Learning what the repair ledger could not explain alone

The repair ledger was one of the first records I learnt to question. A replacement valve could be booked correctly and still tell me very little about why the same section of network had required repeated attention. I joined Hengluan Heat Services in August 1996, shortly after completing my accounting degree at Qingzhen Institute of Applied Commerce. My early work involved checking invoices, matching them to authorised jobs and preparing schedules for the chief accountant. The numbers were important, but the people who understood the pipes knew why the work had become necessary.

That distinction shaped how I learnt. I accompanied the network cost team on planned visits and asked supervisors to explain the records they used. I did not assess the condition of equipment or challenge a technical safety instruction. I wanted to understand whether an invoice related to an urgent repair, a planned replacement or an extension that would serve new buildings. Those activities had different purposes and different consequences for future spending. Putting them under one maintenance heading made the ledger shorter while making the next decision harder.

In August 2002 I moved into network cost accounting. The company was extending its reach, and summer works had to fit into a limited period before heating resumed. I helped compare approved job scopes with contractor claims and recorded the reasons for changes. A higher bill was not automatically poor control. Unexpected ground conditions or a revised connection could change the work. My responsibility was to make the variation understandable and ensure the right people approved it, rather than make every project appear to finish at its original estimate.

I became treasury manager in August 2008. The move changed my view of the calendar. A profitable annual forecast could coexist with a difficult funding period before the heating season, when suppliers and contractors needed payment. Customer collections did not always arrive in the sequence assumed by the first budget. I worked with customer-service colleagues to separate balances that were simply awaiting payment from balances involving an unresolved account or service query. The distinction mattered to both the forecast and the way we approached the customer.

My appointment as financial controller in August 2014 brought reporting, treasury and operating finance into a wider remit. The general manager needed a clear explanation of how operating activity affected the financial result. I learnt to resist a convenient single cause for a favourable number. A lower heat-purchase cost per connected square metre could reflect milder weather, a different occupancy pattern or a technical improvement. Engineers and service colleagues helped interpret those changes. Finance had to preserve the comparison rather than select whichever explanation made the year look most successful.

I took the CFO role in August 2020. The board wanted better visibility of commitments before the winter programme was approved. I kept the existing control routines and added a review that brought treasury, customer operations and technical management into the same discussion of timing. Some colleagues worried that finance was creating another approval meeting. I tried to make the purpose narrower: identify what the company had already promised, what remained conditional and which decision needed attention before an option disappeared. A useful review should remove ambiguity, not become a second operating hierarchy.

One difficult discussion concerned a proposed network extension alongside a renewal programme. The extension had a visible growth story, while several existing sections needed work that residents might notice only if it was not done. I supported a staged extension after technical colleagues explained the renewal priorities. That meant postponing some expected connection receipts and accepting that our next season would show less expansion. It also meant protecting resources for the existing service rather than assuming that growth and renewal could both be delivered within the same contractor and funding capacity.

I have presented to the board for six years, but I have not served as a director. I value the difference between making a financial recommendation and sharing the board's collective responsibility. If I take an external seat, I would need to learn the new company's public-service commitments, ownership arrangements and technical risks before offering familiar answers. My experience is strongest where a service has long-lived assets and a sharp seasonal demand on cash. It is less relevant to trading electricity, financing a large generation portfolio or selecting a new energy technology. I would rather state those limits than let the word energy imply a career I have not had.

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