The 10-year journey of thought since graduating from university

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After graduating from university in 2006, I signed a contract with a coal chemical company affiliated with a large state-owned enterprise (I majored in chemical engineering and technology). When I first started working at that state-owned enterprise, there were four people from our major in total: three men and one woman. The first month was spent in the workshop for practical training, and I was assigned to work on coke ovens. Since the factory had just been built and many things on site hadn’t been cleaned up yet, production started right away; as a result, there was a great deal to move around. I was quite thin at that time, and I felt exhausted every day, but I persisted anyway. The decision to leave this state-owned enterprise came from the fact that the relationship among colleagues changed as soon as I started working there. At that time, the person who mainly guided us was a young technician who was very respected in the workshop (in state-owned enterprises, such people are called technicians). All of us men worked under his supervision, and one of my colleagues began to try to ingratiate himself with this technician by inviting him for drinks, taking him out to eat, and giving him gifts. I consider myself fairly honest, so I disdain doing such things; I think it’s sufficient to just do my own job – there’s no need to engage in those activities. Another classmate is even more awkward, so they certainly wouldn’t do such things either. As these things happened, the relationships between everyone gradually faded away. Moreover, that student who knew how to handle things started to get closer to that instructor; all the easier tasks and those that would yield quick results were given to him, and he was always asked to participate in everything. Gradually, I realized that the relationships in state-owned enterprises were too complicated; I had to rely on my own abilities to make a living, rather than relying on connections to get ahead. Looking back now, I realize just how naive I was at that time. I simply resigned and left. It’s difficult to get into and stay in state-owned enterprises; when I left, they demanded that I pay a huge amount of money as compensation. Damn it, even my entire monthly salary isn’t enough to cover that amount. So I simply went to see the union leader. Fortunately, he was a good person; he told me, “Kid, I really want to help you, but you have to understand that we’re just for show – our words don’t count, so you’ll have to rely on yourself!” ” In the end, I found out that the general manager was my senior teacher. With no other choice, I turned to our dean; he made a phone call, and I paid a symbolic sum of a few hundred dollars as compensation before leaving my job. After leaving my job, I had planned to try my luck in Shanghai. I’m from the north, and I’ve always wanted to see the south, so I decided to go to Shanghai. Since my sister is in Jiangsu, I came here to Jiangsu first to settle down, with the intention of going to Shanghai once I find a job. But due to a series of unfortunate coincidences, when I left the school, there was an error in the ID information recorded on my household registration; and when I resigned, I accidentally lost my ID card as well. As a result, I became officially an unregistered person. After arriving in Yangzhou, I spent every day at my sister’s house, submitting various resumes online. It turned out that none of those resumes received any response; no company called me at all. I’ve been here for almost a month now; I left my previous job in July. The weather in Jiangsu is extremely hot in August, and since I haven’t been able to find a new job, I’m feeling really bad and under a lot of stress. I mustered up the courage to call many large coal chemical companies. Although I was reluctant to work in the coal chemical industry again, it was better to have a job than none at all. Eventually, a large coal chemical company in Shanxi agreed to hire me and asked me to come for a brief interview before starting work. Although very reluctant, there was no other way. It was just when I had already bought a train ticket for the next day, packed my luggage, and got ready to set off the following day. That afternoon, I received a call from a paint manufacturing company; they asked me to go for an interview right away. I was extremely excited and rushed off to the interview. It went well, and it was their chief engineer who conducted the interview (this person later became my mentor). They told me to start working the next day. I called Shanxi and expressed my sincere apologies. That night, as I lay in bed, I thought to myself that I was finally free. Even though this job might just be a temporary solution, at least this grown-up guy no longer had to stay at home. I went to work the next day. I started by working in the production workshop; the task was quite simple – it involved transporting various paint buckets from the warehouse to the workshop and then filling them together with the factory workers. Those heavy paint buckets weighed 50 kilograms each, so two people were needed to carry them, and by the end of the day my arms felt like they had broken apart. But after all, this job wasn’t easy to come by, so I persisted. In less than a month, a college student who was hired at the company at the same time as me gave up because he couldn’t handle such strenuous physical