was preparing for war with the Ottoman Empire and wanted to use the railway to transport logistics.

There is no way to refuse this reason. Moreover, the government did not fail to compensate for the tax exemption for ten years.

As for the war against the Ottoman Empire, why the construction of the railway connecting the Kingdom of Bavaria also had to be accelerated is not the point.

The point is that His Majesty the Great Franz himself spoke, and since he said that it was the main line of the whole country to speed up the construction progress, then it must be the main line of the whole country.

Is it still possible to go to talk to His Majesty the Emperor about this problem?

In the end, the management of the railway company decided to concentrate on speeding up the construction of the main line and suspend the branch line section that was ready to start.

……

This year, railway technicians are in high demand. In order to retain talent, the Federal Railroad also took out some stock options as bonuses and distributed them to these technicians.

Although the amount of money in everyone's hands is not much, the effect is very good, and there is a share of their own in it, and there is no need to open the railway ahead of schedule.

Salvatore thought for a moment and said, "I don't have any opinion on the company's decision, but Mr. Motrich, you have to help me solve these problems."

Also, we have too many casualties in the construction process at the moment, and you better restrain those managers and make them not go too far. ”

The so-called managers are, of course, the thugs invited by the railway company. Now this batch of free laborers is the real "prison labor", which is cheap, but it is not very convenient to manage.

Everyone wants to mess around, as long as no one is staring, they have to grind foreign workers, and even running away happens from time to time. If it weren't for the military watching, there might have been a riot.

Although the army sends people to guard them, it will not send people to help them manage them. In order to speed up the construction, the management personnel invited by the railway company are naturally waiting for them with a whip + stick.

This makes Salvador, whose morality has not been completely degraded, look at it, of course, he is not a virgin, but in passing, he also hates this kind of rebels.

Motterich said with a smile: "There is no problem, the problem of insufficient number of laborers, I will report immediately, there is still in the warehouse of the machinery and equipment company, and I will send someone to pick up the goods directly."

If there is a shortage of technical personnel, I will report it to the head office. But Mr. Salvador, there is a shortage of technicians everywhere and the headquarters are poaching people all over Europe, so don't get your hopes up too much. ”

That's right, the Austrian railway construction team also includes technicians from various European countries. For the sake of strategic security, these people cannot be the main architects.

This point was requested by Franz, mainly because when the British exported railway standards overseas, they were caught in a lot of private goods in this regard, and many countries were trapped.

The same approach is now used by all railway companies in Austria. If there is a shortage of technicians, let the engineer take the apprentice to the top.

Anyway, it is construction according to the drawings, as long as you go to school on the construction site for a year and a half, you can preside over simple technical work, and experienced engineers guide and arrange tasks every day, and then check and accept them.

Basically, a section of the railway was built, and the apprentices were almost out of school. That's basically how railway engineers came from this era, and there are only a few people who graduate from school.

Looking at his morale-boosting subordinates, Salvatore nodded with a wry smile. With the addition of a new construction line, his task as the chief engineer has become even heavier.

The means of transportation in this era was horseback riding, and people who couldn't ride horses couldn't eat this bowl of rice. It is not easy to travel 180 kilometers every three or five days.

On the contrary, the technicians under his command are more relaxed, following the movement of the large army, and there is no need to run in both directions for three days.

This is the disadvantage of the lack of engineers, and he is not at ease if he leaves all these tasks to his subordinates. Basically, when there is a technical problem, El Salvador has to preside over it himself.

From the beginning of the 19th century, the construction of railways in Europe was just beginning. By 1850, there were no more than 15,000 kilometers of railways in operation on the entire European continent.

Experienced engineers are naturally scarce talents, and in this context, as soon as the Austrian railways were built, the major railway companies broke out to compete for talents.

For El Salvador, it is now a time of pain and happiness. Heavy work tasks mean high salaries.

For example, while he is the chief technical engineer, he is also responsible for the main technical guidance of the construction at both ends, so he can get two more salaries.

Now adding two more construction sites, if the company does not send someone to help him share the pressure, it also means that he can increase his salary by two more salaries, that is, a total of five salaries.

If it weren't for the fact that the salary was too good, he would have quit a long time ago, how could he accept this kind of work day and night?

Such good days are not unusual, and with Motterich's promised bonuses, once the task is completed, El Salvador will receive ten years' salary in one year.

After all, there are only a few like El Salvador, and it is impossible for the railway company not to send engineers down to help all the time, after all, a person's energy is limited, and he can barely support it in the early stage, and he will not be busy at all when it comes to the later construction.

However, it is not uncommon for one person to complete two or three people's work tasks in railway construction.

Capitalists are not philanthropists, so they can't always be so generous. Now they are irreplaceable, naturally they are treated preferentially, and once they can be replaced, then their good days will be over.

El Salvador knew very well that once the construction of the railway was complete, they were ready to get out.

When the railway company is in operation, it does not need so many experienced engineers, and the capitalists will naturally choose cheaper ordinary technicians to be responsible for the later maintenance of the railway.

Even after the supply of engineers exceeds demand in the later stage, even if they do two jobs, they can only get a salary in the end.

The relationship between supply and demand in the market determines the price of goods. The same applies in the human resources market, capitalists pay high salaries when there is a shortage of people, and naturally find a way to make up for it when there is no shortage of people.

In general, they are in a good time to make money. After this village, there is no longer this shop.

How long these good days last, El Salvador is not clear. If possible, he hoped that the days would last longer.

He even had the idea of going to the Ministry of Railways to get a job, although the treatment was not so good, but it was better than stability and decency.

As night fell, Salvatore lay in bed, lit a cigarette, and got up deeply, unable to sleep for a long time.