I had a very intriguing conversation on Korea Business Central with Mike Park the other day in which we tried to answer that always elusive question:
“What exactly is it that Koreans are good at?”
The discussion started from a debate on the accuracy of my comments about Naver. Mike noted that:
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Korea is “globally competitive” and powerful with “single” solutions, but when solutions need to address “plural” or “multiple” groups, Korea is extremely weak. Hence, “globally not competitive” when it comes to packaging-up and marketing new innovative ideas and concepts to different market segments/consumers.
Naver, unfortunately, was never designed to attack international markets. It started as a local alternative to non-Korea-created portals/search engines. Hence, it has no fizzle/appeal outside Korea. It would be nice to see future Korean products, as well as services designed, with ambition/intent to reach beyond Korea country boarders and consumers.
If we look at automobile, shipbuilding and mobile phone industries, Korea is getting much better in this area with significant market share (more users/buyers) outside Korea than within.
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In considering this thoughtful reply we must break down Korean strengths at multiple levels. The task is not simple and involves some epistemological hair splitting.
To start with, Korea is simultaneously a nation of extreme specialists and also a nation of generalists. We have a great depth of expertise in fields like welding or LCD that is unrivalled in the world. Such specialization is Korea’s secret weapon and has powered its economic rise. Such specialization is also seen as Korea’s weakness in that Korea produces so many experts who cannot manage to think outside the box. Most importantly, many Korean experts seem to be very poorly socially adept, not being capable, it seems to internationals, of developing close relations with outsiders or imagining how others might view the world.
That specialization is coupled with a certain global thinking as well in that Korea is successful in fields like shipbuilding or memory or display not because it is the best in the world in a particular technology, but because it can mass an integrated group of technologies at a very high level of sophistication, if not exactly the best in the world. Shipbuilding requires a vast assortment of specialized technologies that are integrated into a total package. Here Koreans seem to be quite at home: Forming a team, working together effectively and innovating constantly in the process as they struggle to meet a set goal.
But there is another side to Korea that is equally important. The class of generalists who draw on Korea’s tradition of a universal ephistemology dating back to the 16th century. We have many administrators in government and in the corporate world who constantly shift from one responsibility to another without a chance to build up an expertise. I have seen government officials spend periods of less than six months on a particular assignment and then be transferred to completely unrelated divisions. Korea has a large cadre of such individuals in government and business and they play a critical role in the decision making process. I am tempted to trace the phenomenon back to the words of Confucius, “The Gentleman is not a specialist.” There was a strong belief in traditional Korea that the scholar and policy maker should be grounded in the classics and be prepared to do any job that comes along. What we see in Korean policy and Korean business practice is the intersection of a radical specialization born of the post 1960 drive for modernization with a lasting emphasis on non-specialists in the decision-making process.
The subject requires further investigation, but I would propose that when internationals remark that “Koreans behave in this manner” they are referring to a kind of Korean that does not exactly exist. What they observe is an interference pattern of quite different Korean approaches. That combination seems to have some strength, even if it is hard to locate a particular genius behind it. That makes sense, after all. Korea is successful not because of particular geniuses, but rather because of the generally high level of education across the board.
Korea is struggling now to create content on a global scale that makes it a cultural player. In fact, Korea is quite successfully in producing culture that impacts East Asia, but has had more trouble in Europe and the US—the places that dominate global business culture. The challenge for Korea today is to bring internationals into the center of the decision-making process. That trend has started, but has often been dramatically reversed. Ethnicity is so much a part of how Koreans motivate themselves to innovate and work that a multicultural company is taking a long time to develop. The related challenge it getting Koreans to imagine how the foreigner sees the world. That means to stop thinking about how to present things so that the foreigner has a good impression, but rather to understand how the world looks through the eyes of someone else. That process is hard for all of us, but perhaps because of Korea’s educational system, it has been a bit more troublesome here.
Insightful post. As for Naver: to the best of my knowledge, Naver mainly makes use of human labor to filter and index content. This is in contrast to search engines like Google and Bing, which rely on automated techniques to crawl and index the whole Web. As a result, Google and Bing have a solution that, from a global point-of-view, fundamentally scales much better than the solution offered by Naver.
