There is no “Dogmatism”in Allyes
          ——A Interview of Leslie Yao, Executive Assistant to CEO of Allyes
             (China) Holding Company Limited by IT Post


Chen Jiayuan

Today I leave Allyes, but maybe one day I will come back. So is that for you. However, some day we can tell others, “I have been to Allyes Harbor, and that is a beautiful place, where the water is blue, the sand is white, beauties are a lot, and CEO David Zhu is a thin man…”
From the Blog of someone who ever worked in Allyes.


The doors of managers’ offices are always open

“In our company, all the doors of managers’ offices are always open.” Leslie Yao told the reporter at the beginning of the interview. The reporter noticed that as the manager of administration and human resource, Leslie let the door of his office open, too, and other employees came in freely for work. Leslie thought the most important characteristic of Allyes’ culture was smooth communication through the company structure. “Since the foundation, Allyes’ communication channel is always smooth. Not like many other companies, the office doors of our CEO and other managers are open for employees to find them for work or communication at any time without separation.”

The smooth communication channel that Leslie talked about was not only the open office doors, but also the democratic thoughts of Allyes’ leaders. As he said, Allyes’ employees would often go to CEO’s office directly to chat about their thoughts or difficulties in the work, and the CEO or managers wodul also patiently listen to their thoughts and discuss about solving the problems.

“Allyes’ managers will often actively go to chat with our employees, communicate with them a lot by email in the work, give telephone calls to some of them to talk about their problems, and sometimes have meals together. We are willing to communicate with employees.” Leslie said, “Besides the communication at work, Allyes’ managers also take some communication after work in the informal situation, like meeting in the lift, hall, or other places, when the communication is the most efficient.”


There is no “dogmatism”in Allyes

“We don’t hope there is dogmatism in Allyes: only the department director or the team leader makes the decision, and we can’t hear other employees’ suggestions. The employees at the junior level may have more good suggestions.” Leslie quite appreciated the brain-storm working style, as Allyes was a professional online interactive marketing service company focusing on Internet advertising technology service, online marketing service and pay-for-performance marketing service.

He introduced that in Allyes no decision was made by only one person, and each decision was made after lots of discussion and analysis, such as maybe the employee of one department would join in the decision making of this department. “Our conference rooms are always arranged fully for meeting and discussion of departments. For example, when the ad team need do a solution for clients, the case solution of high quality can’t be done by only one person, but need the team work.”

“Each month Allyes will hold a regular meeting of management team to discuss about some strategies and decisions of company development. In fact, the attendees include many department directors besides the management team.” Leslie thought the directors working in the front line were the ones who most understood this industry and the business development which they were in charging of. And the management team maybe only read the reporting but did not join the projects a lot. “So we will often invite them to join in the meeting to talk freely and give their opinions as the leaders in the front line of business.”

Teamwork was advocated by many companies, and Allyes particularly urged it. Leslie emphasized, “Allyes needs a good team much more than an elite man. As a team’s power is more than a man’s power no matter how excellent and passionful he is, we don’t want to form “dogmatism”, and would like to fully apply the intelligence and ability of each employee in the team to achieve the success we need.”

Leslie said, “Allyes had an employee before who was elite and could complete the work in very short time. But he didn’t like to share his thoughts with others or listen to others’ opinion, so he was insulated by the work team. We didn’t want to hear a voice like “If he can do the work, let him do it alone.”

“We don’t hope to think about the relationship before the work starts like some national companies. However, today is the teamwork times, and the basic ability of communication is still needed. In Allyes’ want ad, teamwork and communication skills are always the most basic requirements.”


Training is not welfare but an investment

“As a company founded in 1998 when focusing on technology, Allyes insisted through the Internet depression. When Allyes was in the hardest time, it still kept its 80 employees till the end of 2004 without reduce or defaulting the pay. Since 2005 Allyes has been in fast development: last year the number of employees increased from 80 to 130, and this year to nearly 400. For these new employees training is obviously very important.”

Leslie told the reporter that Allyes always paid lots of attention to the employees’ training and took different training ways for employees of different levels. “Firstly for the new employees we have orientation of 5 different lessons in the first 3 months, including regulations in administration and finance, and business knowledge of each department.”

“For backbone employees, Allyes will look for the suitable professionals to give the training they need, which may be professional knowledge or foreign languages. For example, when some department needs English training, HR department wwill find the professional English teachers to give the training.”

And for some managers, Allyes also supported a lot. “If our managers hope to have some lessons like EMBA, Allyes will pay for the lessons.”

Leslie considered training was not welfare but an investment for the company. “When the employees have more knowledge and skills, they can work for our company better. In HR management, training is a way to gather employees. We hope they can steadily work for Allyes.”