Leaders and guests present at the event to witness the important moment included Professor Xie En, Associate Dean of Tongji SEM (the person-in-charge), Ms. Dong Bianlin, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee of Tongji SEM, Professor Cheng Mingwang, Associate Dean of Tongji SEM, Professor Wu Sizong, former Secretary of the Party Committee of Tongji SEM, Professor Zheng Xin from the Department of Marketing of Tongji SEM, Ms. Xing Yue, Vice President of Alibaba Group, Vice Chair of Alibaba Women’s Federation and Vice President of DingTalk, Mr. He Yong, Ecosystem Director of Alibaba Cloud Government-Enterprise Business Unit, Mr. Zhang Jiayao, Director for Strategic Cooperation of DingTalk, Mr. Lin Weixing, Director for Strategic Cooperation of DingTalk, Ms. Li Jie, General Manager of Xinfengwei Colleges and Universities Business Unit, Mr. Wang Dong, Executive Deputy Director of the Information Office of Shanghai Normal University Tianhua College, and Mr. Wang Xiaobo, Deputy Director for Artificial Intelligence Practical Training of Shanghai Normal University Tianhua College.

The event was hosted by Cheng Guoping, Assistant Dean of Tongji SEM, Director of the Alumni and Corporate Relations Office, Director of the Professional Degree Programs Center and Director of the MBA/EMBA Center.

Professor Xie En mentioned in his speech that disruptive changes in the AI era have brought an enormous impact on the direction and future development of business school education; Tongji SEM has been committed to cooperating with excellent enterprises to continuously deepen industry-university-research integration and collaboratively advance the upgrading of the talent training system; Tongji SEM’s collaboration with DingTalk is a significant step toward Tongji SEM’s integrated development and will effectively promote the transformation and upgrading of its talent training mode.

Ms. Xing Yue, Vice President of Alibaba Group, Vice Chair of Alibaba Women’s Federation, Vice President of DingTalk, an undergraduate in International Trade in the Class of 1998 and a master graduate in Business Administration in the Class of 2002 of Tongji SEM, recalled her days at Tongji University with deep feelings, stated that she was pleased to be able to promote the cooperation between DingTalk and Tongji SEM to inject vitality into digital-intelligent talent cultivation for the alma mater, and expressed the hope that the cooperation could further promote the spirit of Tongji University’s motto of “helping people be of one heart and one mind” and promote Tongji University and Tongji SEM to foster new strengths.

This partnership between Tongji SEM and DingTalk will accelerate their cultivation of digital-intelligent talents. To strengthen the partnership even more, a kick-off ceremony for “Tongji University AI Assistant Creation Competition” Kick-off Ceremony was held in conjunction with the event. Furthermore, Ms. Dong Bianlin and Mr. Zhang Jiayao signed the memorandum of cooperation on behalf of the two sides in the presence of leaders from Tongji SEM and DingTalk.

Tongji SEM is steadily advancing digital-intelligent talent cultivation, with the cooperation with DingTalk being a firm, solid step. Going forward, the two sides will cultivate a group of able talents who can be put to good use in the digital-intelligent industry and contribute more to the development of China’s society.

During the meeting, both sides presented detailed overviews of their respective strengths in various disciplines. Prof. WANG gave a comprehensive overview of SEM’s research capabilities and innovative achievements in various fields. In return, UIUC shared its cutting-edge experiences and success stories in areas such as online MBA programs, global education and training initiatives. The two sides discussed in detail possible areas of cooperation, including English teaching and pedagogy training programs for faculty, accelerating undergraduate and master’s degree programs, online MBA programs and short, tailor-made study visits, etc.

Professor WANG emphasized the importance of international exchange and cooperation in education for Tongji SEM: “We are committed to fostering cooperation with top institutions like the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) in areas such as faculty training and MBA and EMBA programmes. Through such partnerships, we aim to continuously improve our international educational standards and institutional capabilities.”

Founded in 1867, UIUC enjoys a prestigious status alongside the University of California, Berkeley and the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, collectively known as the “Public Ivy trio of American public universities”. In particular, UIUC’s Gies College of Business boasts exceptional strength in accounting and finance, with its discipline of Accounting ranked No. 2 in the United States.

Ms. LIU Lina, a Shanghai non-heritage “tea culture” trainer, was invited to share her tea art course with the theme of “Full-blown Flowers in Four Seasons” in the activity. SEM teachers enthusiastically participated in the event and enjoyed a particularly meaningful “8 March” International Women’s Day tea tasting. 

At the beginning of the activity, Ms. DONG Bianlin, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee and Chairman of the Labour Union of Tongji SEM, extended her warm greetings and blessings to the female faculty and hoped that they would fully enjoy the festival.

The event began with a tea show, where everyone enjoyed the tea master’s demonstration of how to brew lotus tea, accompanied by meditative music. The tea master took a lotus flower and placed it in a transparent glass vessel. The bud slowly bloomed, curled up and smelled fresh.

Ms. Liu Lina also introduced the history and health knowledge of flower tea in detail. Led by the tea master, everyone experienced the brewing methods of different flower teas such as jasmine tea, lotus tea and white tea, etc. They tasted the fragrant tea, which was fragrant and had a long sweet aftertaste. While tasting the tea, everyone also enjoyed the traditional dessert of Song Dynasty, such as peach blossom pastry, and other Shanghai specialties.