Also, I would personally answer the question in the title as follows: the rather strict hierarchical nature of Korean society makes Koreans very good at “fast following”, or to put it more positively, at pursuing an “embrace and extend” strategy.
Emanuel: Your comments rings quite true. I would say the way to understand internationals is by first understanding yourself. I find Koreans don’t quite know themselves and as such find it hard to understand others. In the West, we have the Hellenic culture that taught us to know thyself. Korea I find is not at that level. That’s why I am becoming successful here because I teach about emotional intelligence as understood and written by Daniel Goleman in Working with Emotional Intelligence. If there is one book that needs to be translated into Korean and I am unaware at this moment that it is, it would definitely be this one. It’s about controlling ourselves and being around others.
There have been MANY books on EQ and personal development written for the Korean audience as can be seen in a Kyobobook.com search for “EQ”. The book by Daniel Goleman was translated and published in 2008. Self-help books are often bestsellers in Korea and have been at least since the 90’s. It is culturally arrogant to suggest that a people do not know themselves. I cannot imagine saying that about ANY culture, regardless of how it may appear to me, or to say that “they are not at that level.” Whose level? Koreans may not have a Hellenic culture, but draw upon their own traditions for self-improvement/awareness. The reason many Koreans have a hard time understanding internationals is due to social conditioning. Korea is a homogeneous society and has not been as exposed to other cultures for a long time. Other cultures may not have a deep understanding of outside cultures, but there are more opportunities for contact/exposure. Korea is a culture where empathy is highly emphasized, 눈치, etc. The only reason that Koreans would have difficulty understanding a foreigner is due to conditioning that foreigners are different from them. That is all.
Prof. Pastreich, I have been quite enjoying your blog and this post is particularly excellent. My own thought is that Korea is better off being known as a country that makes world-class machines (a la Germany) rather than being known as a country that makes cultural products, because the latter requires Korea to fundamentally change its culture and co-opt into the dominant, Western worldview. I do not think it is healthy. I would like to know if you have any thoughts on this point.
The Korean
http://www.askakorean.net
Hi, I really liked your article. I would like to ask you a few questions. What about Korea’s education system restricts the ‘international’ mindset? What kind of policies would foster that kind of thinking? Korea is well known for rote memorization but besides that what is the difference between Korean and western education. For example, how does western style education foster and encourage imagination and team work better than the korean educational system. Finally, I would like to hear your thoughts on what could be done to make korean companies more multi-cultural. I know that one problem korean companies have is with promotion. Promotion is usually based on age and duration of service. Promotion in korean companies also discriminates against foreign employees to favor korean employees, even if that is bad for productivity and growth. Another problem is with communication between young and old. What kind of solutions are there for these cultural barriers in the korean work place. If you can answer these questions i would be very greatful.
Koreans are really good at making the best Korean food in the world. And in case you hadn’t heard, Korea also makes the 21C world class best Koreanized Japanese and Chinese food.
Secrets to success? Korean culture is so monolithic and thoroughly institutionalized that little or no introspection is required. No need to waste time with psychology. We’re all Korean, there’s little privacy in society and we know everything about each other including our favorite color (depends on your age), our favorite food (sex dependent) and favorite overseas universities and travel destinations (depends on your economic class). All men join the army and learn how to behave appropriately. Koreans don’t want others to feel uncomfortable and everyone should be herded into the group and avoid direct statements to one another, unless we’re drunk.
@Alan: Our favorite foreigners are either middle aged white male CEOs dropping off a briefcase of FDI or any kind that makes us exclaim “You are just like Korean!”. Foreigners wanting to succeed in Korea need to get with the program. Or at least fake it.
My question was aimed at the author, not you. If your answer was serious and not full of sarcasm and actually addressed my question I might have considered it.
The criticisms are legitimate about Korea, but at least we Americans must be quite humble in our statements. No matter how irrational Korea may seem, we should not forget just how incredibly stupid our own policies have been, and continue to be.