The S-Class Chairman Who Does It All Himself 58
Tap-tap-tap.
“Yes, customer. This is Hong Sejin from AK Capital Personal Credit Management Team 3.”
“Hello, customer. This is AK Capital…….”
With Department Manager Lee Jinhee’s entrance, the office came back to life.
“…….”
“…….”
“…….”
Of course, that didn’t apply to Team Leader Kim Donggeon and the staff of Personal Credit Management Team 1, who had been at the center of the mess. The other teams’ employees pretended to concentrate on their work, but their ears were pricked and every one of them had their attention fixed on Lee Jinhee.
“What happened here?”
“…….”
“…….”
“…….”
Lee Jinhee asked, looking at the employees of Personal Credit Management Team 1 nearest the door and then at Kim Donggeon, but no one opened their mouth. They sat there like mute idiots with honey in their mouths.
“Kim Donggeon.”
“Yes.”
“What happened here?”
“…….”
“Why aren’t you answering? I asked what happened.”
Lee Jinhee walked toward Team Leader Kim Donggeon, shoving aside the coins under her heels as she went. Each time she passed someone from Team 1, they lowered their head and avoided her eyes.
“Kim Donggeon.”
“……Yes.”
“Aren’t you the team leader?”
“……Yes.”
“I don’t know exactly what happened here. But one thing I do know.”
Lee Jinhee swept her gaze over the members of Personal Credit Management Team 1 one by one as she spoke.
“At the very least, this is no environment for people to be working in. Do you think they can work like this right now?”
“……No.”
Kim Donggeon had been hoping Lee Jinhee would lose her temper and give him a proper chewing-out. If she did, he could just beg forgiveness and somehow work out a solution. But she wasn’t angry now.
That was even scarier.
A superior who doesn’t get angry. Kim Donggeon understood better than anyone what that meant.
The reason was simple. Lee Jinhee had apparently decided there was no need to be angry at all. She didn’t look as if she intended to shield Kim Donggeon from discipline, and she certainly didn’t seem like she planned to defend him to the executives at headquarters.
So there was no reason for Lee Jinhee to be angry at Kim Donggeon. He could be made to write a written apology, docked pay, and if it came to it, she could even use today’s disaster to pile on every screw-up he’d ever made, strip him of his team leader position, demote him to ordinary staff, or in a severe case, force him out altogether.
“Team Leader Kim Donggeon.”
The title came after his name. Proof enough that she had no intention of letting this pass.
“Last chance. Report the facts exactly as they happened.”
“……Understood.”
Normally, Lee Jinhee would have called a subordinate into her office and heard the story in private, if only to preserve their dignity and mood. But not now. To be fair, every employee in the office had clearly seen and heard this whole fiasco anyway, so that part might not matter much……
It’s over……
That was what Kim Donggeon thought. He had to survive somehow, even if it meant going to Lee Jinhee alone, grabbing the hem of her trousers, and begging. But she didn’t seem inclined to give him that chance.
“Well…….”
With no choice left, like a cow being led to the slaughterhouse, Kim Donggeon had to recount everything exactly as it had happened. Even if he tried to embellish in his own favor, Lee Jinhee’s personality meant she would verify the facts with the other employees. A clumsy lie would only tighten the noose around his own neck.
“Hoo…… Do Jaehyun…….”
Lee Jinhee let out a sigh and ran a rough hand through her hair.
“Huh? What did you just say?”
“…….”
Kim Donggeon reacted to the faintly heard name, Do Jaehyun, but Lee Jinhee only glared at him sharply without saying a word.
“Am I supposed to report what I said to the team leader?”
“No, I’m sorry.”
“Haah…….”
Lee Jinhee glanced at her wrist to check the time. Under normal circumstances it was a luxury watch that made her feel good just looking at it, but right now she felt like tearing it off and slapping Kim Donggeon across the face with it.
No matter how the mess had started, Lee Jinhee was still ultimately responsible for everything that happened in the credit management department.
And if she ended up on the front page over something this absurd, the department heads in other divisions who were fighting with her for a board seat in the subsidiary would be the only ones applauding.
Especially the head of Financial Planning, Mr. Kim, and the head of Risk Management, Mr. Jeong. They were the kind of people who would clasp their hands and pray for Lee Jinhee to make even one small mistake.
“Team Leader Kim Donggeon.”
“Yes, Manager.”
“There’s one hour left until the work deadline. So what should you be doing now?”
“I, first…….”
Kim Donggeon trailed off and shot helpless looks around the office, but no one came to his aid. No, it would almost have been better if they had merely ignored him. Instead, quite a few of them openly threw him looks filled with hostility and ridicule, expressions that usually never showed on their faces.
“We need to organize today’s work and r-report it. And we also need to report the collection rate, and together with the other team leaders, settle the amount of outstanding debt that hasn’t been recovered yet to see how much is left to reach the target.”
“Is that so?”
“……Yes.”
“Then of course you’ve already prepared your end-of-day report.”
“That’s right.”
Kim Donggeon’s face brightened slightly. The unusual incident of the day had already been reported in full with the mood of a man going to the slaughterhouse, and all that remained was the performance report. And fortunately for him, thanks to the chaos earlier, Personal Credit Management Team 1 no longer had any debt left to collect.
