艾訊股份有限公司

The building is great

The sales director responsible for a certain region and their right-hand person are both the type who step on colleagues and only criticize others. The client had not responded despite being asked three times, and they actually blamed the colleague for not continuing to follow up. Then why couldn't you help follow up? Because you're high-ranking and only responsible for watching the show?

As a director, how could you be in a meeting with a client and only say after 30 minutes, “Sorry, I couldn’t hear anything”?

You needed help with a translation, and simply copying and pasting it into some inexplicable software was called translation? Did you really look at what the translated content actually looked like?

No wonder the company's performance is getting worse and worse.

The right-hand person was also inexplicable. A colleague replied with an image containing an explanation of the edits. Since the colleague is in sales, not a related technical specialist, they couldn’t understand it—yet this was enough to make a complaint? What does it have to do with you if you couldn’t understand it? Did the client say they couldn’t understand it?

If the client doesn’t understand, that means they aren’t the person responsible; naturally, they will forward it to the person in charge or someone who understands, won’t they?

And who knows where you got the nerve to criticize others’ emails for being unclear and lacking next steps, when you yourself sent an email whose entire body consisted only of “Are you there?” Is that the level of your ability?

Or were you digging a hole, waiting for someone to reply “I’m here,” so that you could continue complaining and accuse the response of being too empty?

After the third floor was renovated, the lighting seems to be a little brighter.

I won’t say much about the vice president’s side; the overall management style is still stuck in a very old-fashioned stage.

Taking half a day off is the minimum, with no flexibility at all. It completely disregards the company regulations and operates by its own rules. Moreover, as long as someone takes leave or leaves work on time, they will be subjected to heightened scrutiny. Office staff are managed as if they were factory-line workers, emphasizing discipline at the expense of trust.

Recently, an entire team on the third floor was wiped out, with various explanations for the resignations, but the common thread seems to center on this new manager, who only took office this year.

This week, even the manager is preparing to resign. Only after the tide went out did senior management see the problem clearly. Too late~~~ Everyone is gone, and the associate general manager’s dream of waiting for retirement has probably been shattered too.

There was reportedly a case of sexual harassment involving someone on that team.

What was particularly unusual was that the company took no measures to separate the parties. Instead, the person was still required to attend the weekly meeting in the conference room with the alleged perpetrator every week as usual. After the conference room was remodeled, it became smaller and poorly soundproofed; it is hard to imagine how agonizing that environment must have been for the person involved.

Such matters are usually treated as “family shame should not be made public.” If left unaddressed, eventually no one mentions them anymore. After all, it didn’t happen to them; saying one extra word might lead to being accused of meddling, and in the end they might even be labeled “not a team player.”

Although the manager is leaving, even if the company offered these people triple their salaries, there probably wouldn’t be anyone willing to return to such an environment lacking trust.

Overall, this company has changed its decor and appearance on the surface, but underneath, it is still the same old company.

Heavy on rules, deep in hierarchy, slow to respond~pathetic.

Who wouldn’t love a company where, from the moment you join OP, everyone gets bonuses, quarterly bonuses, and performance bonuses?

Even if you’re an idiot with no ability, you can receive the same percentage as engineers—perfect for people who just want to coast~

There are three strange things about this company: people, systems, and quality. I’ll introduce them in order.

People

The R&D staff hired here actually have very strong thinking skills. On the factory side, even OPs who came from R&D can handle the existing team-leader and section-manager positions. By comparison, the only advantage old employees have is that they “understand the procedures,” but their innovation and self-learning abilities are almost zero; their thinking has remained stuck in the first five years of the company’s founding.

Then there’s the new department director. He seems to really want to reform things, but there’s always some invisible force preventing him from发挥ing his abilities (the higher-ups).

There’s nothing he can do. The factory is full of old-timers, including many people who entered society at this company and have stayed until now. Their thinking has long since become fixed. Asking them to change would be less effective than simply replacing them.

