…”our biggest competitor. And the confidential files she sold were ours.”
I stared at the report. Jenna’s former company, a marketing agency owned by the boss she’d left me for, had worked on a short project for my company the year before. They’d had access to our product launch plans. Three months before our big release, our competitor announced an almost identical product. We had lost a major client because of it, and we never understood how it happened.
Now I did.
Jenna went pale when she saw the report. She didn’t deny it. She said her ex-boss, Trevor, had dumped her and cut her pay, and a recruiter from the competitor had offered her twenty thousand dollars for “some background research.” She didn’t realize, she said, that the files were ours. Then she admitted she had realized. She just didn’t think anyone would find out.
“You came here to interview for a job,” I said, “at the company you sold out.”
She started crying again. “I didn’t know it was yours. I swear I didn’t know you owned it.”
I believed that part. And it didn’t change anything.
I ended the interview politely. My HR director escorted her out. Our lawyers contacted the competitor that week. Faced with the evidence, they agreed to a settlement that more than covered the client we’d lost, and their head of strategy, who had arranged the purchase, was fired.
Jenna was already facing a lawsuit from Trevor’s agency. I didn’t add another one. Our lawyers advised that the settlement was enough, and I didn’t feel the need to bury someone who was already drowning.
I won’t pretend there wasn’t a small moment of satisfaction when she saw my name on the door. But mostly, I felt sad. She hadn’t left me because I was a dreamer. She left because she was always looking for the shortcut.
Last month, my company won an industry award. In my speech, I thanked my team, my investors and my mother. Then I said one more thing: “To anyone who’s ever been told they’ll never amount to anything, keep building. Quietly. The work speaks for itself.”
