Real Man

Translator: MarcTempest

Chapter 49

Yoo-hyun sat on a bench at the outdoor terrace on the first floor, drinking free vending machine coffee.

For office workers, smoking time was also known as the second meeting.

It was more comfortable to talk outside in a relaxed posture than in a stuffy office.

It was similar to becoming talkative after drinking alcohol.

“Phew…”

Park Seung-woo, the assistant manager, had a different expression than usual as he exhaled smoke.

He didn’t smile awkwardly, but looked serious.

“I agree with what you said, but I think the PDA project will fail. Maybe it would be faster to succeed with the Apple phone?”

“…”

Park Seung-woo’s intuition was not bad.

No, it was exactly right.

Although it was still treated as an MP3 player, the Apple phone would pioneer the smartphone market in a few years and absorb all the PDAs.

“But why are you doing it? Kid. When you work in a company, you know. Sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do.”

“…”

Yoo-hyun nodded his head as an answer.

Company employees had no choice but to follow what their bosses wanted.

To change the instructions, they had to provide enough evidence.

Of course, even if they did that, it would be hard to hear good words.

The best thing was to achieve results by following the right decisions made by the boss.

The next best thing was when the boss made a wrong decision, but changed it in the middle.

They could still make some results if they tried hard enough.

The worst thing?

When they followed the wrong decision made by the boss and failed to make any results in the end.

In the worst case scenario, the person in charge would have to take all the responsibility for the failure.

It was exactly the same situation that Park Seung-woo was in.

“By the way, how should I prepare a backup plan…”

“Huh?”

Park Seung-woo stopped talking as if he realized something.

He seemed to forget that Yoo-hyun was a newbie because he was too proficient.

“Oh, backup means. In case the product quantity doesn’t come out as planned, it’s the follow-up plan.”

“So can you switch to another product?”

“It’s not easy. You can’t find a product that uses such high specs right away.”

Why not?

There was already a touch phone that used a pen before HPDA3 at Hanseong Electronics.

And it was a product that collaborated with Channel, a luxury brand.

Yoo-hyun asked.

“Can’t you use Channel Phone 2?”

“Hmm… It’s possible. Well, they’re also rushing their schedule, so it might be possible.”

“…”

“But it’s too much of a difference in quantity to use it as a backup plan.”

Park Seung-woo looked troubled by his words and Yoo-hyun just agreed with him.

“Is that so?”

“Yeah. Even if we get a lot, we can’t get more than 10% of the production line quantity we set for HPDA3. Well, that’s not a small number either.”

10% was not a small number and Park Seung-woo knew that well.

He looked like he thought it could be one of the backup plans.

But it was true that they needed a proper backup plan in case HPDA3 completely failed.

They couldn’t sell their panel inventory to customers who didn’t have any plans.

They needed some other perspective to deal with it.

Yoo-hyun hoped that Park Seung-woo could find an answer.

“But does it have to be the same resolution product?”

“No. That’s not it. But it’s better to have the same inch size to match the post-processing.”

“So lower resolution is possible.”

“If there are customers who want low resolution on 3 inches. But what kind of high-end model would want low resolution panels?”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah. Why would you buy a good touch panel and use it with such low resolution?”

That was because Park Seung-woo only thought of high-end models like PDA or Channel Phone.

He had a fixed idea that touch phone users were a minority who used high-end models.

They had to break that first.

“Can’t you lower the resolution of the touch panel? I don’t think people will write or draw with a pen on a small screen anyway.”

“Why? It’s quite useful. Customers liked it on HPDA2 and Channel Phone 1.”

Customers are afraid of denying something new.

They couldn’t tell the customer’s purchase intention with a simple survey.

Yoo-hyun asked casually.

“Have you tried it?”

“Me? I tried it.”

“Really?”

“Hey, it’s expensive.”

Park Seung-woo said it as a joke, but it was true.

Touch panels were expanding their market share, but it was still a time when people thought that phones had to have keyboards.

They didn’t even feel the change even though they were on the scene.

“It would be cool to get rid of the buttons and just use touch.”

“Why?”

“The design would be cool. And the screen would be bigger and easier to see.”

“No buttons…”

Park Seung-woo paused at Yoo-hyun’s words.

He hoped he would catch on at this point.

Could he break his frame of mind?

“People would buy it if it was cheap. If we lower the touch resolution, the price would go down too…”

“That’s true.”

“Yeah. Who cares if the touch is bad. As you said, they would only press big buttons or icons. But the design would still look good.”

“At least better than this.”

Yoo-hyun took out a folder phone from his pocket and Park Seung-woo chuckled.

But he kept rolling his eyes as if he was still thinking about something.

He looked serious, but he kept bouncing his butt.

It seemed to be his habit when he thought deeply.

What was he thinking?

He was probably struggling between ideals and reality.

No matter how good an idea they had, they couldn’t make a product as a component company.

They had to change their perspective.

“Isn’t it our product planning team’s job to make customers able to make such products?”

“…”

Park Seung-woo lost his words at Yoo-hyun’s words.

It was not to squeeze the development department with the specs that the sales team brought in, but to plan panels that could lead the market to make products that could come out into the world.

That was the real role of the product planning team.

It was also the real work that they had never done before.

Clap.

Park Seung-woo clapped as if he had an idea, but then he fell into thought again and rolled his eyes around.

He didn’t have a company that could make it.