It’s just like the military here: if you stay too long and then go out to look for a job, you won’t be able to find one. So those who have been here for almost five years should be careful. Don’t stop learning; keep up with the outside world. Your self-learning ability must keep pace with the outside world—don’t instead become assimilated by this place. If you’ve been here nearly five years, get out while you can~

The higher-ups are quite protective of these people who don’t have much ability. Seriously, if the higher-ups retire,

the new director gives people the impression that he would want to replace those old-timers immediately, minute by minute.

This is the first time I’ve seen a department director work so hard at a mid-sized company.

At outside companies, department directors just wait to hear reports and receive proactive updates. At this company, the department director has to proactively go around asking for information himself.

Systems

The bonus system uses a one-size-fits-all approach: bonuses, quarterly bonuses, and performance bonuses are all shared by everyone at the same percentage. Employees below engineering positions receive the same amount, which leaves both frontline staff and engineering-level employees with no motivation to improve their independent thinking or abilities. Everyone eats from the same communal pot, leaving the company lacking competitiveness.

I suggest differentiating by job level: positions below engineering should receive only manufacturing bonuses and year-end bonuses, while engineering positions and above should enjoy all bonuses, quarterly bonuses, performance bonuses, and so on. This would also strengthen the motivation of employees in engineering and below to pursue higher positions and the benefits they bring.

Add external learning subsidies: regularly hold or subsidize external certification courses, bringing in the latest information and technical thinking so the company can keep up with the pace of society.

There is also a solution for old-timers who “make no contribution”: their quarterly and performance bonuses could be distributed to other proactive colleagues in the same department, naturally creating survival of the fittest.

Quality

There are unexpectedly many people in QC at this company. I don’t know why.

And it seems that even QC engineers have to go down to perform inspections?

It seems that this company’s production-line quality awareness is extremely weak. Why not refer more to other companies outside?

Aren’t engineering positions supposed to have QC engineering staff perform inspections? The production line should be able to conduct self-inspections and understand the relevant standards, shouldn’t it?

No wonder things often go wrong, and then QC gets dragged out and flogged (WTF?

Whenever something goes wrong, the production line is of course responsible, but QC is always blamed first for not seeing it and not inspecting it.

Let me first clarify the responsibilities.

At the most basic companies, QC is divided into two job levels:

1. Inspector (QC): performs incoming-material, in-process, and outgoing-product inspections.

2. Quality-assurance engineer (QA): performs abnormality analysis and process optimization.

This company seems not to separate them, mixing them together like a “urine-and-meatball” concoction, while the salary is at least 5K lower than the industry standard.

There are also people with low-end thinking who believe QC is an easy job. They either slack off or cause trouble, and think anyone could work in this completely useless department.

What they say is not entirely wrong: QC really needs to show its credentials, but not one person is up to standard—no brains, no logic, and always trying to shift blame.

Basically, if we use a score of 10 as the full mark for a group of ten people, then on the factory side, all the QC staff combined do not even reach 5 points in qualifications.

Across the three departments, only one to three people in each department on average actually have brains.

Only a very small number have qualifications and abilities that might even allow them to replace old-timers who have stayed for more than five years.

With quality like this, they still dare to make QC shoulder everything? I really don’t know whether people were hired with their feet in the past.

It seems the engineers are expected to shoulder responsibility for the quality of the entire company and gamble on customer complaints.

There are only two ways to improve:

1. Follow the most basic external-company model and divide QC into two job levels (high cost).

2. Instill quality awareness throughout the production line.

Most companies use the second approach. It saves QC personnel costs and raises the overall standard through quality awareness,

rather than having the scales tipped entirely to one side as they are now, with all quality being gambled on a single checkpoint.

The most cost-effective approach for the company would be to delegate first-line inspections to production-line OPs, teaching them basic self-inspection according to AQL and basic appearance standards. QA should be reserved for audits and coaching, focusing on root-cause analysis (5 Whys, fishbone diagrams, D8), customer complaints, projects, and improving systems.

Quality-awareness and process-improvement workshops should also be held regularly at the factory so that OP and QA can learn together and truly instill quality awareness into every step.