work. Let’s first give a brief overview of this company: it has dozens of employees and is mainly engaged in the production of adhesives and coatings; it is a fairly well-known coating manufacturer in the area. A month later, my supervisor transferred me from the workshop to the R&D center. Since my supervisor was highly skilled and I was very dedicated, and as I lived on site at the factory, I spent over ten hours a day in the laboratory working on various prototypes. I also often went with my supervisor to different construction sites, which helped me gain some practical knowledge in customer service. In less than half a year of doing this, I have already reached a level that would typically take a paint engineer nearly three years to attain. I am determined to continue working in this industry. Later, for various reasons, the master and the boss had a falling out, and he left. After he left, the company lost all its technical expertise, which made my role more important. Although the boss was very distrustful, since there was no one else available, I was still the one who had to take on and carry out all the technical work. At that time, my salary had risen from 1,200 yuan when I first started working there to 3,000 yuan. After my mentor left, there was a lot more work to do, and I realized that my skills weren’t sufficient enough, as I encountered too few real-world situations and was unable to solve certain problems; it was a very stressful situation. With the master leaving, I had more contact with the boss. It’s necessary to introduce the boss here, as this was a very important reason that led to my resignation. The boss is a woman; she used to be an elementary school teacher, but later worked as an accountant in a company. The company was originally a collective enterprise, and during the restructuring process, she and the then general manager (the village committee secretary) managed to bring the company under their control through various means. Later, the company shifted to producing coating products. Perhaps the boss used to be a teacher, so he treats his employees like his own children; he often goes to the production floor to scold this person or that, and sometimes even resorts to physical violence against them. Back then we worked 6 days a week, and she would often post a notice right before work ended on Saturdays saying that there would be overtime work the next day. An overtime shift of half a day paid 50 yuan, while a full day of overtime paid 100 yuan. After working hard for 6 days, we really wanted to have some time for ourselves on Sunday, but that plan was often ruined by just one of her notices. The management methods in the factory have also become increasingly bizarre. A bell is rung to signal the start of work, just like in schools during class time. After the bell rings, the gates are closed; no one is allowed to go in or out. At that time, I lived in the factory, so it didn’t bother me much—as long as I wasn’t late, it was fine. Thus, I accepted it. But what’s even more infuriating is that, even though it was already quitting time, she simply wouldn’t ring the bell (the button to ring the bell is located in the finance office). Everyone was ready to leave; there was nothing left to do. We waited and waited, but no bell came. The finance staff said that the boss wasn’t in a good mood today, and they didn’t dare to ask whether we could go home or not. That woman is probably going through menopause—she’s in a bad mood way too often. As a result, being able to leave on time became a luxury for us. Even if there’s nothing for you to do, you still have to wait until she’s in a good mood before you can go home. What happened next was even more bizarre. At that time, we didn’t have meals provided at work during lunchtime; we had to go home or eat outside. She posted a notice saying that, considering everyone’s situation and the short lunch break, the company would set up a canteen so that people wouldn’t need to go home. Everyone thought it was a sign of the boss’s kindness, but they were wrong. From then on, he stopped taking breaks at noon as well; after eating, he would go to the workshop and direct everyone to start working. In the end, after much thought, I wondered what future awaited me working for such a boss, and what kind of person I would become if I stayed in such an entreprise That’s why I thought about leaving. Although the old woman treated me well – taking me out to eat and on social outings, and even covering the cost of my round-trip flight tickets – I could still stay at home for a few more days during the Spring Festival. But this is not the career life I want, so I secretly began to investigate various local chemical companies. In April 2007, I left that coating company and joined this subsidiary affiliated with a Taiwanese parent company. Since the local industry is not very developed, there are really few chemical companies, and even fewer that are profitable and large-scale. Nevertheless, I managed to find one such company – a newly established Taiwanese firm that was hiring engineers. I took time off secretly to apply for the position. Thanks to my work experience, I performed well during the interviews with the managers, so I started working there with a higher rank than the other colleagues. This company is a subsidiary of a very large Taiwanese enterprise. It has excellent business philosophies and access to advanced technologies. I worked there for three years; during that time, I