Glass ceiling cracks at Hyundai Motor

By Jhoo Dong-chan

Kim Hyo-rin, Hyundai Motor director

Cho Mi-jin, Hyundai Motor VP

Kang Eun-young, Hyundai Card director

Lee So-young, Hyundai Capital director

Hyundai Motor Group has long been notorious for its male-dominant corporate culture, but this year’s annual reshuffling proves it is trying a different track as the nation’s largest carmaker promoted four female executives.

Hyundai Motor announced Monday that it has promoted one vice president to president and 11 executives to vice presidents while seven promotions took place in the R&D department. It also included the promotion four female executives compared to just two in 2016.

Cho Mi-jin, who has worked at Hyundai Motor Group’s university as a director, was promoted to vice president and will take care of the carmaker’s human resources this year. After majoring in sociology and educational technology at Yonsei University and Indiana University, she has served in various posts both within and outside of Hyundai such as director at LG Display and chief consultant at Heidrick & Struggles chief.

Kim Hyo-rin, 46, an expert at analyzing user experiences, was also promoted to director at its R&D division.

She majored in computer science at Yonsei University and received a master’s degree with a concentration in interactive media from New York University.

Lee So-young was promoted to the post of director of Hyundai Capital Risk in the reshuffling. She graduated from Ewha Womans University majoring in political science and was awarded a master’s degree in management from Boston University,

Kang Eun-young, who worked at the Hyundai Card loan evaluation center, was also promoted to become the company’s director of customer service. She majored in horticulture at Seoul National University.

Through this year’s reshuffling, Hyundai Motor now has a total of 11 female executives in the group among over 1,000 executives.

“The proportion is still way to low, falling far short of global standards. Even compared to other conglomerates in Korea, Hyundai Motor Group lags behind in terms of gender equality. That might be caused by its male-dominated culture of long standing,” said a professor at a university in Seoul.

“However, it doubled the number of women executives this year compared to 2016 and I expect things will improve down the road.”

Meanwhile, Hyundai focused on research and technology in its latest personnel reshuffle and this follows a slight drop in sales of at the group’s two flagship units: Hyundai Motor and Kia Motors.

Hyundai Motor Group continues to remain the world's fifth-largest automaker by sales, but the combined sales of the two units slipped 1.7 percent year-on-year to 7.88 million cars in 2016.