Axiomtek is not bad in essence; what Axiomtek lacks is essence.

Only through major reform and a change of personnel can Axiomtek grow rapidly—even to the point of buying back the shares held by R&D.

I thought about it for a long time, and honestly, I can't think of any advantages!

This company only offers decent benefits at headquarters (although even those are worse than they used to be). But at the factory, to put it bluntly, if you die, someone else will immediately take your place. A manager at the factory who apparently came from R&D has introduced all sorts of reforms, but honestly, they have simply brought over the R&D approach. After being here for a while, things have not improved—in fact, customer complaints have been increasing. Why are there so many complaints? Sorry, but it is because everyone works overtime every day, to the point of questioning the meaning of life. The employees are already exhausted, yet the supervisors are still checking whether their productivity targets have been met. In the end, it becomes an endless cycle: employees get tired, make mistakes, and receive customer complaints.

The factory’s quality-control manager is also outrageous. He loves holding meetings in front of his subordinates and boasting about how capable he is, talking about what he did at Honx and Sunx, and so on. Yet when making decisions, he never considers the consequences. He also says that his subordinates are professionals and should offer suggestions, but after they give their opinions, everyone still has to do what he says anyway = =. He constantly changes his directives. If you are considering a quality-control position, think twice. Oh! Right—he especially likes reprimanding his own subordinates in front of people from other departments to make himself look superior! If something will affect his KPI, he tells his subordinates to make it go away; if it will affect a subordinate’s KPI, he puts on a seemingly impartial face and says that it should be handled according to the rules. In short, he is very good at making grand promises. I generally do not recommend working at this company’s factory unless you have absolutely no other options! Oh—and filing a complaint is useless too; it will just be swept under the rug!

It’s undeniable that the R&D staff here are actually highly capable.

They even develop the test fixtures for the motherboards themselves.

The combination of software and hardware is something that genuinely makes me feel this company is highly focused on R&D.

This year’s health checkup was once again conducted by a major hospital. After the examination, they were even concerned that you might be hungry and prepared MOS Burger for you. It could be considered care for your health—because they still need you to keep working yourself to the bone.

The company also provides shuttle buses for employees in certain areas to commute to and from work.

That is another aspect of the company that is fairly admirable.

HR often says: “It’s difficult to find people because the location is relatively remote and job seekers aren’t interested,” and so on.

Actually, it’s just that these incompetent PMs have ruined the company’s reputation.

As soon as you don’t comply with a PM’s wishes, they casually fire the R&D staff.

PMs who understand technology cannot survive here, because the vice presidents don’t understand technology either.

When you explain the bottlenecks you encounter at the technical or engineering level, can you really expect them to understand?

To the vice presidents and PM department directors, you are just numbers and dates.

Therefore, PMs only need to be good-looking; whether they understand the specifications is no longer important.

Learn to push things to the relevant engineering units, CC the vice president on the email, and get their sign-off.

Naturally, someone will pick it up and do it.

Here, you absolutely cannot refuse a PM or argue with one.

If you fail to meet the target, it will be because you didn’t follow instructions—“You’re fired.”

The management style feels very American, but the bonus they give you is very Taiwanese and Chinese in style.

Now compare the salaries of these PM department directors and vice presidents with your salaries.

Why do all you people at the bottom get only 16 months’ pay? (Sometimes even less.) Because it has all been taken and divided among the people above you...

These dead-tired R&D workers sweat and toil, but you still can’t learn what upward management means.

So you deserve it~~~~

Whenever a vice president’s birthday approaches, all the managers with any standing have to do their best to curry favor, to make the big, big boss happy.

Understand?

So, for anyone planning to come here, besides selling your skills, you also need to know how to put on a smile—you must not offend the PMs.

> The above refers to the business unit on the fifth floor.

Also, why can the rules and systems of the Operations Center override those of the company?

Are you related to the chairman?

=> HR actually doesn’t dare to intervene, because they’re not much use either.

