On January 6, 2019, President Tao Ming of Evering Consulting gave an exclusive interview to the China Real Estate Club to discuss his understanding of planning and his observation of the industry. Here's a cleansing of the content.
Q: Please briefly describe your personal background.
A: I graduated from Tongji University, later studied in France, obtained a master's degree in business administration and master's degree in urban planning, and after returning home to join the internationally renowned engineering consulting group Atkins Shanghai Branch, participated in dozens of different types of urban and regional development planning projects, and later founded Shanghai Evering Consulting Co., Ltd., which has now more than 10 years of experience in urban and regional strategic planning.
Q: Our real estate club brings together a lot of real estate related industry elites, often hear them argue about planning issues, how do you understand city planning and strategic planning?
A: Yes, friends in the industry often have this kind of debate, and the focus of the debate is often which is more important. There is in fact a lot of professional pride in the mood in it. In fact, objectively speaking, they are different practices, and both are essential for doing a good project. However, in real practice, the interface if the two planning process is not very good. This is also a problem that we often see. In essence, planning is a kind of policy intervention. It is a comprehensive discipline covering urban economics, geography, engineering, sociology, public policy and so on. However, a more prominent problem in our national planning education and practice lies in the fact that city and town planners trained in the colleges often lack of width in their learning, and tend to be more biased towards the thinking of engineers, and are more familiar with and good at the problems and solutions of the spatial and engineering dimension. They are unfamiliar or insensitive with economic, social, financial and policy aspects. It’s hard to expect them to develop an integrated solution on their own. Therefore, it’s good for city planners to work with consultants who are specialized in addressing some strategic aspects of a complex project.
Speaking of planning, everyone's understanding of the concept of planning may vary from person to person, some people will put out an idea as a plan, some people will pursue creative ideas or exquisite copywriting, and I think, as far as urban development projects are concerned, planning is essentially a rational thinking process, from market research to strategic positioning, then to implementation. Although sometimes creativity is necessary, especially in the planning of tourism projects, but the idea also has to land. It must be feasible if you really value it.
When we do urban and regional development projects, we need have a strategy. Strategic aspects of the problem should include positioning and development goals, development paths and measures, and so on, and then we come to the spatial and material level of technical programs. To avoid ambiguity, I personally prefer to use the word strategic planning to sum up such a task and process. In the field of business administration, strategic planning is a familiar concept. In fact, urban and rural planning and urban management disciplines are increasingly drawing on theoretical and thinking tools from the discipline of business administration. For example, we now often talk about the concept of project positioning, differentiated competition strategy, as well as the practice of city or place marketing. They are all from the marketing management theories. ]This helps our urban and rural planning and urban management disciplines mature.
Q: What do you think is the most important thing to do strategic planning?
A : Summarizing my experience over 15 years , I think two principles are very important . First, we should have a strategic height and overall vision, and can grasp the overall direction of project development and overall objectives. Nothing is more typical than the planning of the Xiong'an New Area. The planning of the Xiong'an New Area is known as a national event and a millennium plan. In this regard, the country leaders must see very very far in the future about the functions and influence if the new urban area. Secondly, the feasibility of a project's strategic planning must be prudently considered. Many of our leaders in many cities and towns are often not short of ambition, but the feasibility and a lot of implementation details are often not in the center of their attention. Of course, it is not an easy task to balance creativity and feasibility. To make a good strategy plan requires us to not only stand high, but also be able to closely link long-term goals and near-term tasks.
