The Battle Beneath the Surface
Meng Zhijun's face had turned faintly ashen. She had never imagined that her supposedly fair and impartial secret ballot would give these people so much nerve. They knew perfectly well what she wanted, yet still went against her behind her back. It was simply infuriating.
After all, department heads had higher-ups above them. Though Meng Zhijun liked to use a mix of favors and pressure to win people over, not everyone would do as she wished. Especially when their own interests were at stake, who would care what a mere department head thought?
That was precisely why, even though Director Meng had secretly valued and supported Chen Sheng, the others might not necessarily agree with her.
So even though Li Bai had been off doing his own thing for several days, he had never deliberately tried to win over colleagues or secure their votes, yet many had still cast their ballots for him.
"There are thirty-three votes in total. Yu Guan has one, Xie Wenzhi has one, Yan Xiao has one, and Doctor Li and Doctor Chen each have fifteen. But there's only one available position for attending physician, and I'm the only one here who hasn't voted yet, so my vote will go to..."
Annoyed, Meng Zhijun had no intention of paying attention to what the doctors and nurses thought. She was ready to exercise her authority as department head and remind everyone who called the shots in psychiatry.
If everyone had known what was good for them and voted for Chen Sheng, she could have happily kept up the pretense of being impartial.
But now she had no choice but to use a fallback plan that went beyond the rules of the ballot. She could choose whether or not to cast her vote,