climbed every pipeline, walked up every staircase, and touched every tank. Due to my diligence and sense of responsibility at work, as well as my handling of several fire and explosion incidents, I received praise from the headquarters in Taiwan. But since the factory is located in a remote area, and I have reached marriageable age as well, I didn’t want my descendants or my own later years to be spent in this small place. So I decided to leave, but I hadn’t thought through where to go; that’s the problem. Since I had some savings, I decided to take a break for a while. That’s how I started resting, and then I signed up for a driving school to learn how to drive, while also thinking about my future path. So in August 2009, I decided to leave my job. At that time, our former supervisor (from Taiwan) was on a business trip in Chongqing. When he heard the news, he called me and suggested that I choose between the Quality Control department, Production Department 1, or any other department under his management – as he had been promoted to deputy plant manager. He offered to arrange everything for me if I wanted to go there, but I politely declined. At the time, I had a one-hour conversation with the General Manager. I told him that the company could no longer meet my future needs and aspirations. This isn’t something that any one person can decide, so I still hoped to leave. Thus, in August 2009, I left this place that taught me to learn and summarize things on my own; to some extent, it also helped me to realize my own talents. One day, while watching TV, it was mentioned that there was a large job fair in our city, and my sister said we should go take a look. I prepared 8 resumes in the evening; when I arrived at the job fair in the morning, there was still a huge crowd, but there were very few chemical industry companies. Thanks to my previous experience, my expectations had risen – I wanted to find a job and company where I could make my own decisions and realize my own ideas. After thinking it over, I submitted two resumes. I had a discussion regarding one of the positions; I felt that I wasn’t very interested in doing chemical engineering design, so I politely declined it. The other position was for a laboratory supervisor role. I applied for it casually. The two girls handling the recruitment said that their boss would be coming later, and asked me to wait so that he could interview me. Since I wasn’t particularly interested in their company, I replied politely, “Sure.” After that, I wandered around the venue. When I returned to their recruitment booth, their boss still hadn’t arrived. I decided to leave the job fair and head home. By the time I reached the door, my phone rang; their boss called me to talk to me, and so we had a casual conversation. Their boss seemed very interested in me and asked me to go to their company the next day to take a look. The next day, I went to the area near the station, where their boss drove to pick me up and took me to the company; we discussed various aspects in detail, including the work, compensation, and future prospects. To be honest, at that time the company was located in a town not very close to the city center, and it was also in a rented premises; the working conditions were quite average. Most importantly, it was a trading company, and I already thought about giving up. Before leaving, the boss said he hoped I could start working tomorrow, and I said I would think about it. Actually, this is just an excuse; I really don’t want to work at this company. The next day, while I was still sleeping, I received a text message from this boss; he asked why I hadn’t come to work. I said I hadn’t thought it through yet, and he told me to mention any conditions I had. Looking back, I realized that I didn’t really have any special requirements. I just wanted to find a boss who truly cared about me, and a company where I could realize my ideas and find my sense of purpose—a place where I could grow together with the company. His humility really won me over. Plus, he was quite young; I figured that younger people tend to have more dynamic ideas, which would give me greater room for development. After some thought, I decided to give it a try. I told him that I had no material demands; I just wanted to be in charge of a task on my own, able to make decisions independently and bring my own ideas to life. And that’s how I ended up at this company that has caused me so much distress, and which I’m still with to this day. When I first arrived at the company, I found that there was no real quality control, inspection, or customer service – everything relied on deception. Of course, since this industry had only just begun to develop in China and was considered a sophisticated sector at the time, the company’s business performance could only be described as passable, just enough to survive. Upon joining the company, I immediately established and improved various experimental methods, rules and regulations, and customer service systems. I set up laboratories for coatings and building materials, as well as a quality control laboratory, and standardized and developed documentation related to the company’s various products and technical service materials. The most notable instance was at the end of 2009, when the company held a product launch event. At that time, the company had very few representative products; they were all rather ordinary. More importantly, no one in the company truly understood the product’s features