=> Whatever the people above say, they simply follow orders, because after staying here too long, their legs have gone numb.

I once asked someone who had left Axiomtek, “Why did you leave?”

She asked me in return: “Is the effort you put in here proportional to your bonus?”

I looked at my payslip and was speechless for a long time~~

Job security until retirement, with decent benefits. You won’t become rich, but you won’t go hungry.

There is a cherry blossom trail outside the office, and plenty of rainwater, so you won’t have to worry about thirst.

Don’t come to the Operations Center. Its subordinate units include the factory, QA, Document Control Center, and After-Sales Service. Once you’re here, you’ll feel uncomfortable all over because after the vice president from the Golden Factory took over, the focus has been on militarized management and “discipline.” Simply put, specialists and engineers are managed like production-line operators.

It’s understandable that discipline is important, but violating the Labor Standards Act by restricting employees’ annual leave is not acceptable. Company regulations state that one hour is the minimum unit, and in emergencies you can notify your supervisor first and submit the leave form later. Yet they insist that four hours be the minimum unit, and you cannot take annual leave for sudden emergencies—you can only take personal leave. Even if you submit the form according to company regulations, it will still be rejected because it does not comply with the vice president’s decree. Why should you be unable to use your annual leave and have to take unpaid personal leave instead? Is making four hours the minimum unit intended to maliciously consume employees’ annual leave?

The Labor Standards Act stipulates that, provided work is not affected, an employer may not prevent an employee from taking annual leave. But in the units under the Operations Center, leave requests will indeed be blocked. Have any of you ever seen this kind of management style?

If you want to work overtime, you can. You may exchange it for compensatory leave or receive overtime pay, but you can only apply for two or four hours. Compensatory leave can also only be taken in units of at least two hours.

I really don’t understand what these leave rules have to do with discipline. The key point is that they are also illegal.

So why do I say that working under the Operations Center makes you feel uncomfortable all over? Because every form you submit will be reviewed by the little secretary—leave requests, official trips, material requisitions, expense claims, and so on. The little secretary will record everything and report it to the vice president. If the little secretary has any questions about your forms, your supervisor will be harassed endlessly. If people from headquarters are stationed at the factory, your every move will be monitored. Even when you go to the restroom, people at headquarters will know.

Having a proxy system for leave is perfectly reasonable. I believe every company has such a system. But in all the companies I’ve worked for, I have never seen employees taking leave required to photocopy their assigned tasks, have the proxy sign them, have the supervisor sign them, and then file the hard copies. What era is this? In short, it shows a lack of trust in employees.

Before long, they may even start controlling what time you drink water, how many times you use the restroom each day, and how many times you smoke. Because we’re production-line operators!!!

The R&D headquarters building is fairly new.

Other than that, there don't seem to be many advantages.

Most colleagues are nice, except for a few PMs—you shouldn't try to become buddies with them.

Even PMs have the authority to fire sales staff.

What else can you expect this business group to accomplish?

This is where I have to tell the story.

First of all, this company belongs to the Advantech group, so PMs wield overwhelming power.

I previously worked in the “Intelligent Design Services” unit, located on the fifth floor of headquarters.

If you are interviewing for this business unit, I would advise you not to go!

Because the director of its PM department has so much power that they can fire anyone. The workplace culture is truly bizarre.

The vice president of Intelligent Design Services is called “Qiwen.” He worked at Axiomtek for more than 20 years and was promoted from vice president to general manager.

Currently, he and Wu Wei-Xiong, the general manager on the fourth floor, are being considered to see which of them can succeed as Axiomtek’s chairman.

I cannot really comment on the other departments because I have not worked with them.

Qiwen has a sales background. He is handsome, refined, and well-proportioned. Combined with his excessive power, this inevitably means he needs people to flatter him. Every year, when this “Qiwen” vice president (now promoted to general manager) is about to celebrate his birthday, the PMs in this business group mobilize colleagues from every department to help Qiwen make a birthday video.

They also have department assistants film and edit the video, and then arrange glow sticks into something resembling a catwalk on the Avenue of Stars.

