Financial firms rushing to hire senior digital experts

A notice about branch consolidation is posted in the window of a KB Kookmin Bank branch in Seoul, Jan. 25, 2021. Yonhap

By Lee Min-hyung

Korea's major financial holding firms are in a rush to scout senior digital experts possessing decades of field experience at major IT firms.

With digital transformation becoming the new normal in financial circles in the wake of the pandemic, banking groups here are seeking to stay ahead of the toughening digital competition by hiring better digital experts.

KB Financial Group recently recommended Gangneung-Wonju National University professor Choi Jae-hong as its new non-executive director, in recognition of his broad career experience at major IT companies ― such as NHN and Kakao.

The nation's largest financial holding firm by market capitalization expects him to give a clearer direction to its ongoing digital transformation. Choi is best known for his advisory role, having worked as a non-executive director at Kakao for six years and helping the company develop into the nation's top mobile platform operator.

Last May, Hana Financial Group also appointed former Delivery Hero executive Kim So-jung as the vice president at Hana Bank's digital experience division. Kim had also been a vice president of eBay Korea before moving to the online food-delivery service operator in 2020.

She has since placed her focus on driving Hana Bank's mobile growth, looking for the lender's next digital innovation initiatives.

Industry officials said the moves will accelerate down the road, but most financial firms still face difficulty expanding their digital experts.

“Even if banks can find such executive-level officials with less difficulty, most banks have a tough time hiring digital experts in working-level positions,” a financial industry source said. “This is because demand for officials with IT background keeps surging while supply is still limited. Most IT experts still prefer to work at conventional tech firms in the area of games and IT platforms. Banks are not the priority for most digital experts.”

But financial firms have no choice but to invest more in the digital sector at a time when conventional financial services are being replaced by online platforms rapidly.

According to data from the Financial Supervisory Service, the number of sales offices of Korea's top four banks ― KB, Shinhan, Hana and Woori ― came in at 3,203 as of the end of September 2021, a decline of 15 percent from five years earlier.

But the number of subscribers for their mobile banking apps is on the rise each year, even among those in their 60s and older. Data from the nation's five banks showed that the number of mobile banking subscribers in the age group reached 8.57 million at the end of 2021, up 63.1 percent from two years earlier.