and specifications. Therefore, this responsibility fell on my shoulders. I stepped in without hesitation and delivered a perfect presentation by introducing the basic performance and applications of the products, as well as the unique features of our company’s products; as a result, my boss saw me in a new light. (Although much of the data is fabricated, it’s still perfect.) However, after this presentation, our work fell into a vicious cycle. Our main partner was a company based in Zhejiang; its products had mediocre quality. Moreover, this product was completely new to me—I was still in the phase of exploring and learning about it. Naturally, those working in technical roles tended to be rather conservative. In my opinion, what we should have done at the time was to thoroughly study product testing methods so that they could better align with real-world applications. At the same time, we should have actively explored and learned, refining various testing procedures. It wasn’t merely a matter of producing a simple COA report. More importantly, we needed to ensure consistent product quality during shipments. Back then, I was also quite tough and assertive; I believed that working in technology required to be done in a certain way, and that quality control needed to be handled in a specific manner. But perhaps the boss doesn’t think that way; he might consider my ideas to be too conservative and that they could cause him to miss out on some market opportunities. (He didn’t discuss this with me; I just guessed it later on.) Due to a lack of effective communication, and because the company is small with no established systems or rules for working, many things were difficult for someone like me who comes from a larger company where things are handled in a more structured manner. As a result, conflicts with my colleagues arose. And that’s when some people started to speak ill of me behind the boss’s back. I wasn’t mature at that time either; I liked to express my dissatisfaction with the boss in front of my colleagues. (However, these complaints were only related to work matters.) Moreover, I lacked effective long-term communication with the boss, which set the stage for future professional embarrassments. The turning point in my career came at the end of 2010, when I had been working there for almost a year. A client received a large order from a well-known international corporation. After several months of hard work, the product I developed finally passed the tests conducted by the end client. At the time, my boss said that if the development was successful, he would take me and my team on a trip abroad. But even now, nearly five years later, his promise still hasn’t been fulfilled. With the development of this product, I also found inspiration. I led the R&D team to develop numerous products; many of them have become the company’s flagship products. To this day, these products face no competition in the domestic market. They have become the company’s main source of profit and a powerful tool for clients to gain market share. Many clients have used these products to capture 30%–50% of the market share in their respective segments. However, to this day, the boss has made no acknowledgment whatsoever regarding the benefits brought about by our R&D efforts. --------This is one of my confusions. With the continuous development and adjustment of these products, our work has entered a relatively stable phase. On one hand, I need to observe the impact and actual effects of these products in the market, and on the other hand, I truly need new ideas and insights. As new employees kept joining the company, a man was brought in to work in the overseas sales department. He gradually gained the boss’s trust, as the market he was responsible for did not overlap with that of the products I developed. Moreover, due to his own limitations, his promotional efforts were not very effective. Yet he reported to the boss that he couldn’t promote my products, shifting the blame for his own shortcomings onto me. Given that my relationship with the boss wasn’t very good to begin with, I ended up being the one to bear the consequences. As everyone knows, domestic sales take place in the realm of low-end products, with little room for product differentiation. As a result, domestic sales staff always attribute poor sales performance to two factors: poor product quality and high prices. It should be noted that the domestic market does not require products with advanced features, as the local industry is still at a relatively low level; what is needed are ordinary specifications, and these can be met through production. We are a trading company, so production is not part of our responsibilities. Moreover, since the boss owes a lot of money to various factories, those factories do not supply goods to us in a timely manner. This means that we sometimes have to ship goods even though we know they are of poor quality. Yet the boss ignores this issue, and whenever quality problems arise, he blames the department I lead, which leads to an accumulation of conflicts over time. Once again, I led the team in addressing the issue of product quality. After a year of efforts and improvements in the supply process, we were generally able to ensure stable shipments, with virtually no quality-related complaints. However, there were still instances of delayed deliveries. These delays occurred because no qualified products could be shipped to customers. Although the company has a procurement