Covering the food & beverage industry, beauty, fashion, retail markets, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and related people and entities worldwide
INTERVIEW Celebrity author rediscovers 'Koreanness,' bets on economic value of kindness
James Rhee speaks during an interview with The Korea Times in Seoul, April 2. Courtesy of James Rhee
By Ko Dong-hwan
James Rhee dubs new business operating system as 'Red Helicopter'
Companies led by management that treats employees and consumers with kindness often see improved productivity and product quality, an important business principle that is frequently overlooked today, according to Korean American author of “Red Helicopter,” a bestselling memoir and self-help book in the United States.
James Rhee, Johnson Chair of Entrepreneurship at Howard University, senior lecturer at MIT Sloan School of Management and a graduate of Harvard Law School, credits his business philosophy to his upbringing by immigrant parents who emphasized the importance of helping others.
As he tours the U.S. and Korea promoting his book — which frequently mentions the Korean concept of "jeong," a deep sense of emotional attachment and affection — he admits the key feature of Koreanness has pulled him away from the world of private equity and instilled in him a new evangelical mission to spread the importance of kindness in business and all soul-searching human beings.
Rhee defines kindness as investing in your own and others’ agency. When done right, he said kindness creates a fluid mutualism that accustoms one to the benefit of the self and others. Kindness, he argued, is the foundation of the philosophy of democracy and capitalism.
“As a company, we should expect our leaders to be kind,” Rhee said during an interview with The Korea Times in Seoul.
“Kind leaders aren’t power-hungry. Kind leaders help inspire systems that bring out the best in all of us. Kind leaders encourage people to strive toward a higher goal and purpose. In this way, kind leaders create flat, agile and mission-driven organizations.”
Rhee said he sees a distinct deficit of kindness among today’s leaders across the globe. He has been encouraging leaders to extend kindness not only to their customers but also to their employees. He argues the management of many deep-rooted, traditional companies is based on a broken and outdated pyramid structure taught by so many American business schools.
“Traditional companies are losing massive shares to startups that work with flat organizational structures that urge its individuals to innovate, debate and bring their best opinions to the forefront,” Rhee said. “Those startups might not be describing themselves in terms of kindness, but many aspects of this type of high-agency organizational structure are indeed kind.”
James Rhee gives a Red Helicopter-themed lecture at the National Library of Korea in Seoul, April 1. Behind him on the screen is a photo of himself as a boy alongside his mother, left, who he regards as a living example of kindness. Courtesy of James Rhee
Rhee proved his kindness theory when he was CEO of Ashley Stewart from 2013 to 2020. The American plus-size women’s clothing company was acquired by FirePine Group, an impact investing firm he founded in 2009 after nearly a decade in private equity at Merrill Lynch and J.W. Childs Associates in Boston. He took the job at Ashley Stewart to help turn the company around when it was on the verge of filing for its second bankruptcy in just three years.
At the company, which predominantly employed and caters to Black women, he first told his employees to sell kindness before clothes.
“Here, you have a Korean man with no CEO experience, Black women and we had no money. We were supposed to hate each other,” Rhee said.
After seven years of service, the company had zero debt and generated an internal rate of return in excess of 160 percent for his original investors. Employees of Ashley Stewart later sent him a letter thanking him for his management practices.
Rhee also confirmed the role of kindness in America’s senior residence industry, which he said was “not a thriving industry.” He introduced a kindness-centered operating system in one of the country’s largest senior care businesses. Seeing that some employees there could not afford healthy meals, he fed all employees a free nutritious meal every day.
Rhee saw “staggering” changes in human behavior. Employees felt cared for and gave better care to the residents. Cortisol levels of the residents came down, as did the business’ friction costs.
“All it took was kindness, a little math and the unexpected friendship of a group of women who gave me permission to rediscover myself,” Rhee said in his book first published in April 2024.
My Koreanness
In "Red Helicopter," Rhee tries to prove how kindness, or jeong, can improve businesses and personal success.
He says readers can create a more sustainable balance between life, money and joy for both oneself and others. Rhee examined Koreans’ unique ways of thinking that stem from the country’s war-torn history and tumultuous lead-up to democracy and how that shaped unspoken but a distinct connectedness among one another.
The book’s title refers to a toy he received at the age of 5 from a stranger when he was in kindergarten in New York, prompted by a kind act to one of his friends. He learned his kindness from his parents. Now in his 50s, Rhee understands his parents’ heritage better than ever — including its powerful application to all human beings.
James Rhee leads a workshop, titled, "What is Korea's red helicopter story?" for Ondream Society, a social impact platform run by the Hyundai Motor Chung Mong-koo Foundation in Seoul, March 29. Courtesy of James Rhee
“I have sensed and felt connectedness in various social groups, ethnicities and countries. I’m married to a white southerner. I chair entrepreneurship at the most prestigious and historically Black university in the U.S. I have written for a travel book in Austria, and studied at Oxford University. I consider myself a fairly well-travelled individual,” Rhee said.
“Now, Korean jeong is a very special, a very Korean version of connectedness. During my time at Ashley Stewart, I found that the concept of ‘soul’ as used by the Black community was very similar to jeong. This similarity enabled me to understand the goodwill that was inherent in the relationships that comprised Ashley Stewart.
“That soul, that jeong, that goodwill was not translated effectively into a business plan or financial numbers. But I saw it, I felt it and I could translate it into an operating system that created the financial numbers necessary for the company to thrive and continue. I wouldn’t have been able to do so had I not first truly understood my Korean heritage.”
Rhee aims to share his book with more people across the globe. The book’s Korean translation was published in December.
“Now there is a common language, and emotional language, for many Koreans to share. For that, I am grateful,” said Rhee, whose latest two-week trip to Seoul ended on April 8.
A Portuguese translation followed and Spanish is set for publication this fall, with Rhee planning to visit Brazil and some Spanish-speaking countries to promote his book. This spring, he also has a busy schedule of teaching and speaking engagements in various American cities and states, hosted by a diverse range of interest groups spanning business, civic and nonprofit sectors.
“It gives me an immense amount of joy how the Red Helicopter operating system connects people who otherwise might appear divergent in interest,” Rhee said.
“The book has made me feel even more connected to people by forging global and intimate ties to people and cultures all over the world. Today, I can safely say that Red Helicopter is truly global. Nowhere is this truer than as it relates to my connectedness to Korea. I have never felt more connected to my Korean heritage, or my parents for that matter.”