Chapter 561 - A Person's Worth

Two weeks later, the Iris Long fever continued raging at Jin Corporation. The company wasn't an isolated case. It had spread to other parts of the country, especially in busy cities, towns and villagesplaces that had more access to the media.

Then Orchidia Beauty announced a restocking of all its inventories, fuelling this so-called "Iris Long fever" even further. The company increased the number of units available for purchase and removed the product limitations per person.

Since its memorable grand launch, Orchidia Beauty had become the "in" skincare brand throughout the country. Many famous beauty influencers, celebrities, socialites and even regular people raved about it. The ones who successfully bought products during the launch showed off their "hauls" online. These haul videos and blogs trended, encouraging more people to jump into the bandwagon as well.

Everyone was reviewing it. Everyone was using it.

That was what it seemed like based on its current online popularity.

As the Owner, President and CEO, Iris Long's name was closely associated to Orchidia Beauty. On one hand, her celebrity status was an automatic endorsement for her own company. On the other hand, the rising popularity of her company was also helping increase her own fame. It was a win-win situation for both her and her company.

Bright Summit decided to revamp her image into a savvy celebrity businesswoman as a result of this. In these two weeks alone, she had now posed for various business magazines and guested on business-centric programs.

This move was met with quite a few resistance from those who were still feeling skeptical about her business abilities. These skeptics thought that she was just a puppet leader, believing that Chen Fei and Long Jinjing were the real leaders who ran Orchidia Beauty. After all, they were the ones who had business degrees.

At the moment, Iris Long was on her way to a guesting for an afternoon business news program on cable TV. She rode in her executive van with Dom and Tang Yiyi. The sky was overcast and chilly, somewhat making it a depressing day to everyone. To Iris, however, it was an exciting day.

Clover was currently reporting to her on the phone.

"How many asked this time?" Iris asked with a faint smile, as she looked at the gloomy traffic outside.

"Three this morning," Clover replied. "COO Chen expects that there will be more this afternoon."

"Hmmm. In total, how many interested investors have asked us?"

"After the grand launch two weeks ago, we received a total of...uh...195, no, 198 inquiries about it."

"I see."

Iris and Clover discussed a few matters before hanging up. After the phone call, she closed her eyes and rested on her seat while Tang Yiyi and Dom busied themselves organizing her work schedule.

The day after the grand launch two weeks ago, Orchidia Beauty was immediately contacted by investors who were interested in buying shares of the company. Iris declined the offers because she wanted to keep Orchidia Beauty a 100% private company. She was the official owner and held 90% majority shares while Alric Bauer held 10% minority shares.

Even though she was adamant in declining the offers, they kept on coming almost every day. She wasn't annoyed. On the contrary, she was pleased and excited at this development. This was a good sign. It meant that there were many established investors who saw the potential in her company. Nevertheless, she wasn't the least bit tempted of making Orchidia Beauty a public company no matter how many offers she received. For now at least. She had a better plan for both Orchidia Beauty and Planet Monkey in mind.

Later, they finally arrived at a small TV broadcasting station. They were welcomed and led to a dressing room where the program director personally greeted them.

A few minutes into the interview, it was clear that the news anchor was trying to trip Iris up, wanting her to make a fool of herself. Dom was enraged while Tang Yiyi was dismayed. However, they couldn't do anything right now because the show was being broadcast live on cable TV. Tang Yiyi was already planning on lodging a complaint about this.

If the others noticed it, of course Iris did as well. Despite the repeated veiled provocations from the news anchor, asking her difficult questions and using business terminologies, Iris answered smoothly and almost perfectly. She maintained her calm, making the news anchor feel like he was punching cotton.

Grudgingly, the news anchor admitted to himself that Iris Long had some business knowledge and knew how to answer all the technical questions he threw at her.

'Maybe she studied a bit before coming for this interview,' he thought.

However, he didn't want to give up just yet. He felt peeved when he was informed that he would be interviewing Iris Long.

'I'm a serious business news anchor. Why must I interview a singer? So what if her company has become popular? It's not like she's the one running it!'

These thoughts prompted him to make it hard for Iris Long during the interview. He wanted to embarrass her and show the viewers that she didn't deserve the respect reserved for serious business leaders. However, he was unable to trip her up in this interview no matter how hard he tried. She had perfect answers to all of his questions, making him the one to feel embarrassed instead. The director was already making signs at him, warning him to stop what he was doing. Knowing that he was already in trouble with the director, the news anchor resented Iris Long. Since he couldn't trip her up with his prepared questions, he attacked what he thought to be her most vulnerable point as a "wannabe" businesswoman.

"You didn't go to university," he said.

It wasn't a question but a statement. There was a look of challenge in his eyes, as if he had just thrown the ace in his sleeve which guaranteed his victory in this battle of wits that he instigated between them.

"You're now a CEO of your own company," he said, putting emphasis on the word 'CEO'. It was obvious in his tone that he didn't think she deserved the title. "You also claim to have built Orchidia Beauty from the ground up with your own abilities. Don't you think that your claim and position would be so much more believable if you attended university and have a diploma to prove it?"

Iris looked straight into his eyes, silently telling him that she wasn't the least bit intimidated by his provocation. Then she looked straight at the camera to do the same with the viewers watching the business news program.

"A diploma is indeed very important to gain the respect of others and to prove to everyone that you're educated," she said. "It's a proof of your hard work, perseverance and efforts from all the years of studying and also a gift to your family for supporting you throughout your education. A diploma is like a ticket for a stable future, but whether you'll be able to ride the train to success is still up to many factors. There are many successful business leaders in the world who don't have diplomas. Some of the wealthiest and most popular billionaires in the world are dropouts. A few of them didn't even bother enrolling in university or college. From this perspective, you can see that a diploma doesn't always equal business success. Success still depends on the person."

The news anchor opened his mouth, appearing like he was about to argue with her but Iris beat him to it, speaking more quickly than him. She didn't allow him to get even just a word in.

"I'm not saying that a diploma is worthless. My point is that it shouldn't be used as the sole measurement of a person's worth, especially if you don't look at the bigger picture and know the real circumstances of the person. In my opinion, one's achievements and current success are more accurate in gauging one's potential and worth than a diploma. Can you guarantee that everyone who earned diplomas have successful careers? Of course not. A diploma is like a ticket for a stable future, but not a guarantee."

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