None at all

First, let me clarify: there are two companies with similar names. One is 貿友, which represents overseas exhibitions; the other is 貿有, which organizes domestic exhibitions. Both are headed by the same person. What I am sharing here concerns 貿有, which is responsible for organizing domestic exhibitions.

The disadvantages can be divided into institutional and work-related aspects.

Institutional aspects

1. Attendance bonus: The company encourages employees to come to work, so it calls this an “attendance bonus” rather than a perfect-attendance bonus. I am highlighting this because it concerns menstrual leave for female employees. For the relevant regulations on menstrual leave, please see the link: https://www.gov.taipei/News_Content.aspx?n=EEC70A4186D4C828&sms=87415A8B9CE81B16&s=419152782D666630. Basically, if you take one day of menstrual leave per month, for a total of no more than three days per year, it cannot be counted as sick leave or affect your perfect-attendance bonus. According to the company, however, what it provides is an “attendance bonus,” so it is not subject to these limits: if you take menstrual leave, you lose the NT$2,000 attendance bonus.

2. Overtime pay: This is something that exists in name only. The employee regulations do contain provisions regarding overtime pay, but in practice the company has no overtime-pay application form, and no one has ever applied for it. Therefore, the overtime-pay provisions are effectively the same as having no provisions at all.

The work-related aspects depend on an individual’s moral views and working style. Some people may be able to accept the company’s practices, but I personally cannot, which is why I am bringing them up.

1. Staff shortages: At 貿有, exhibition work is divided into administrative and sales functions. Strictly speaking, there are only 2.5 people handling administrative work, because one of them is a supervisor who also has to handle sales, so that person can only count as 0.5. Basically, these 2.5 people are responsible for marketing, exhibition operations, forums, media, and more. Each of these areas should have an entire team handling it, but at 貿有, only 2.5 people do all of it. In the boss’s eyes, these are merely basic errands and very simple, so the staffing is sufficient. When speaking to partners externally, the boss then says that the company has a powerful team responsible for the matter. You read that correctly: at 貿有, one person is not singular but plural.

2. Disrespect for expertise: This overlaps somewhat with the first point. Basically, the company likes to hire people with absolutely no experience at low salaries and then demands that they perform at more than 100 percent. This applies not only internally but also to external partner vendors. Arbitrarily haggling over prices is common. When someone tries to explain the difficulty of a task, the boss only says, “You’re talking so much that I can’t understand you.” The meaning is: no matter what, just get it done for me.

3. The boss not only loves to fantasize but is also highly emotional: The boss is a pitiful person who lives in his own world. No matter what others say, he twists their words into whatever version he wants to hear, then says that they have received support from so-and-so and tells the sales staff to quickly use these talking points to recruit exhibitors. If you are not planning to stay for eight or ten years, do not come here under any circumstances. Otherwise, when you resign, apart from the reason that you found another job, all other family-related reasons and personal factors will be portrayed by him as though your reasons were completely insignificant, and the boss will then start sharing his “rough” past. It may seem as though he empathizes with you, but in fact he does not care about you at all; he is only trying to pressure you into staying. This was my former colleague’s experience. As for me, after I found another job and said I was leaving, I became invisible from that moment onward, and every work report was ignored. Even after leaving, I was still the subject of gossip everywhere.

In short, unless you have lost your mind, do not join 貿有. If you stay there long enough, your own values will become seriously distorted.