I have worked in the electronics industry for quite a while, and I really have never encountered anything like this... Your birthday is your own business.

If your lackeys want to celebrate your birthday, that is their personal choice. But mobilizing R&D, ME, partner units, and then having the nerve to call it a collective action—

you people are truly awful~~~~~~~

However! This behavior exists only in “Intelligent Design Services”! Other business groups and departments do not do this.

Everyone, please do not misunderstand!

Next is the most serious issue: as I said, “PMs have too much power.” There are three major product lines.

The PM director for one of them, the “KIOSK” product line, is Tony Chang, who bullies colleagues.

He uses his position to yell at coworkers face-to-face and even uses his authority to whisper complaints about anyone he dislikes to “Qiwen.”

As a result, some excellent employees were fired. Of course, Qiwen does not need to know about these things~

You might ask: Does Tony Chang generate very high sales? Honestly~ no. It is just that Tony’s family “seems” to have a connection with Shopee,

so Qiwen needs those orders. That is why he is relatively indulgent toward Tony Chang.

Even more absurdly, after Qiwen was promoted to general manager, he expanded the power of the three PM directors even further~

One PM director oversees R&D, another oversees the Systems Department, and Tony Chang oversees Mechanical Engineering.

=> At that point, Tony Chang wanted to add mechanical engineering suppliers he knew to Axiomtek’s approved list.

Even though the products from these suppliers were clearly poor in quality, this great PM director, Tony Chang, demanded that people in the mechanical engineering department embellish them

so they could be submitted to management for approval.

In addition, Tony Chang has two lackeys under him, one man and one woman. Their distinguishing feature: both have the largest builds in the department.

These two have also absorbed Tony’s influence and learned their superior’s methods. Although they do not hold managerial positions, they also bully colleagues.

Yet nothing has happened to them to this day because they are Tony’s favorites.

As I said, these bizarre and abnormal things happen only in “Intelligent Design Services.”

Orders in the other departments are stable and even continue to increase, so they simply do not have spare time to engage in this kind of nonsense.

And as I said, if you offend a PM! Even God could not save you.

This is simply such a bizarre place, so by all means, do not go.

The HR person was very polite.

There were two interviewers. One of them was okay and asked some basic interview questions and so on, but the other interviewer, Txxx, talked far too much nonsense. My career plans are none of your business. This was the longest, most pointless interview I have ever had. If you don't like me, you simply shouldn't have invited me to interview. You invited me and then talked a bunch of nonsense.

None

As for the IT side, use your own judgment; everything below was just a dream I had..

If you happen to be assigned to a certain Mark's team, run away quickly (through the X department, supposedly a new department that handles some material reports). Even before he was promoted to a junior managerial position, he had already started observing others. If you returned to your seat a little late after lunch or did not eat with him, he would speak in the tone of a senior colleague and say, "You're a new hire and still in your probationary period. Please pay attention to the lunch break schedule. Also, when I want to find you for lunch, I can't find you anywhere. I may speak very directly and it may sound unpleasant, but this is advice from a senior colleague 🤪🤪." That's right, those are his exact words. In addition, taking too much leave would also prompt him to remind you (he would always give these reminders in the name of an even higher-level manager; who knows whether that was true). Later, after he was promoted to a junior managerial position, besides the original weekly meeting (with the higher-level manager), we also had to hold a meeting with him every morning to report our progress and plans. The development schedule also had to follow his wishes. If the number of days reported was too high, he would shorten the timeline. The phrase he said most often was, "If I wrote this requirement, it would only take me X days. You reported too many days. If you really can't finish it, work overtime on your own." If you did not listen to him, he would make a petty report to the higher-level manager. However, from what I saw, the higher-level manager had no intention of intervening and simply tacitly allowed all of this behavior to continue. So, if you do not listen to Mark, even if you are capable and do your job well, you will ultimately be dismissed on the grounds of failing your probationary period. At present, only he and another new hire are left rushing to complete the projects, and they often work overtime. If you encounter him during an interview, please be careful.