department, all it does is say that they’ve placed orders; when those orders don’t meet quality standards, they claim there’s nothing they can do about it. Thus, the problem remains unresolved—we must find a way to ensure that products meet quality standards. Some issues are inherent from the very beginning and beyond our control. Yet the boss insists that we must resolve them, leading to further conflicts. All the problems got intertwined, and eventually I felt I couldn’t take it any longer. Since you’re not satisfied with whatever I do, then I’ll stop doing it – you do it instead. The boss is a very arrogant person; he thinks he’s definitely better at everything he does than anyone else. So, I resigned from my position as department manager and let him take charge instead. He oversimplified everything; firstly, he didn’t understand anything about it, and secondly, he simply had no time for it. As a result, the department’s work became a complete mess. I couldn’t stand watching this any longer, so I volunteered to take back my role as department manager. In the end, he announced that I would become the deputy department manager—there was no longer any department manager at all. For work, I accepted it too. The training of technical personnel requires a long-term process. Especially in a trading company like ours, we have to handle all kinds of tasks and may encounter various fields of work. As a result, we often find ourselves in a rather passive position. I consider myself to be quite capable; yet sometimes I’m overwhelmed by the workload. I hesitate to assign certain tasks to my subordinates. Generally, they just assist me with some of the work or carry out assignments I give them. My main goal is to ensure that the company doesn’t miss out on any potential opportunities to secure clients. However, my boss sees it differently—he believes that I try to take on all the important tasks myself, preventing others from growing professionally. In his view, I fail to cultivate another person who could take over my responsibilities. I find this completely illogical. Firstly, there’s a process involved in training technical personnel; secondly, by training someone like me, is your goal to prevent me from leaving? On the other hand, are there things that can be cultivated just by cultivation? With all these terrible things piling up, I submitted my resignation. He talked to me, but since we’re both stubborn people, the conversation turned into a tense exchange of complaints. In the end, we parted on bad terms. He then emailed me to inform me that he agreed to my resignation. He thought about it later on; I don’t know what his true thoughts were. He called a few sales staff members to persuade me not to leave. I figured that it was actually just a difference in work philosophies, with no real conflicts, and that improving communication might resolve these issues, so I stayed. But after staying, my performance at the company started to decline; my boss lost trust in me. For some important role changes, he would initially talk to me about his plans for the company and ask me to take on more responsibilities. But after a few days, there was no further communication, and as a result, those tasks were given to someone else. But I still don’t care. I believe I’m someone who is naturally inclined toward technology, and I still hope to excel in my technical work. Since the company doesn’t want to be dependent on just one supplier, it seeks to develop relationships with other suppliers. I believe I have excellent negotiation skills; I often manage to secure high-quality suppliers at very reasonable prices—prices that the procurement team simply can’t negotiate. However, in his eyes, all of this seems to be part of my job responsibilities. He’s a very suspicious person; he always suspects that there might be some kind of financial dealings between me and the suppliers. In reality, ever since I joined the company, I’ve never taken any advantage of it or accepted any money from any supplier. The only time I received anything was when suppliers treated me to meals or offered me entertainment during site visits. Anyway, ever since I mentioned resigning, he started scheming on various fronts. He said he wanted me to take on greater responsibilities, but at critical moments, I was always sidelined; no substantial opportunities ever came my way. Moreover, my salary and benefits have remained largely unchanged ever since. Actually, ever since I saw all this, I’ve changed a lot as well; I can now talk to him about work on a regular basis. Although for those in technical fields, what’s there to discuss about work that doesn’t yield any results? But he’s different – he feels needed. Yet no matter what I do, it seems he still gives more importance to salespeople and company shareholders. He promises every year to help me develop my career, but by the end of the year, nothing has been done for me. Then he makes those promises again the following year. I don’t know when this will end To be honest, I’ve been at the company for several years. Since the industry we’re in is quite niche, there are very few companies that truly focus on developing technology. Most of them rely on price wars, and their main market is domestically. Personally, I don’t have much knowledge about production, so my career path has become increasingly limited. Now, I have no idea what direction to take Thank you all for listening to me talk so much. I also hope you can give me some suggestions!