The owner of a beauty salon chain in Guangzhou has implemented a ‘filial piety’ policy which forces staff to send a portion of their salary to their parents.
The Chinese-language publication,
Guangzhou Daily, writes that an unnamed company in the Baiyun District takes 5% of wages from married employees and 10% from single workers and deposits this directly into their parents’ bank accounts.
“Filial gold inspires employees to honour their parents and helps the company retain people to alleviate problems of staff turnover and recruitment difficulties,” a company spokesperson, Lu Meiye, told
Guangzhou Daily.
"Those who disagree with [the policy] will not be hired," she added.
The chain also conducts regular workshops with its 80 employees teaching them the value of honouring one’s parents. Managers even call employees’ parents to let them know their sons or daughters are in good hands.
With an average monthly salary of 3,000 yuan (S$660), the stipend can be a significant contribution to the livelihood of the workers’ parents, many of whom live in rural areas, Lu said.
There has, however, been some pushback by staff against the scheme. Lu Zhiping, one of the firm’s managers, said he discovered an employee holding his parents’ bank cards so he could keep the money for himself.
Other staff have voiced complaints that the forced nature of the policy has taken the meaning out of the gesture.
Users on the Chinese social media site, Weibo, have also had mixed reactions.
“Filial piety is filial piety, and salary is salary,” one user wrote. “Salaries are for the employees not for their parents. They should just mind their own business.”
“The company's intention is good but its methods are too heavy handed. And filial piety should come naturally from the heart. This isn't quite right,” another user said.
“I support this! These days many young people just want to earn money for themselves and spend it on themselves, very few care for their families,” wrote a third user.
What do you think? Would this kind of policy work in Singapore businesses or is it better to simply let employees handle this sort of thing on their own?
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