The above is what I dreamed about, so use your own judgment. That's all; I'm going to take unemployment benefits and rest for a while. Thank you to him for letting me go—and for leaving me with some money to collect.

A peaceful, retirement-like atmosphere at the factory.

If you’re not in an online role, it’s extremely idle when things are slow and extremely busy when things are busy.

The benefits and compensation at the factory are separate from those at headquarters.

People relocating from southern Taiwan are not recommended to work at the factory. It’s better to look for a position at the head office; at least then there’s a chance of buying a small studio apartment.

Factory salaries are an annual income that won’t fill you up, won’t starve you, and certainly won’t let you buy a house. They’re a tiny bit better than in southern Taiwan—really, just a tiny bit.

People there always say that they sometimes provide a surplus bonus package.

But in reality, it’s only half the base salary—or, at best, a full month’s salary. Foreign workers don’t get it.

The factory’s compensation and benefits keep getting cut.

They always say the compensation is better than what is required by the Labor Standards Act. Better in what way? Isn’t it just the bare minimum...?

The annual salary was changed to a guaranteed 13 months. It really is just 13 months, so don’t expect them to pay any additional annual performance bonus or anything like that. There isn’t one. It used to be 14 months.

After the factory relocated to Xizhi, the raw materials for the company’s own products were considered more important. As for employees’ computers—sorry, move them yourself.

It’s very obvious that this is a company that doesn’t take care of its employees.

The procedure for applying for transportation expenses for business trips is so complicated that you simply don’t feel like applying.

Perfect attendance bonus: 500... less than at any company in southern Taiwan, so quite a lot of people there like to take days off.

The stock price keeps rising, while compensation keeps getting cut. Salaries haven’t increased, and employees aren’t even allowed to buy company stock anymore.

As for the internal culture, some people rely on their seniority to throw their weight around, and some even skip procedures when handling things.

The only people in the entire factory without ulterior motives are the foreign workers.

You can become a textbook corporate drone here. It’s unbearably harsh.

Enough said. I’m going to look for another job.

Air conditioning.

I worked at the factory site.

Internal politics.

The younger PMs actually do things, while the older ones throw their weight around.

There are errors in the SOPs, but the older employees never admit them and even tell other departments not to issue abnormality reports.

When contractors point out problems with the SOPs, they blame the contractors for not understanding them.

Only when something serious happens do they start passing the buck—first to quality assurance, then on-site manufacturing, then material issuing.

No matter what goes wrong with a sign-off, the PMs push the blame away the most. But they fail to realize that the source of every incident is always unclear and incomplete SOPs.

There is an older, bespectacled employee in the finished-goods warehouse who complains all day. The person in charge of the warehouse, despite being one of the more senior employees there, is always half-hearted about managing it.

When you ask where something is, they tell you to find it yourself. Come on—the warehouse is your responsibility. Even when you ask where something was put, they just grumble and waste time that could be spent searching.

They completely shirk responsibility and are very good at dodging problems. They clearly know where things are, but never tell you. They are basically just someone who moves cargo around and serve little purpose.

Look closely at the assembly section of quality assurance: only 10% of the people actually do their jobs. Everyone else pushes their work problems onto that 10%.

The other 90% are mostly idle, or they disappear midway through their shifts.

As for benefits:

They are extremely basic—really basic.

Having benefits that comply with the Labor Standards Act is considered good, but they are not better than what the law requires.

Simply put, you need to have worked for more than a year to receive a subsidy for the company trip.

The year-end bonus was changed to one month’s salary; it used to be two months.

After working here for half a year, I have seen nothing but benefits shrinking, with no improvement. The stock price, however, has risen.

The employee welfare committee has not been updated for five years.

Even when activities are organized, they are all geared toward older employees: watching obscure basketball games, taking trips around Taiwan (old-town tours, mountain climbing), and movie days.

(They are cinemas I have never even heard of—actually, not cinemas, but theaters—showing movies I have never heard of.) In any case, these are all activities that young employees would not want to attend.

