Who says China's new young are stubborn and spoiled?

The resignation letter from Chunxin came as a complete surprise. Just two years out of college, she was almost always the first to arrive in the morning and among the last to leave at night. At very meeting, she would have a pen in hand, taking notes diligently. She rarely asked questions, and when prompted to speak, she would blush and stammer. But she did her work beautifully, and every in a while, she would meekly voice a brilliant suggestion to make every head turn.

In a nutshell, she was nothing of the stereotypical spoiled post-80s kids one had heard so much about; rather, she seemed the stereotypical hardworking Chinese employee every boss would love to have.

Yet, now this stereotypical hardworking employee wanted to quit.

I arrived early in the morning to find her alone in the office. We sat down to talk, and she explained the key points in her long resignation letter: too much work, not learning enough, and feeling insecure with not learning enough. Plus, she wanted to do her job well, which led to long hours, leaving no time for her personal interests.

Oh, that should be easy, I thought to myself. I reminded her that it is natural to be overwhelmed by the real-world work environment, that on-the-job learning is a lot more chaotic and unstructured than school learning, and that the stress over obstacles was natural.

I could see her resolution waver a bit, in her eyes. Hadn't I just made a logically irrefutable case? She had not gone to a big-name university and her introverted personality had given us doubts at first. How could she possibly leave this precious opportunity to work for a multi-national for the other option?

Then she said no. She wanted more time to herself.