Chapter 643 Independent Prime Minister
In December, throughout the winter, the main force of the Taishan Army, 50,000 troops, spent the winter in the Taiyuan Basin.
Although the war was over, Zhang Chong still had no time to spare, because he was devoting most of his energy to reforming the central decision-making system.
As a new group, especially since this group was almost built by Zhang Chong with victorious efforts, Zhang Chong naturally has supreme decision-making power. This is beyond doubt.
Coupled with Zhang Chong's superhuman physique, he has infinite energy to deal with large and small matters. Therefore, even during the Yecheng period, the three provinces and six ministries system had been formed. But these people were just praise paintings, and the final decision-making power was still In Zhang Chong's hands.
It was okay that Zhang Chong had stayed in the center of Yecheng before, but as he led the shogunate on an expedition and it was obvious that he would stay in Taiyuan for a long time, this decision-making system became a bit outdated.
Because if everything was decided by Zhang Chong as in the past, it would still be too late to cover the long distance from Yecheng to Taiyuan.
In fact, Zhang Chong had already discovered this problem during his management of Taiyuan, but he was busy with the war at that time, and because reforming the decision-making system was too important, Zhang Chong kept it in his mind.
It was on this winter day that Zhang Chong had enough energy to start solving this problem.
However, although low decision-making efficiency is a problem, it does not mean that it can be reformed casually.
Throughout the ages, the most important core power of any group is decision-making power.
Who makes the decision, how the decision is made, what is the basis for the decision, the efficiency of decision-making and execution, and how well the decision is executed can all determine the direction and rise or fall of a group.
It was precisely because of this importance that Zhang Chong thought about it behind closed doors for a long time before he finally got some clues.
First of all, in terms of the decision-making group, Zhang Chong still believes in the seven disciples selected before. These people also represent different interest groups under the Taishan Army.
Zhang Chong knows very well that no matter how superhuman he is, there are only twelve hours in a day. This is an iron law of nature and has nothing to do with biological diversity.
Therefore, in order to deal with today's huge territory on a daily basis, Zhang Chong must authorize these his most trusted and talented subordinates and let them form the core decision-making group with him.
Zhang Chong also did this before. He first divided the civil and military affairs, that is, the civil affairs department had the political affairs hall, and the military affairs department had the privy council, each of which was responsible for its own affairs.
The political affairs hall is actually Zhang Chong's secretarial team, seven subordinates, and six ministers discussing together. If there is no objection, the decree can be implemented.
But now that Zhang Chong is leading his army in Taiyuan, not only is he not there, but his team of secretaries have also been brought to Taiyuan, so the original political hall cannot be opened. After all, the most important decision-maker is not here, the person who issued the edict is not here, and even the seal is not here.
Therefore, Yecheng's political hall can actually only handle some routine work. Especially serious or unexpected situations need to be quickly conveyed to Zhang Chong's marching shogunate to decide on the draw, which can be said to be very inefficient.
In order to improve the efficiency of decision-making, Zhang Chong thought of empowering the seven subordinates of Yecheng Political Hall.
First of all, Zhang Chong classifies all decisions first.
The first is the most important imperial meeting. This is a meeting attended by Zhang Chong and all central officials. It is scheduled on the 1st and 15th of each month. The two days are also called Shuo Ri and Wangri, so they are also called this within the Taishan Army. It’s the morning ginseng at the end of the lunar month.
On the one hand, this kind of meeting is where Zhang Chong announces important decisions. For example, when he decided on the candidate for Prince Wang, he announced it at the meeting.
The other way is to give the officials in Yecheng a direct opportunity to Zhang Chong. Zhang Chong knows very well that no matter how public-minded the seven disciples he selected are, they are also human beings and have their own likes and dislikes, so what is reported below is very Naturally, it will be pressed under the door.
But now Shuo Wangchao Shen has given middle and lower-level officials a loophole in the system, allowing them to bypass the bureaucratic administrative rules and report directly to Zhang Chong.
This not only enhances the activity of officials, but also because only by opening up the public can Zhang Chong better understand what is happening below and be clear about it.
In addition to this kind of large dynasty involving a large number of people, there is also a more daily regular dynasty.
The regular court was also held by Zhang Chong, usually from morning to noon every day. The number of participants would be smaller, and they were all senior military and political officials.
In the Taishan Army system, the rank of officials can be simply divided into three grades: high, medium and low.
Among them, all officials below Qianshi are low-level officials, and they can be three levels of six hundred stones, Biqianshi and Qianshi.
Then there are mid-level officials between Qian Shi and Two Thousand Shi. The specific grades are also divided into three levels, namely, one thousand six hundred Shi, two thousand Shi, and two thousand Shi.
