Reflections on Running KangAi Commune: Why Did We Fall into the Self-Proving Trap?

Looking back over these years of running KangAi Commune, I have come to see my greatest error in thinking: the belief that as long as we did things well internally—properly, transparently—we would be recognized by everyone and could develop steadily over the long term.

Our way of doing things in the past was simple: work solidly, and be worthy of our members. We placed enormous value on openness and candor; whether it was routine work or the sensitive issues the industry habitually avoided, we would proactively explain them clearly to members and never hide anything. On costs we were even more frugal and restrained—at the height of our staffing, our monthly office rent never exceeded 8,000 yuan. Back then I always felt that transparency, controllable costs, and candor toward members were our greatest strengths.

But after a series of events, I have come to fully understand: doing well ourselves is only one-sided self-improvement; it cannot solve the core problem of distrust and lack of recognition from the outside. Praising yourself and supervising yourself is never persuasive enough. However perfectly we perform, however comprehensive our disclosures, in the eyes of outsiders, regulators, and the public it is all just "saying good things about ourselves." A single team restraining and disclosing on its own, with no outside participation or witness, is naturally very hard-pressed to dispel outsiders' concerns and doubts completely.

In terms of underlying logic, we used to focus only on "keeping internal costs low and doing internal things well," while overlooking the most important point: doing things is one matter; making the outside world believe it and setting regulators at ease is another. Compared with refined internal management, external trust, recognition, and compliance endorsement are the key to an organization's survival.

This is not an isolated situation; it is a universal law across every industry. It also made me recognize a very real law of survival: even ordinary external collaboration is more valuable than working behind closed doors to the utmost extreme.

This multi-party participation model is not about mutual restraint or draining infighting, but about using third-party participation and multi-party witness to backstop the matter and endorse trust. A matter is no longer done, spoken of, and judged by us alone; with external institutions participating, witnessing, and collaborating, it shifts from "proving our own innocence" to "everyone bearing witness together." This is also the approach that regulators and the public most recognize and trust.

Based on these deep reflections, KangAi Commune will thoroughly adjust its operating approach and establish a new principle: minimize closed-loop, self-contained work and maximize external collaboration and multi-party participation.