Ms. Sophie SIMARD, Director of the International Development Department of Northern France Higher Business School, one of our partner institutions, was also invited to the tea party and experienced the Lotus Tea brewing process and enjoyed the unique charm of traditional Chinese tea culture with SEM teachers. She said that Chinese tea has deep cultural connotation and unique cultural beauty, from the production and brewing techniques to the matching tea utensils, and she was very happy to learn about Chinese tea culture with the staff of Tongji SEM.

During the tea party, each female teacher was given a copy of Blossoms Shanghai. At the same time, four male teachers and all female teachers were invited to perform the Shanghai version of the dubbing of the lines, recreating the classic scenes of Blossoms Shanghai. The lively and interesting performances won the applause of the audience, and everyone felt the cultural charm of the Shanghai dialect through laughter.

At the end of the party, each teacher received a tea bag, hoping that everyone can forget their worries, have a cup of tea, read and relax in their free time after work. In the future, the trade union of Tongji SEM will fully play its role, strengthen cultural construction, promote staff cohesion and contribute to the further development of SEM.

Journal: Management World

All authors: Cheng Mingwang (School of Economics and Management, Tongji University), Wei Xinyu (School of Economics and Management, Tongji University)

Keywords: legally binding contracts, labour protection system, migrant workers’ well-being

Introduction to the main content of the paper

Promoting the comprehensive development of rural migrant workers in building and sharing is the inevitable requirement of the Party Central Committee to “promote fairness and justice and improve people’s well-being”. Based on 4858 micro samples in Shanghai from 2015 to 2020, we empirically analyze the effects of labour contract binding and labour protection on the well-being of rural migrant workers and their mechanisms, using health as a proxy variable for well-being. The study finds that: (1) 84.64% of migrant workers have signed some form of contract with their employers, indicating that the promulgation and implementation of the Labour Contract Law has promoted the legalization of labour relations in the migrant labour market and the standardization of contract signing. 24.68% of migrant workers have been provided with five insurance policies and one pension by their employing enterprises, and 36.25% of migrant workers’ employing enterprises have purchased “five insurances and one pension”. 36.25% of migrant workers are employed by enterprises that strictly adhere to the working time system, and 56.98% of migrant workers are provided with food and beverage subsidies by their employing enterprises, indicating that the implementation of China’s labour protection system needs to be improved. (2) The more legally binding the labour contracts signed by migrant workers, the greater the incentives for their enterprises to enforce the labour protection system. The labour protection system plays an important intermediary role in the process of contract binding to promote the welfare of migrant workers. All three aspects of labour protection systems, namely social insurance, working time system and living welfare, significantly increase the level of well-being of migrant workers. (3) Further heterogeneity analyses revealed that the above phenomena were more significant in the sample of migrant workers with lower levels of education, employed in the service sector, and from regions with lower levels of institutional quality. This study is of great significance for promoting the well-being of migrant workers and even for achieving the goal of social justice in China.

Research Experience Sharing

The team has long focused on the “three rural issues”, particularly migrant workers. Since China’s Reform and Opening up, hundreds of millions of migrant workers have flocked to cities, contributing to China’s ‘growth miracle’. In our fieldwork and interviews, we found that migrant workers are still disadvantaged in the urban labour market. Some migrant workers do not sign employment contracts, and some employers do not implement labour protection systems. Protecting the rights and interests of migrant workers and improving their welfare are still serious problems. Based on this problem orientation, we established the theme of legally binding labour contracts and labour protection systems to improve the well-being of migrant workers. The cycle from writing to publication is almost 4 years. Repeated revisions and refinements have allowed us to experience the bitterness and joy of academic research. We are very grateful to the reviewers for their constructive comments on this article, who provided many very professional and detailed suggestions on the research background, theoretical hypotheses, robustness analysis and restructuring of the article, which significantly improved the quality of the article. We would also like to thank the editorial staff of Management World for their hard work, which is very professional, rigorous and responsible, and for carefully correcting all the details of this article. We would like to express our sincere thanks to the reviewers and editors!

Professor Profile

CHENG Minwang

Vice Dean of Tongji SEM; “Changjiang Scholar” Distinguished Professor of the Ministry of Education, “Young Changjiang Scholar”, “Oriental Scholar” (Shanghai Distinguished Professor), “Shuguang Scholar”, “Pujiang Talent”. Prof. CHENG has published more than 70 articles in top or important journals such as “Ecological Economics”, “Economic Research” and “Management World”. He has led over more than 10 major projects of the National Social Science Foundation of China, of the Ministry of Education for Philosophy and Social Science Research, of the National Social Science Foundation of China, and of the National Natural Science Foundation of China. He has won the first and second prizes of “Excellent Achievements in Scientific Research of Higher Education Institutions of the Ministry of Education”, the first, second and third prizes of “Excellent Achievements in Philosophy and Social Science of Shanghai”, and the “Zhang Peigang Award for Developmental Economics”. Economics Award”, etc.

Research areas: public policy and macroeconomic analysis, labour economics, development economics and human resource management.