Finally, there are the senior officials, all of whom are worth more than 2,000 dan. It is also divided into three levels, namely three thousand stones, four thousand stones and five thousand stones.
This kind of ranking order is also called the third level and nine grades because of the three ladders and nine divisions.
Therefore, those who can participate in the Chang Dynasty are almost all the veteran generals and senior officials of the Taishan Army, and they are all the leaders and their deputies of various lines in the center.
Moreover, senior military officials also have to participate in this kind of regular court, but they do not need to attend every day, only one court every three days.
During Zhang Chong's time in Yecheng, most of the meetings he held were regular court meetings. All major military and state affairs were discussed, and all official reports were discussed. However, they only discussed major matters and did not decide on minor matters.
In addition to the above two kinds of meetings, there is another kind of meeting called the political hall meeting. The number of participants in this meeting is all the sect members, which is more confidential and more effective.
But now because of Zhang Chong's absence, the political hall meeting has been suspended, so what he is thinking about now is to solve this problem.
He thought about it over and over for more than ten days, and finally decided to set up a "prime minister" system among all the sects.
In fact, during the Yecheng period, all the officials knew very well that the so-called subordinates were actually no different from the three princes of the Han family. In fact, they were all prime ministers, but there were more people.
Among the seven, according to the arrangement of seats, they are also divided into first and second seats, so Zhang Chong proposed that this prime minister is not difficult to understand.
And everyone also knows that this person must be Zhang Chong's important partner in starting a business, and he is now the chief disciple of the Taishan Army, Duman.
But if this was just a convention in the past, now Zhang Chong has to confirm this in the system.
The prime minister's responsibility is to attend and preside over political affairs meetings when Zhang Chong is away, and can directly draft political documents for circulation to the six ministers.
It can be said that Zhang Chong directly handed over the decision-making power of political affairs to Duman, while he was mainly responsible for the military and state affairs of the Taiyuan shogunate.
This level of decentralization is not insignificant.
Zhang Chong hesitated at first and thought of using a collective decision-making method, allowing seven subordinates to discuss government affairs together, and then reach a consensus through consultation before finally making a decision.
But Zhang Chong knew something was wrong after thinking about it.
Because the so-called consensus has always been a false proposition. Duman and the other seven people all represent different implementation concepts, so how can everything be coordinated.
Moreover, this method will cause greater consequences, that is, selfishness will destroy the public spirit.
For example, if a policy is obviously a good thing, but it requires the joint approval of seven people before it can be implemented, then if one of them disagrees, the policy may be invalidated. So how do you convince such people to agree? It was nothing more than a private promise.
This kind of voting politics is something Zhang Chong has always hated. This single consequence made Zhang Chong give up this idea.
Therefore, the joint decision-making by the seven people was just in vain. In the end, what they ended up with was either cliques for personal gain, or they were just wrangling and failing to get anything done.
The reason why Zhang Chong is willing to decentralize power is to let his subordinates solve problems effectively, not to play some power game.
However, there is certainly a problem here, that is, once the power of the prime minister is concentrated in one person, will his power be too great?
Zhang Chong also hesitated on this point. He even thought about letting these seven disciples take turns for a month, so as to avoid the concentration of power in the hands of one person.
But in the end Zhang Chong gave up.
Zhang Chong considers himself to be ambitious, and some of the things he does are not superficial scribblings in a year or two, but major things that really change the world.
In terms of implementation, the most taboo thing about this kind of thing is that the order is changed from day to day, and there is no coherence in the policy.
Therefore, although the rotation of the prime minister is convenient for Zhang Chong, it is not beneficial to the country.
After much deliberation, Zhang Chong decided to let Duman take full charge of central political affairs to stabilize his rear.
Since Xiao He could do this in the past, Zhang Chong believed that his situation was no smaller than that of Liu Bang.
After that, Zhang Chong wrote down all the envisioned prime minister system in his own hand. The content not only involved the decision-making reform of the central government, but also included local reports, supervision of political affairs, the format and format of the Prime Minister's edict of the political hall. Seals can be said to be involved in all aspects.
Of course, Zhang Chong has no political childishness. He knows better than anyone else who reports to whom, which means who is responsible for whom. In the long run, political affairs must belong to the prime minister.
But this does not mean that Zhang Chong has no ideas about political affairs. On the contrary, his ambition must be implemented through administration. Therefore, in order to prevent the ruling route from deviating from the established framework, Zhang Chong still left several constraints on the political affairs hall.
One is reporting constraints. That is to say, the Prime Minister must send a file of his decisions to Taiyuan every month so that Zhang Chong can understand the current political situation.