That was not a wrong statement.

The product planning team had been doing their job by adjusting the detailed numbers to the production level according to the guide given by the customer, that is, the phone making company.

But now they had to change their perspective.

To make it possible, he needed another plan.

Yoo-hyun recalled his past memories as he looked at him.

Next year, Ilseong Electronics would launch a budget-friendly touch phone and cause a sensation in the market.

It was the time when the touch phone boom began.

But Hansung only followed suit with a similar product after a year had passed.

They were late in terms of timing, but they were still able to supply the products on time.

It was thanks to the PDA panel line that Park Seung Woo, the assistant manager, was in charge of.

They just changed the resolution and used it as it was.

And the achievement went to Shin Chan Yong, the section chief, who joined in late.

The only thing left for Park Seung Woo, the assistant manager, was a red mark due to the failure of the PDA.

PDA backup plan.

What Yoo-hyun brought up in people’s minds was a device to prevent Park Seung Woo, the assistant manager’s, performance from being taken away in vain.

The report he wrote under the name of backup would surely do that job.

Would it just prevent it from being taken away?

Or would he do more than that?

How much more could he do?

It was entirely up to Park Seung Woo, the assistant manager.

Yoo-hyun decided to watch for now.

He had to teach him how to catch fish rather than give him fish.

That afternoon, in the conference room on the 12th floor.

The team members gathered for the weekly report.

A beam was projected on the white screen on the wall.

Each part’s work and plan for the last week and the next week were written on one page.

Part 1 was busy with Nokia’s response, and Part 2 was not in a good mood because of Hansung Electronics’ low phone sales.

Despite that, Shin Chan Yong, the section chief who presented, looked quite confident.

“…As I reported, the market response to Channel Phone is quite good. We are planning to include the success story of Channel Phone LCD panel in our company’s training materials.”

“Is this what HRD (Human Resource Development) asked for? You must be busy with your work. Are you okay?”

“Yes, team leader. It’s something that helps the company.”

Oh Jae Hwan, the team leader, nodded his head as he heard that.

Channel Phone was a product made by Hansung Electronics and Channel, a famous luxury fashion brand.

Shin Chan Yong, the section chief, was in charge of the LCD panel that went into it.

In fact, he used the same LCD panel as other models, so there was no product planning to speak of.

Development, sales, marketing were also aligned with the phone division without any special crisis.

Yet he made it into an achievement and even planned to make it a success story.

He could make a drama-like story with a few adaptations.

He had no better material to package his work.

Yoo-hyun sneered.

He must have asked HRD to make it himself.

The education team at HRD must have been grateful for his offer.

They were struggling to find success stories every year.

The whole process might not have been visible to the team members, including Oh Jae Hwan, the team leader, but it was clear to Yoo-hyun.

He had worked under him for more than two years already.

He knew that his true self was nothing but an empty shell who looked impressive.

Then it was Part 3’s turn.

Part 3 was always scolded by the team leader at every weekly report, but today was different.

“Choi Section Chief, you heard what your boss said, right? I’ve told the sales team already. Try to take initiative this time.”

“I’ll do my best.”

When Choi Min Hee Section Chief reported on Hyunil Automobile’s spec change part, Oh Jae Hwan Team Leader smiled for the first time at today’s meeting.

“Park Assistant Manager, good job on your report today.”

He even praised Park Seung Woo Assistant Manager who always got nagged at.

Shin Chan Yong Section Chief who was sensitive to changes around him felt a sense of incongruity at Part 3’s changed atmosphere.

From Shin Chan Yong Section Chief’s point of view, Part 3 was nothing but a sucker part.

They did all the hard work but had no chance of success.

It meant they had no chance of getting good scores on their performance evaluation either.

Moreover, most of their failed projects were ahead of their time by about two years.

If he proposed them as new items to the phone division using them, that would also be an achievement.

How generous they were to give them away.

But today, for the first time, he thought ‘maybe’.

What had changed?

At that moment, he saw Park Seung Woo Assistant Manager smiling in his sight.

His eyes were directed at the new employee sitting next to him.

He really hated that guy.

He tried to recruit him because he looked sensible, but he was a fool who couldn’t even catch the given opportunity.

On the other hand, he wondered.

‘Wasn’t it him who answered the phone from Hyunil Automobile?’

Come to think of it, he was also there at Park Seung Woo Assistant Manager’s report that he thought would fail.

Did the new employee do some magic?

Shin Chan Yong Section Chief laughed at the thought that came to his mind.

“Really, me. Does that make sense?”

How well could a new employee do?

It must have been a coincidence.

As he thought so, his eyes met with Yoo-hyun’s.

Then Yoo-hyun smiled at him.

Smiled?

It was not a mocking smile for sure.

But somehow, his gaze seemed to look down on him from above and it was very unpleasant.

Shin Chan Yong Section Chief wanted to teach that greenhorn a lesson that he had to lower his eyes in front of him.

Thud.

Thud.

Section Chief Shin Chan Yong who was making a rhythm by tapping his desk with his index and middle fingers looked at  Assistant Manager Go Jae Yoon next to him as if he had a good idea.

“Assistant Manager Go, would you like to have a cup of tea after the meeting?”

He said with a friendly smile.

‘Shin Chan Yong and Go Jae Yoon’s combination.’

Yoo-hyun watched the two people leave together after the meeting.