Do Je-hae edits news stories as part of the AI team.
Why did Samsung’s Lee Jae-yong visit Canon Korea?
By Do Je-hae
By Do Je-hae
Samsung Chief Operating Officer (COO) Lee Jae-yong is undoubtedly one of the busiest men in Korean business.
But he has taken the time to visit Canon Korea Business Solutions (hereafter Canon Korea), a small manufacturer of office machinery three times.
These previous trips to Canon Korea’s Ansan factory in Gyeonggi Province were motivated by his search for tips for upgrading production and organization systems at Samsung. The visits from 2003 to 2005 were accompanied by Lee’s closest aides, including Choi Gee-sung, who now serves as Samsung Electronics CEO.
“New Ways of Working (Randomhouse Korea),” by Ryu Lang-do, is a report on the 10-year transformation that established Canon Korea as a model of product innovation, capturing the attention of global Korean conglomerates like Samsung and LG. Members of the
Japanese and Chinese business community has also paid regular visits to Canon Korea.
In Lee’s case, he came to see the factory of Canon Korea because he was “concerned for the future of Samsung.”
Apparently, Lee was looking for tips to ease the friction among the company officials in charge of innovation, factory leaders and top executives on Samsung’s future course.
Unusual benchmark of innovation
Why did Lee choose to visit Canon Korea, of all places?
Founded in 1985, Canon Korea is a joint venture of Canon Inc. and Lotte Group. It was formerly known as Lotte Canon until 2005. The company’s main products are copiers, facsimiles, scanners, bubble jet printers, laser printers, liquid crystal display projectors, and other related products.
In the last 10 years, Canon Korea has emerged as a popular choice for innovation lessons in both the business and public sectors.
This is an unusual phenomenon, considering the nation’s general disregard for small and medium sized firms.
Korea faces a sad reality where young job seekers shun applying for small- and medium-sized firms.
The media has also paid scant attention to the innovation initiatives at some smaller companies. In-depth reading material on this subject is rare, although some writers like Ryu are starting to pay attention to the cases of smaller firms’ management and production innovation.
In Canon Korea, Ryu said that he found the answer to the ultimate question he has posed as a best-selling writer in management and a professional management consultant.
The question is; what would motivate people to harbor a sense of ownership, to immerse in their jobs with pride and achieve outstanding performance?
Ryu is a best-selling author of 10 books on improving performance in the work place.
His latest book “New Ways of Working” is a departure from his previous works, in that it focuses on the innovation process of one specific company.
His representative books like “Work to Produce Accomplishments,” or “Make Proper Instructions” consisted of general guidelines for those aiming to become or to nurture “high performers.”
Combining his extensive experience in human resources at several companies, he earned a Ph.D. in management and went on to set up The Performance, a management consulting firm.
Secrets to high performance
The key message of Ryu’s books and his work as a management consultant has been that high performance at the work place is the result of whole-hearted partnership and understanding between the employer and the employees.
This translates to high performers who actively take the initiative to produce top quality outcome and take pride in what they do.
In “New Ways of Working, Ryu argues that “change and innovation of a corporation begins from the management’s earnest care for its members.”
To make his point, Ryu fills his latest publication with interviews from employees of various levels and experiences that were directly involved in turning Canon Korea around starting in 2002.
At a time when the company faced closure, Canon Korea’s managing director Kim Young-soon decided that weathering the crisis is possible only through nurturing “happy employees.”
“In the last 10 years, the leaders of Canon Korea found that the level of happiness of the employees is proportional to our company’s productivity,” Kim was quoted as saying in the book. “We realized that to love our employees is the best way to love our company.”
The book contains significant coverage of how Kim, the de facto leader of Canon Korea’s Ansan factory, interacts with the employees of all levels and how he incorporates their complaints to create a more effective working environment.
A large portion of the book is about the management’s consistent efforts to change the company culture. This is why the book is particularly relevant for leaders of any organization that aim to instill a resolute sense of purpose and sincere passion among their members, which are key ingredients to high performance.
Producing more with less
It was with a new system of production that Canon Korea started to gain attention from the media. In 1999, it adopted the “Cell Company Organization (CCO)” for maximum manufacturing capacity at minimum cost.
A cellular organization is composed of cells (self-managing teams or autonomous business units) that can operate alone but also interact with other cells to produce a more effective production mechanism. The CCO system also contributes to abolishing unnecessary administrative processes and reducing inventory costs.
The key feature of CCO system at Canon Korea is that it requires all factory members to equip themselves with the capacity to engage in the entire production process, from ordering of parts, manufacturing and assembly, production management, quality management, logistics and so on.
Ryu concludes that the system was ultimately successful in sharpening the level of expertise of the employees, giving them a higher sense of ownership and responsibility.
There are times when the book reads like a promotional story for the company. But for the most part, “New Ways of Working” is a useful, honest account of a small firm reaching for great heights.