Stopping at the twentieth floor instead of the twenty-fifth floor where her office was stationed, Oh Ji-Soo let out exasperated sighs repeatedly until she got to the large open workspace.
"All of you listen up."
Knocking twice on the door frame she was standing next to she got the staff's attention.
Immediately, everyone stopped with the side talks and work in their hands and turned their attention to her.
"We have to prepare a proposal to join J Group's latest bidding project."
Sweeping her gaze past each one of them to catch the expressions on their faces, she continued.
"I need all of you to gather at the auditorium to share your intelligent ideas, you have five minutes to assemble."
Finishing up with her symbolic speech, 'You better come up with something worthy otherwise your paycheck for this month will be withheld' she turned her back and trotted away, leaving them to their opinion.
As soon as her back was far from them, everyone began to whisper amongst themselves with a frustrated look sitting on their faces.
"Do we have to do this a day after the weekend?"
"Why is Director Oh so mean to us this early in the morning, I haven't signed in to the system yet."
"Did you see her face? I didn't even see any smile on it."
"Why is she heading this meeting herself? She should have asked the project manager to handle it."
"Is this some sort of transfer of aggression?"
"Don't you know, if President Kim is the male devil, Director Oh is the female devil." An older woman with a round face said with certainty.
"But she is not as nearly evil as the big boss. She doesn't hold a candle to his devious leadership."
Another female staff clarified while shaking her head. Although she didn't work directly under Kim Ji-hun, she had seen a fair share of his vicious ways of dealing with people and situations.
"Right… Director Oh is only that way because he is hard on her." A male staff in his thirties added with a tinge of pity in his tone.
He didn't think that only Oh Ji-Soo was to be blamed for being hard on them. If their company's president didn't trouble her, then peace would equally extend to them as well.
"Poor Director Oh."
"Sighs! In the end, we still get to get a fair share of the President's dissatisfaction."
Suddenly while everyone was still busy talking amongst themselves, trying to analyse the reasoning behind their senior manager's treatment and its relation to their big boss, warning bells rang in their ears.
"Director Oh said we have 5 minutes to assemble, but I think we only have 3 minutes left at the moment."
Immediately, everyone seemed to have come to a realization. If they stayed a moment there, they were all going to be late.
Without a second thought, they all started moving out in their numbers.
As there were a good number of them, they couldn't take the elevators at the same time hence, most of them made a beeline for the stairs.
Those of them choosing to exercise a little instead of waiting for the elevator which would have ended up making them late, bore no grudges as they all had one unique thought.
'They must not appear at the auditorium a second after Director Oh has made an entrance.'
Meanwhile, Oh Ji-Soo had taken the elevator back to the 25th floor to do a quick task.
Stepping into her office, she walked straight to the shoe cabinet next to her office chair and opened the doors.
A soft sigh escaped her lips as her eyes glanced over the four pairs of sneakers aligned in neat rolls.
Left with not much choice, she picked the white one and went to sit on the chair behind her desk to change out of her heels.
There was a lot of work to do on the first day of the week so she needed something comfy for her feet.
The thought of dealing with aching ankles while working all day on a project that didn't even give her breathing space in between, made her throw it off the chart.
Kim Ju-hun was a big headache already and all her time was dedicated to easing the pain from his impact.
A few minutes later, Oh Ji-Soo walked into the auditorium and directly climbed the stage as the noise died down from the audience.
Seeing the white sneakers on her feet, one of the older ladies sitting behind coughed and leaned slightly toward the woman sitting next to her.
"She is putting on one pair of her legendary footwear collection."
"This means serious business activation mode," the other whispered in return just before Oh Ji-Soo started addressing them.
"We have strong competitors bidding for J Group's project. And this project is very important to Dream Axis because President Kim is very much interested in it. We have to get it beyond every reasonable doubt."
Checking the time on her wrist she revealed, casting her glance at them. "Actually, we have less than 24 hours to submit this proposal to the President."
"What?"
"This can't be."
"Are we going to slave our entire day here?"
"This is so unfair!"
"I can already hear a crack in my head."
Hearing the noise being made as they complained in hushed voices, Oh Ji-Soo didn't find it funny.
Her thin brows furrowed as her gaze narrowed down at them.
"Why the murmur?"
Sensing the anger in her tone, the voices from the audience died down almost immediately.
"This is Dream Axis. If you don't have the potential to prove why you are here receiving a high salary every month without fail…."
Five seconds later when everyone was on the brink of losing their minds due to the unfinished statement, they heard the last words that caused them to seal their protests in their hearts.
"Get lost!"
None of them dared to utter a word as they all swallowed back their resentments.
Who wanted to leave a company this great even though the stress level associated with it was on the high side?
Oh Ji-Soo didn't believe that any staff who could not prove their abilities should remain in their current positions.
They should be demoted or fired at once.
She too was getting an earful on a daily, they, being the junior staff should not be pampered either.