Thoughts on Korean Business by Don Southerton

My mission is akin to the aphorism "a rising tide lifts all boats.” I work to build bridges among the members of Korean, American and global teams.  Understand the Culture! I feel the issues and impasses that surface are less about “them and us”.  Frankly, it's more about working through the issue and collaboration. I’d like to share with you my two step process, which I hope will be insightful.  To Begin...
A colleague once forwarded a well-crafted article titled, “Stop Blaming Your Culture.” A long time employee of a major Korean subsidiary, he recognized the concept had value for working with and within their Culture.  More so, they feared a major and far-reaching initiative was in danger of not being considered by local senior Korean management. Insightfully, the colleague reached out and asked me if perhaps there was merit in taking a more Korean view and approach to the assignment.  Learning more about the project, a...

Best wishes Chuseok wishes to all.

It’s that time of the year with Chuseok, (the Korean Harvest Moon Festival) right around the corner. In 2018, Chuseok holiday falls on Monday September 24th.  The day after is also celebrated as a National Holiday. Koreans, as many agrarian cultures, once followed the lunar calendar, but in recent history, they have deferred to the solar calendar in line with international practice. While public holidays are based on the solar calendar, there are a few days that are celebrated based on the lunar calendar.  These are the two most important traditional holidays, the Korean New Year’s Day (the first day of the first lunar month) and the Chuseok mid-autumn festival (fifteenth day of the eighth lunar month). In mass, and I mean a substantial part of the population travel.  For many this is back to their home villages. Over the holiday they perform ancestral rituals at the graves of relatives as well as share time with their family over traditional foo...