In other words, there had been an incident, but they had still achieved first place among the credit management teams by being the first to recover every single account.
“There was an unfortunate accident today, but Personal Credit Management Team 1 recovered all debts with a Perfect result.”
“Perfect?”
“Yes.”
“You recovered everything?”
“Th-that’s right.”
“Then you can let the employees go home early, I suppose.”
“Pardon?”
Something was wrong.
“Or do they still have work to do? You said they hit Perfect, didn’t you?”
If it had been a normal day, he could have sent the staff home early in good spirits. Unless the neighboring team was groaning and begging for help, of course. It was the end of the month too, and above all, Kim Donggeon’s team performance had been achieved perfectly. He could even have told the employees to leave early and take annual leave tomorrow, the last day of the month.
Then he himself could come in tomorrow, brag about being the month’s top performer, whip up the end-of-month settlement and performance report, and spend the rest of the day loafing around.
“W-well…….”
It was fine to send them home…… but for some reason, it still felt a little off.
What was it?
“There’s not even an hour left until quitting time. Your people have already hit the goal, so why keep them here? So what are you going to do? By your own logic, the employees have nothing left to do, and all the team leader has to do is settle the accounts, right?”
“That’s right, Manager.”
Kim Donggeon stopped thinking any further. In fact, he should send the employees home, then use the team settlement report as an excuse to get Lee Jinhee alone and apologize to her properly once more. And whatever happened, he needed to stress that despite the crisis, they had still finished first in performance and ask her to smooth things over for him today.
“Everyone, you can go home.”
At Kim Donggeon’s words, the employees of Personal Credit Management Team 1 quickly grabbed their things and left the office. A part of them wanted to stay and see how this would all end, but after the stress they had taken today, they just wanted to get out of this damned place and have a beer.
“Team Leader Kim Donggeon.”
“Yes, Manager.”
“What is a team leader’s core authority?”
“Yes, the most important thing is…….”
“No, let me rephrase.”
Just as Kim Donggeon tried to answer, Lee Jinhee cut him off with a wave of her hand.
“Honestly, I could just manage one hundred ordinary employees by myself. So why do we even need the position of team leader? What does a team leader do?”
“W-well…….”
“I think I’ve said this a few times before. Don’t you remember?”
Kim Donggeon’s face went white. But there was no room to dither and delay answering here.
“A team leader…….”
“A team leader what?”
“Someone who helps employees work without worrying, and supports them so they can produce the best results…… that’s what you said.”
“Is that all?”
“…….”
“Is that all?”
“…….”
“Not answering?”
It was a dressing-down.
To any ordinary Korean man, it looked exactly like the kind of verbal pounding one might get in the army or at a male-dominated company. But Kim Donggeon couldn’t answer. This was the same style of speech he used when bullying his own team members, and now that he was the one on the receiving end, he could feel firsthand how miserable it was.
“If that’s all a team leader is responsible for, then should I, as a department manager, take responsibility for team leaders’ actions only to the same extent that Kim Donggeon takes responsibility for his employees?”
“Manager! That’s……?!”
Kim Donggeon’s voice shot up into a higher register before he even realized it. There was a blade hidden in Lee Jinhee’s words.
If you’re only going to take responsibility for that much, then I’ll take responsibility for you only to that same extent. I have no intention of protecting you any further, and no intention of taking your side.
That’s fair, isn’t it?
“What? You think that’s unfair?”
“No……”
Do Jaehyun.
Now Do Jaehyun surfaced in Kim Donggeon’s mind. The style Lee Jinhee was using now, her tone, the way she spoke. If Do Jaehyun were just a little older and held a position like Lee Jinhee’s, he would absolutely talk exactly like her.
“Last chance. What does a team leader do?”
“A team leader is someone who takes responsibility for everything that happens when team members carry out the tasks assigned by the team leader.”
“Right. That’s it. But there are exceptions, aren’t there?”
“……You said that incidents and accidents arising from a team member carrying out something the team leader did not assign on their own are not the team leader’s responsibility.”
“Good. Can you stand by that as a team leader?”
There was only one answer Kim Donggeon could give here.
“Yes. I can take responsibility for it.”
If he said he wouldn’t take responsibility, then Lee Jinhee would not take responsibility for him either.
“Then why did you give me a false report? Even after I clearly gave you your last chance?”
“No. I didn’t lie. I really didn’t.”
At Kim Donggeon’s voice of absolute certainty, Lee Jinhee pinched the bridge of her nose.
“Are you just stupid, or do you really think I’ll let this slide without checking anything?”
“W-what? Absolutely not, Manager. Me trying to fool you? Never.”
Lee Jinhee tapped her foot lightly, kicking away the ten-won coins.
“You said Perfect, didn’t you? Are the coins rolling around on this floor really worth twelve million won? And if they are worth twelve million won, wasn’t the original payoff amount eleven-point-something million? You’d already issued the discharge certificate, so the company was supposed to transfer the remaining difference. Did you check the amount properly?”
“Th-that…….”
“You said Perfect, didn’t you? If I believed only your word, approved that Team 1 had met its target, and filed my report, what do you think would happen to me? Would I get praised for doing well and cover for you, or would I get cursed out by the president for not even checking something like this properly, with both me and my subordinate getting torn apart the same way?”
Kim Donggeon’s face turned ghost-white.
“I-I’m sorry…….”