Vending-machine snacks are restocked once a week, and quite often only once every two weeks. Usually, three days after restocking, only obscure snacks are left.

The snacks are all cheap. The drinks are cheaper than those outside, although that is because they are brands of drinks no one has ever seen before.

The lunch boxes during the lunch break are expensive. There is basically no company subsidy; after 2,400 is deducted from your pay for meals, your actual base salary is what remains.

But lunch boxes generally start at NT$70. They are ordered collectively, so don’t expect otherwise. If you order separately, you can only arrange delivery yourself, which costs more.

There is a 30-minute break during overtime (17:00–17:30). At such a remote factory in Beitou, going out to eat is more exhausting than serving in the military.

There is no group order for lunch boxes either. If you want to eat, you have to go out, and you have to eat quickly enough to rush back for overtime. So basically, everyone working overtime waits until the end of the shift to eat. It is extremely inconvenient.

At this rate, if I don’t end up with colon cancer, I’ll be amazed. But I heard the new factory provides meals, although employees have to pay part of the cost. I don’t know how much yet (NT$40–70).

The advantage is that profits are distributed every March, June, and September, but it is always a fixed half-month’s salary, or otherwise a full month’s salary (so far, I have only received half a month’s salary).

For each of the three major holidays, they give NT$500–1,000. That’s it—really, that’s all.

This March, employees were no longer allowed to subscribe to company shares (but the stock is still rising; perhaps they want to keep all the gains for themselves?).

Basically, if you do not own a home in Taipei or have moved north for work, you can stop considering this place.

The salary is nowhere near enough to buy a home. If you already own a home, you can stay.

Renting is also possible, but then you end up neither well-fed nor starving.

So basically, the people who stay here are over 30 or live in Taipei and just want to earn some spending money.

However, I heard that the headquarters (Xizhi) offers excellent compensation. So if you have the ability, remember to apply for a headquarters position rather than a manufacturing position at the factory site.

The benefits system is not shared between them.

In short, it is a system manufacturer resembling a traditional industry. You could even call it a traditional-industry company, since internally people are rigid-minded, inefficient, or older employees use their seniority to pressure others.

I am referring only to the factory site.

The direct supervisor is a nice person

The interview process was very efficient

The colleagues are easy to get along with

Those of you sitting comfortably in the office,

please pay a little more attention to the factory employees.

They are the true production backbone of Axiomtek.

While you senior managers

are busy bantering with other female colleagues

and rushing out the moment the workday ends,

just taking each day as it comes,

please spare even a little thought for how the employees at the Beitou factory feel.

Improve the working environment, and the quality of the work will naturally improve.

When quality improves, mistakes are less likely to occur.

When goods are delivered overseas, we won’t have to face the embarrassment of the other party discovering a pile of defective products during inspection.

Domestic shipments may be one thing, but overseas shipments represent not only the Axiomtek brand, but potentially the image of the entire country.

Don’t let other countries laugh at Taiwan’s manufacturing, okay?

Even Taiwan Semiconductor is taking a major step onto the world stage—could you please not be a blemish on Taiwan’s brands?

Could you visit the Beitou factory more often?

If you don’t want to go to the factory, that’s fine. Could you at least spend more time online and learn about what the factory employees are thinking?

The interview process is efficient; applicants are not kept waiting too long between the interview and receiving notification.

Salaries are paid on time and are never delayed.

The job posting for the Beitou factory states working hours of 08:00–17:00, but in practice employees must arrive early, at 7:45–7:50, to attend the morning meeting on time every day. Employees cannot leave promptly at 17:00; they have to finish packing up for several minutes before going downstairs. Managers actively retrieve entry and exit records and overtime hours to monitor whether approved employees and their departments are working diligently. Employees who leave later and frequently work overtime are considered to be the ones actually doing their jobs.

People who are capable can finish their work during working hours; those who lack ability have to rely on overtime to earn overtime pay. This also increases the operating costs of the parent factory and reduces the profit distributions received by other employees.

