The Gap Between Drive and Ability
Lee Seonghun’s father had been a businessman.
But not anymore.
He had been a businessman before Seonghun was even born, until the day his company went under when Seonghun was in middle school.
Back then, Seonghun’s father blamed himself hard.
“I just didn’t understand management well enough.”
Every time he drank, that was what he said, and hearing it over and over made Seonghun take an interest in management himself.
In fact, up until his first year of high school, he had been leaning toward the humanities track.
He thought that if he became good at management, his father might be able to become an energetic businessman again.
“Um, the school told us to talk it over with our parents about whether to go humanities or sciences,” he said.
“Oh?”
“Yeah. I was thinking maybe I’d go humanities and then major in business administration.”
But his parents saw things differently.
“It’s your choice, of course, but if you go into the sciences, it’ll be easier to find a job. You’ll also have a better shot at a stronger school.”
The collapse of the family business had been a huge shock to the household.
Thanks to the loving, caring atmosphere in his family, Seonghun had grown up without any rough edges, but his parents’ obsession with stability was even stronger than he had realized.
“We just want you to grow up safely and steadily.”
So when his parents told him that cautiously, Seonghun could only agree at once.
He was admitted to Korea University’s upper-tier Computer Engineering program through early admission.
But after entering as the top of his class, the general education courses he took to cure his boredom—and the club activities he joined—ended up changing the career path he wanted to follow.
“Lately, marketing and management seem pretty interesting. I think I might be good at them, too.”
Seonghun’s family talked a lot.
Because of that, he had grown up hearing stories from his father about business, and he’d developed the habit of taking those examples and applying them on his own.
Thanks to that, he won prizes in various contests, big and small, and his parents began to recognize his potential as well.
“Are you thinking of changing majors now?”
His parents had no intention of forcing any choice on him.
They believed they had no right to do that.
Still, Seonghun could see immediately how grim their expressions were at the word change majors.
He was also well aware of his family’s circumstances—they were still living in a two-room villa.
“No. I want to keep my major and try to get into a better university. That way, even if things get really hard later, it’ll be easier to find work again as a developer.”
“Ah. Then that’s fine! Do whatever you want!”
Watching his parents’ faces brighten so clearly, Seonghun only smiled.
And then he set deadlines for his own plans.
Transfer to Korea University within two years at the latest, then gain marketing or sales experience before graduation.
After that, decide on a career path in the year he graduated from Korea University.
So Seonghun truly lived hard.
Even while working part-time and catching up with his major coursework, he never neglected the business classes and self-study in marketing.
Of course, he won nearly every domestic conglomerate contest he entered.
“At this point, I really do think I’ve got talent.”
In an environment that was far from easy, Seonghun kept living brightly, shining all the same.
And along with that came confidence in himself.
When he entered TA Medical and was impressed by Kim Siwon’s results, he still vaguely believed that he himself could do the same.
So this time, too, he wasn’t worried about making the marketing promotional materials on his own.
“Siwon-nim~ I sent the promotional material plan by email!”
“Yes, please explain it at tomorrow’s meeting.”
“If you’re not busy right now, how about we go to the conference room and talk there?”
“Ah. Yes, sure.”
Seonghun felt excited.
He thought this would be the moment he’d finally be recognized by Kim Siwon, a man who had all the talent of a manager without even taking a single business class.
He thought it would be the moment a talented person acknowledged his own talent, and he could decide his future with complete confidence.
“I reserved the meeting room! Let’s go~”
“Yep~”
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
My older brother Seonghun’s presentation materials were really pretty.
Even though they were for just the two of us to use, they were incredibly neat, from the graphs to the rough draft of the promotional materials.
And the way he explained them was calm and dependable, too.
“That’s all.”
That was it.
> Keep your expression under control.
On my laptop screen, Badugi urgently popped up a speech bubble.
So I consciously kept my face composed, too.
“If you have any questions or feedback, please let me know.”
With my brother’s proud, confident expression in front of me, I only nodded silently at a loss for words.
His materials were very well made, in the way a college student’s work would be.
By the standards of a fresh graduate you might often see at a company, they were good, but from the perspective of a startup that needed something usable in the real world right away, they were a little ambiguous.
> If you give him honest feedback, he’ll probably get hurt, right?
> I’ll write the lines for you, so just read them in a voice that sounds purely curious.
It was a situation so awkward that even Badugi, who almost never stepped in directly, was rushing to help.
On one side was my brother, overflowing with confidence; on the other, me, who had to quickly turn that into something fit for the field.
I had only ever remembered Seonghun as a polished, fully developed CBO, so I calmly read out exactly what Badugi told me to say.
“Seonghun-nim. Could you maybe explain the competitor analysis section on the fourth slide a little more in detail?”
I couldn’t say I was good at marketing, but looking at what my brother had made, there were too many things I wanted to fix.
So even beyond the parts Badugi pointed out, the desire to give feedback kept bursting up inside me.
