I had a similar directive at a past job. The company president told me to install Windows 3.1 or he would do it. His logic was that the company purchased one copy, and since it was so expensive, we should be able to put it on as many PCs as we wanted. Needless to say, I found another job.

You can't go wrong by doing the right thing. You may suffer in the short term, but in the long term things work out for the better. That's how it worked for me.