34: Chapter 34 Team Growth

One month after the Shopee store went live, orders slowly climbed from one or two per day to five or six. Although it couldn't compare to the domestic market, that upward curve made Chairman Wang Shunyi feel that he hadn't taken the wrong path. However, he also saw a problem clearly—there weren't enough people.

Li Dongxu was holding down the overseas business by himself, from nine in the morning to nine at night, staring at the backend, replying to emails, contacting logistics, and handling returns and exchanges. Sometimes his phone would ring in the middle of the night with messages from Southeast Asian buyers, and he would have to crawl out of bed to reply. Once, when Chairman Wang Shunyi came to the office on a weekend to pick something up, he saw Li Dongxu alone in the office, gnawing on a sandwich in front of his computer, with three or four express delivery slips spread out on the table.

"Dongxu, you're here on the weekend?"

"There's an order from Malaysia, and the buyer is asking about the logistics progress, so I came to check," he said, putting down his sandwich and taking a sip of coffee. "President, shouldn't we assign two more people to the overseas business? I'm a bit overwhelmed on my own."

Chairman Wang Shunyi looked at the sticky notes on his desk, which were densely covered with to-do items. "I understand. We'll start recruiting next week."

After the job posting went out, they received even more resumes than last time. Shunyi Foods' reputation was gradually growing, and many young people were willing to give it a try. Chairman Wang Shunyi, Zhang Junhao, and Park Min-ji spent two days screening resumes, selecting thirty people for interviews out of over two hundred.

The interviews were held at a cafe near the company, where they rented a private room on the second floor. They were scheduled from nine in the morning on Saturday to six in the evening on Sunday, with only a one-hour break for lunch in between.

The first person to come in was a twenty-six-year-old girl with short hair, wearing a thin dark blue jacket and holding a transparent file bag. She bowed upon entering before sitting down. The resume read Jung Soo-yeon, a graduate of the Chinese department at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, who had previously interned at a cross-border e-commerce company for half a year.

"Ms. Jung Soo-yeon, please sit," Chairman Wang Shunyi said, flipping through her resume. "What did you mainly do during your internship?"

"Daily operations of the Shopee store, including product listing, order processing, customer service, and data analysis," she said. Her voice wasn't loud, but it was clear. "I also participated in some promotional activities, such as flash sales and coupon settings."

Zhang Junhao asked from the side, "Have you encountered any difficulties?"

"Once, a product in the store suddenly sold out, but the warehouse didn't have enough stock, so many orders couldn't be shipped," she said, thinking for a moment. "I coordinated with the supplier to speed up restocking, while simultaneously messaging each buyer to explain the situation and offering some coupons as compensation. In the end, most buyers accepted it, and the store rating didn't drop too much."

Chairman Wang Shunyi glanced at Zhang Junhao, who gave a slight nod.

"Do you have any suggestions for Shunyi Foods' overseas business?" Chairman Wang Shunyi asked again.

Jung Soo-yeon didn't answer immediately; she lowered her head and thought for a few seconds. "I've looked at our Shopee store, and currently, we only sell river snail rice noodles and fire chicken noodles. I think we can slowly expand the product line, for example, with self-heating hot pots and instant porridge. Additionally, consumers in different countries have different tastes—Malaysia has many ethnic Chinese, so we can emphasize traditional flavors; Thai people like sour and spicy, so we can highlight the sour and spicy characteristics of the fire chicken noodles. Differentiated marketing will yield better results."

After listening, Chairman Wang Shunyi wrote an "A" in the top right corner of her resume. It wasn't just a casual A; it was an A with a circle around it.

After two days of interviews, they hired ten out of the thirty people. Jung Soo-yeon was the first one to be confirmed; before she had even left the cafe, Park Min-ji followed her out to tell her to come to work next Monday.

On the day the new employees started, the office was packed. The original twenty people plus the ten new ones meant thirty people were crammed into a one-hundred-square-meter space, where you had to turn sideways to walk down the aisle. Kim Tae-min set up two folding tables at the end of the corridor as temporary workstations for the new colleagues. Jung Soo-yeon sat next to the printer, and every time someone printed something, the paper would drift onto her desk.

Chairman Wang Shunyi stood in front of the whiteboard and cleared his throat.

"Welcome, everyone. The new colleagues might not know me yet; my name is Chairman Wang Shunyi, and I am the president of this company." He bowed first, then looked up. "Shunyi Foods has been established for less than a year. Last year's sales were 6 billion, and this year's goal is to increase that by one and a half times. The overseas business just started last month; we are currently on Shopee, and next, we will open on Lazada, and in the future, we will enter China."

He glanced at Jung Soo-yeon, who was standing in the corner, busily taking notes in her notebook.

"Starting today, we are divided into five departments." He turned around and drew a tree diagram on the whiteboard.

"Overseas Business Department, headed by Li Dongxu, with members Jung Soo-yeon and Park Tae-min. Responsible for cross-border e-commerce platforms like Shopee and Lazada."

