I once worked as a white-collar employee at a private company. During our first training session, the boss declared: "The loyalty of every employee is the company's greatest asset." We took his words to heart. In other words, an employee's loyalty to the company essentially means loyalty to the boss—and rightly so, since he leads us in conquering the market.After working there for half a year, I observed that everyone around me was extremely obedient to the boss, moving in perfect unison. With assets worth hundreds of millions, he was practically a "god" in the eyes of his employees.
But no matter how sharp the boss was, even tigers doze off. Once, when the sales department had just secured a batch of projects, my naturally fearless and straightforward nature kicked in. If I saw a colleague making a mistake in business matters, I'd call it out. Our supervisor had once made an error in a deal, and I had called him out on it.On one occasion, the boss was extremely confident about a particular product. He planned to fly to Beijing the following week to sign a bulk order with the supplier. During the pre-meeting analysis, he laid out his perspective, and everyone nodded in agreement. At that moment, I stood up, my face flushed, and voiced my dissent. I argued that the price of this product might drop in the second half of the year and that market demand might not be significant. This viewpoint was a complete 180-degree turn from the boss's market outlook.After an awkward silence, everyone clearly sided with the boss, almost pointing at me and saying, "What do you know, you kid!" Later, I visited the boss's office several times to urge against signing this major deal, warning it would severely damage the company. Each time, I was scolded out of the office by the boss and several vice presidents. When the boss and his entourage flew to Beijing to sign the contract, I resigned.
Half a year later, the market indeed took a nosedive, proving this "greenhorn" right. The boss lost over ten million yuan in direct and indirect losses. The vice presidents who had sided with him fell silent, humbled by the market's harsh lesson. The boss brooded for a while. When he finally snapped out of it, he issued an order to his department: Find this "greenhorn" by any means necessary.Finally, two vice presidents tracked me down and learned I'd moved to Shenzhen for new opportunities. The next day, they flew to Shenzhen and found me working at a large corporation. When they explained their mission, I felt a pang of nostalgia for my former employer. Plus, my wife and children didn't want me to leave home for work. After returning to the company, the boss appointed me as Executive Vice President.
From then on, whenever new employees joined the company, the boss completely changed his explanation of loyalty. He told them: "Employees who fight for the company's profits in the market—that is the greatest loyalty to the enterprise. Never treat the boss like a 'god.'" At that moment, we all smiled knowingly at the boss's wisdom.