One is supervisory restriction, that is, the censors of the Supervisory Yuan can criticize policies and have the right to send memorials directly to the Taiyuan shogunate.
The other is the refutation constraint. That is to say, the six senior officials have the final power to refute the decision-making of the Zhengshitang. If they have any objections, they can report it to Taiyuan Xingzai for a decision.
This is the wartime decision-making system that Zhang Chong worked hard to come up with.
Nowadays, Zhang Chong is actually trying to cross the river by feeling the stones. Whether this reform of decision-making power is appropriate or not, Zhang Chong himself does not know.
But no matter good or bad, Zhang Chong has enough confidence to control the situation. If it goes well, continue. If something goes wrong with the execution, cancel it.
This is the confidence of a pioneer.
……
In the next few days, Zhang Chong continued to improve this article. Finally, after discussing it with some staff, he sent someone to Yecheng for discussion among his disciples.
After finally finishing all this work, Zhang Chong had some free time. On this day, the last day of November, Zhang Chong held a banquet in the Taiyuan shogunate and invited Xun You and others to appreciate the plum blossoms.
Everyone was talented in literature, and some of the prince's disciples in the crowd also recognized the interest and praised Zhang Chong one after another by chanting plum blossoms.
Zhang Chong was naturally indifferent to such flattery, but listening to the rhythmic lyrics and looking at the proud Mei Xue outside the pavilion, he couldn't help but feel relaxed and happy.
But facts show that for a leader of power like Zhang Chong, even half a day off is a luxury.
Just as Zhang Chong was listening to Wen Hui chanting plum blossoms, a flying army hurried in and handed over a message.
The person who sent this letter was none other than Dong Zhao, who had been traveling to hear the news for more than ten days. There was another copy under Dong Zhao's letter. Judging from the feathers and seals on it, we knew it was information from the Central Plains.
Zhang Chong did not dare to be rude, and waved his hand to stop Wen Hui from continuing to sing. Although this person's aria was quite pleasant, it was just a way of entertainment.
Wen Hui was also a talented man from Taiyuan. Seeing that he missed the opportunity to dedicate a speech to King Zhang, the regret on his face was visible to the naked eye.
But no one dared to disturb Zhang Chong. He just flipped through the paper, reading Dong Zhao's letter ten lines at a glance, and finally couldn't help laughing:
"I didn't expect that Dong Zhao would give me such a big surprise without saying a word."
No wonder Zhang Chong was so happy. It turned out that Dong Zhao used some method to convince the Pei family to join the Taishan Army for more than ten days after hearing the news.
And where is Wenxi where Pei is located? That was the only intersection for the Taishan Army to lead to Luoyang. Zhang Chong was originally worried that because Pei Ye committed suicide, the Pei family would definitely intercept him on Wenxi Mountain Road.
And now this news sent by Dong Zhao, isn't it a blessing from the Taishan Army?
With this happiness, Zhang Chong continued to read the next military report, and read it carefully, but in the end he only sighed.
Suddenly, someone from one side suddenly asked:
"Why does the king sigh?"
Zhang Chong turned around and saw that the person who asked this question was his confidential aide Xun You.
Although there were some scribes from Taiyuan present, Zhang Chong still said frankly without hesitation:
"I marvel at how many heroes there are in the world."
Then he handed the military report in his hand to Xun You. Xun You read it quickly and understood why the king sighed like this.
It turned out that not long after Zhang Chong captured Taiyuan, Yuan Shao of Yuzhou finally captured Jiangxia, and his troops were approaching Xiangyang.
The biggest turning point in the Battle of Jiangxia was that the local Huang family finally changed their tune and joined Yuan Shao. It was under their persuasion that Huang Zu, who was surrounded by Yuan Jun general Ju Yi in the city of Jiangxia, agreed to surrender.
Putting the military report on the desk, Xun You shared Zhang Chong's worries:
"The king is worried that our army will focus on the west and let Yuan Shao from the Central Plains take the opportunity to expand."
Zhang Chong nodded. He didn't expect Yuan Shao to be so capable. Didn't he agree that it was a bag? Why is it that when he comes here, Yuan Shao looks like a hero?
First, he lay dormant in Runan, then raised the flag in Runan, and then in an instant, he pretended to be in the Central Plains, and even turned around and jumped into Jingzhou. It was really the standard of recruiting.
Originally, he thought that Yuan Shao's sudden rise had an unstable foundation. Who would have thought that Yuan Shao would later develop a manor warrior model, imitate his land distribution strategy, and suddenly stabilize a large base.
It can be said that the person Zhang Chong misjudged the most was Yuan Shao.
Could it be said that Yuan Shao is really a genius? A hero?
But then Xun You's words made Zhang Chong clear away the clouds and see the truth.