"Domestic Business Department, headed by Park Min-ji, with members Kim Soo-jin, Lee Min-ho, and Choi Ji-woo. Responsible for domestic channels and marketing."

"R&D Department, temporarily headed by Zhang Junhao, with members Cha In-pyo and Song Hye-kyo. Responsible for new product development and product testing."

"Finance Department, also under Zhang Junhao's management, with member Lee Young-ae."

"Administration Department, with member Zhang He. Responsible for daily administrative affairs."

He wrote the names under each department, then put down the whiteboard marker and turned around.

"Department heads will report work progress to me once a week. If you encounter important issues, communicate with me at any time. The company is still small, and there aren't many levels; if anyone has any ideas, come directly to me."

After the meeting, Chairman Wang Shunyi called Jung Soo-yeon into the small conference room alone.

"Xiuyan, the overseas business is our focus this year. I hope you can take over the daily operations of the Shopee store as soon as possible, so that Dongxu can free up his time to research Lazada. Also, consumer feedback must be collected in a timely manner, and you should compile a report for me every week—what products sell well, which countries have the most orders, and what the buyers are saying; write everything down clearly."

"Understood, President." Jung Soo-yeon opened her notebook and wrote down these points.

"If you don't understand anything, ask Dongxu directly. He has a lot of experience and is a reliable person."

"Understood."

The first week after the new employees joined, the office was chaotic. When the printer ran out of paper, no one replaced it; when the coffee machine's water tank was empty, no one refilled it; unopened express boxes were piled up in the corridor, and people had to walk sideways. Kim Tae-min couldn't handle it all alone, so Zhang He took the initiative to help move things, organize the warehouse, and change the water cooler bottles. After two days of this, Kim Tae-min told Chairman Wang Shunyi, "Zhang He is a good guy."

But the management problems were more complex than Chairman Wang Shunyi had thought.

Before, with twenty people, any issue could be solved by just shouting. Now, with thirty people divided into five departments, information began to get stuck between departments. One day, Jung Soo-yeon received an inquiry from a Malaysian buyer asking if they could purchase in bulk. She wasn't sure how to give a discount, so she asked Li Dongxu. Li Dongxu said this matter had to be asked of Park Min-ji, and Park Min-ji said the pricing strategy was set by the president. A single message was passed between three people, and by the time they replied to the buyer, the other party had already placed an order elsewhere.

After Chairman Wang Shunyi learned about this, he called the department heads together and set a rule: for overseas business pricing and discounts, Li Dongxu could decide directly. Orders under $100 did not need approval; those over $100 needed to be reported to Park Min-ji for review, and those over $200 needed to be reported to him. After hearing this, Li Dongxu said, "President, this will be much more efficient."

Another time, Cha In-pyo from the R&D department wanted to test a new seasoning and needed to purchase a batch of raw materials. He wrote an application form and handed it to Zhang Junhao, who then passed it to Lee Young-ae for budgeting. Lee Young-ae said the budget wouldn't be approved until the end of the month. Cha In-pyo waited for a week, but the raw materials hadn't been bought yet, so he ran to Chairman Wang Shunyi and said, "President, the R&D progress might have to be delayed." Chairman Wang Shunyi asked Zhang Junhao and found out that the process was stuck on budget approval.

"Young-ae, from now on, for R&D raw material purchases, anything under 500,000 per transaction doesn't need budget approval; just submit for reimbursement at the end of the month," Chairman Wang Shunyi said at the Friday routine meeting.

"Understood, President." Lee Young-ae wrote it down in her notebook.

Such problems were popping up every day. Chairman Wang Shunyi used to think that management was just about managing people and dividing work, but now he realized that true management is about constantly optimizing processes, coordinating resources, and resolving conflicts in the process of getting things done. Sometimes he felt annoyed, but then he thought, if the company had reached the point where it needed to manage processes, it meant it was truly growing.

On Friday night, it was almost eleven o'clock after working overtime. He was the only one left in the office, and the lights of Seongdong-gu outside the window were sparse. He leaned back in his chair, rubbed his eyes, and pulled a book out of his drawer—*Practical Management for Small and Medium Enterprises*. He had bought this book at a bookstore last week, but he hadn't read more than a few pages; every time he read a few lines, he was interrupted by a phone call.

He opened the book and read a passage: "The biggest challenge for an entrepreneur transitioning from an operational role to a managerial role is not learning management knowledge, but learning to let go. You cannot do everything forever; you must trust your team."

He read the sentence twice and drew a line under it with his pen.

His phone vibrated; it was a message from Park Min-ji.

"Still at the company?"

"Yeah, getting ready to leave."

"You've been too tired lately. Go home and rest early."

"Got it. You get some sleep early too."

He closed the book, turned off the lights, and walked out of the office. The sensor light in the corridor turned on and then off again. His footsteps echoed in the empty hallway, one by one, as if someone were keeping time for him.