> Shouldn’t we also tell him to revise the market-size estimate on slide three, where he included the pharmaceutical company market too?
> Teach him next time when you’re free. There are forty slides already. If you nitpick every detail, this’ll never end.
Without understanding any of that, my brother continued with an even more confident explanation of his slides.
“Seonghun-nim. Just because two competitors once held offline events for patients doesn’t mean we can pour the marketing budget into offline events.”
“Why not? Because the B2C tendency is strong?”
“In the current situation, yes.”
“Siwon-nim. I think we all need to break out of those classic frameworks.”
“Pardon?”
The problem was how confident my brother sounded.
Maybe because he had worked so hard and poured so much passion into the presentation, his certainty in his own logic was immense.
“Shall we go back to the SWOT analysis page and talk a bit more?”
Fortunately, once we started discussing the market from the ground up, my brother slowly began to look flustered.
He was finding the holes in the logic he’d built for himself, one by one.
“I’m sorry.”
Every time that happened, he quietly apologized to me.
“Huh? No, you don’t need to apologize. It’s your first time doing this, isn’t it? We can figure it out together, one step at a time.”
Of course, I had no intention of hearing apologies from him.
It was obvious from the fact that every answer he gave had logic behind it that he hadn’t done this carelessly.
Besides, I had seen plenty of fresh graduates in my previous life, and I knew very well that my brother was far better than the average one.
“Still, even though Siwon-nim is doing this for the first time too, I’m so lacking.”
Then the real problem happened.
Seonghun started crying in streams.
“Huh?”
“Oh? No, ah. I’m sorry.”
He hurriedly covered his face, and I hurriedly jumped up in a panic to grab some tissues.
“I’m sorry. Really. It’s my fault for not doing well.”
“No, seriously, it’s not that you did badly. We were just discussing it together.”
“No, you’re the one fixing everything I failed to do properly, Siwon-nim. I’m sorry for crying, too.”
No, I only said what Badugi told me to say!?
Seeing someone older than me cry because of me made my mind go completely blank.
We had been talking in nothing but cushioned, gentle language, but once someone started crying while listening to me, I had no idea what to do.
> He must have worked his ass off because he really wanted to do well. Praise the parts he did well, fast.
Badugi offered its own solution, and I immediately did exactly what it said.
“Seonghun-nim—no, older brother Seonghun. You really did amazingly well. Don’t cry.”
“No, in the end I’m just making you do the work twice. Ha.”
“What do you mean, no, seriously, brother, your PPT was really well made. Every page looked like a promotional piece.”
“Marketing is about planning, not design.”
That was true enough.
At my brother’s logical rebuttal, I lost my words again.
The only other thing I could think to say was, “You did well for your experience and age,” but even I could tell that would be utterly useless.
“I wasn’t crying so I could get comfort or praise. I’m embarrassed that I cried too. Sorry.”
“Stop saying sorry. It sounds like I should be the one apologizing.”
“No. I think I just got embarrassed because I was so bad at this. Sorry. Let’s talk about the work again.”
Could we even talk about work in this situation?
And “talk about work” still just meant more feedback.
> Let’s review the A4 leaflet on slide 26. Ask whether design elements without a message about the product can be left out.
My brother looked at the laptop screen with an expression that seemed to say he wanted to act as if nothing had happened.
Badugi told me to just keep giving feedback, so after a little hesitation, I followed it again.
“Then should we move on to slide 26?”
“Yes.”
Watching my brother, eyes swollen red, burning with determination was strangely heartbreaking.
The quiet desperation in him made my chest ache, too.
But instead of trying to comfort him further, I stayed faithful to exactly what Badugi told me to say.
I praised the good parts in between, pointed out the parts that needed revision, and because I wasn’t just asking for simple editing but explaining the reasoning behind everything one by one, far more time passed than we’d planned.
Knock, knock.
“Sorry, but the room was reserved for us at this time.”
“Ah. Yes. Sorry.”
“Yes, yes.”
Before long, the next group waiting for the room knocked and came in, and our meeting came to an abrupt end.
It was also time for me to go meet the professors in the research labs that Professor Shin Dongjin had introduced me to.
“Seonghun-nim, I think I’ll be in meetings for about two hours. What time are you heading home today?”
“I think I’ll still be here when you come back.”
“Ah. Then let’s finish this later! Go to a café and buy yourself a drink on me!”
I handed my brother the corporate card, and he thanked me with an empty smile.
For now, this was the only thing I could do.
“See you later!”
So even if it felt a little uncertain, all I could do was send him off first.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
“Everyone~ I bought coffee with Siwon-nim’s corporate card~”
When Lee Seonghun returned to the club room, several people immediately noticed his swollen eyes.
Those who noticed worried that perhaps Seonghun had gotten into an argument with Kim Siwon.
But right now, Seonghun didn’t have even a shred of negative feeling toward Kim Siwon—far from it.
Rather, he was in a state of total awakening, driven by a burning desire to be recognized by him.
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