Mobile phones cannot be brought into the factory building:

Everyone has family members or children, and no one can predict when an emergency might occur that would require requesting a phone from a supervisor. A family member could suddenly be involved in a traffic accident, or a child could have an accident at school. If the police or school then need to notify the parents or relatives, the rule prohibiting phones in the factory building could cause delays in reporting the incident. Can the company bear responsibility for this?

Tea and water cannot be brought into the factory building:

The employee cafeteria is on the first floor. During a short 10-minute break, production workers cannot possibly run to the first floor to drink water. Occasionally, employees bring bottles filled with purified water and place them in storage lockers in the restrooms on their floor, but there are also self-appointed busybodies who report and provide evidence of this.

This makes new employees feel that only office workers on the first floor are treated as people who are allowed to drink water or coffee, while employees on other floors are not considered people and do not need water or refreshments to sustain them through heavy labor.

Production workers, inspectors, and material preparers must be able to stand for long periods and cooperate with unreasonable overtime demands from the production line:

There are insufficient personnel for incoming-material preparation, production schedules are often arranged improperly, and production workers are inefficient. When shipments are delayed, the company then scrutinizes whether the downstream inspection unit is willing to work overtime and uses this as an excuse to shift blame. No matter how many things go wrong, the final packaging and inspection teams are blamed.

The company also does not look for professional industrial engineering (IE) engineers to establish standard working hours and plan the factory layout when production workers are inefficient. It only wants to save money by having process engineers (PEs) also perform IE work, using one person as several. When the production unit falls behind schedule, the person in charge only complains that there are not enough labor hours, then pressures the PEs and headquarters to provide more hours. The efficiency is extremely poor, forcing the downstream inspection unit to work overtime as well.

If production personnel make mistakes, punishments include being forced to stand and work all day, or serving as the person on duty responsible for cleaning and taking out the trash for a month. Management, from top to bottom, cannot propose constructive improvement plans. This causes the production unit to develop a habit of shifting responsibility for incidents to other departments or to the parent company headquarters’ R&D department.

The production unit frequently extends the probationary periods of hardworking operators, sometimes for as long as a year.

From top to bottom, no one reflects on whether the interviewers’ judgment or abilities are at fault, or whether management has failed to provide proper guidance and help new employees quickly become effective at their work. Instead, management is skilled at verbally insulting employees and then using probation extensions to treat employees as disposable labor and exploit their work.

People who work efficiently, believe that today’s tasks should be completed today, or often finish their assignments within eight hours should consider this opportunity carefully. Those with poor work efficiency who want to earn overtime pay and make superiors perceive them as hardworking may consider this a suitable option.

It is suitable for applicants with high stress tolerance who are skilled at drinking and flattering or ingratiating themselves with others. In addition, people with cardiovascular disease who may need to be transported to the hospital by ambulance should not apply.

Flexible working hours are fairly flexible. The headquarters’ leave policy can be implemented in accordance with the Labor Standards Act. If a manager is being unreasonable, you can also coordinate with HR. Most of the time, you can leave work on time; if you cannot finish your tasks, you are not required to stay at the company and can take your laptop home.

Non-direct employees cannot apply for overtime pay. Regional business managers assign work via LINE during holidays or in the middle of the night and require reports to be submitted before work the next day, making it difficult to relax even during personal time. They also verbally abuse and personally attack subordinates, are accustomed to assigning tasks verbally instead of by email, and shift the blame to subordinates when problems arise.

They follow the Labor Standards Act.

Beitou plant

If you clock in more than 1 minute after the 8:00 start time, you have to take 1 hour of leave. Every day, a morning meeting is held 10–15 minutes before work starts. Although work ends at 5:00, the second bell rings at 5:05, and only then can you organize your things and clock out.

Company activities: The annual sports meet is always held on holidays in Xindian District (unpaid).

Annual performance reviews and promotions only result in a change in the “job title”; in practice, there is no salary increase apart from the annual adjustment, and promotions also seem to lack a formal system.