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MK’s different kind of leadership

By Kim Da-ye Chung Mong-koo, chairman of the Hyundai-Kia Automotive Group, can’t be easily distinguished from the crowd. The 72-year-old business mogul is not an eloquent speaker. Sometimes, he appears to be shy from the limelight and more comfortable blending in with the environment. He also proves to be a different type of corporate leadership. He shows himself by the numbers. Under his leadership, his automotive group has experienced the marvelous growth of the company that emerged as the world’s fifth largest automaker and recorded global sales of 4.65 million units in 2009. The auto conglomerate attributes the success to Chung’s determination to improve the quality of the Hyundai cars and his will to take the business to the world. He is also incredibly hard-working, spending most of time at work. He still commutes to the group’s headquarters in Yangjae-dong, southern Seoul, at 6:30 a.m. from Monday to Friday. When Chung took the leadership of Hyundai Motor in 1998, the company didn’t enjoy its domestic status abroad due to the cars’ poor quality and

POSCO’s soft-spoken leader

By Kang Seung-woo The steel industry often invokes images of CEOs with a barrel chest and broad shoulders. Having looks opposite this stereotype is unassuming, soft-spoken Chung Joon-yang, chairman of POSCO, the world’s No. 3 steelmaker. Chung’s looks may prove to be deceiving, since the 62-year-old hesitates to make tough decisions and follow them through. His management philosophy is largely about expansion. Under his leadership, Posco is the only company among the top 10 steel makers that has not reported a quarterly loss since the global financial crisis hit in 2008. Since Chung was at the helm last year, he has been active in making a foray into the global market with hopes of its investment boosting the company’s profile abroad and putting it in a better position against rival steel producers in the world. The company is also pushing to build more plants in foreign countries as well. The steelmaker is pursuing a $7 billion plant in India’s Karnataka state along with a $12 billion project in Orissa and a $6 billion Indonesian plant. As of now, it currently ha

G20 not going for current account cap

SSakong Il adds credibility to Geithner’s pessimism on target By Cho Jin-seo The world’s 20 leading economies won’t try hard to have a numerical target for current account balances at the G20 Seoul Summit, a top official of South Korea’s G20 preparation team said Tuesday. The remark by Sakong Il, chairman of the Presidential Committee for the G20 Summit, adds credibility to that of Tim Geithner, the U.S. secretary of treasury, in downplaying the need to have a ceiling on the trade surpluses of countries such as China and Germany. “If (G20) can agree on a time frame that alone will be a big achievement, we will endeavor to do that,” Sakong told reporters when asked about setting a specific target for current account balances. He was attending the opening ceremony of the Seoul summit’s press room at the Coex in southern Seoul. Before Sakong’s remark, there has been a disagreement inside Korea’s G20 team on whether it was possible or even necessary to announce fixed surpluses and deficits caps at the Seoul summit. The confusion raised doubts on the international level

More help for poor countries

By Cho Jin-seo Korea needs to allocate more resources for poor countries, which will be beneficial in improving its global image, the chief of the Presidential Council on Nation Branding said Tuesday. Chairwoman Lee Bae-yong said that Korea’s budget for official development assistance (ODA) will be increased to 0.25 percent of gross domestic product by 2015. She also said that the country will teach poor countries “how to catch fish” using its own experience of rapid economic development. “To raise the national brand value, we need to be responsible in our duty as a member of global society,” she said as at a press briefing held at the Coex, southern Seoul, ahead of the G20 Seoul Summit to be held this Thursday and Friday. “Korea has achieved economic development and democracy at the same time. But we need to go beyond that. We need to make more of a contribution to global society, so that we can be trusted and loved by the people of the world.” Korea has made economic development part of the agenda at the Seoul summit. Calling it a “Korean Initiative,” the cou

Beating protectionism a key agenda for CEO summit

By Kim Tong-hyung Fighting growing trade protection is a key agenda item for over 120 CEOs attending the G20 Business Summit that is scheduled to start its two-day run today, Korean organizers said Tuesday. The business summit to be held at the Sheraton Walkerhill Hotel will allow private-sector input to the G20 Seoul Summit of leaders from 20 leading and emerging economies. The four areas of their focus cover trade and investment, financial stability, “green” growth, and corporate social responsibility (CSR). Reports from their discussions will be forwarded to the heads of state. Their 49 recommendations for governments will include calls for introducing consistent global regulatory standards for the finance industry; suppressing protectionism; and renewing commitment toward completing the Doha Development Round in 2011. “The 120 companies have worked diligently to produce a report that well reflects their commitment and sense of responsibility. This is an important start toward a renewed partnership between businesses and governments to overcome the critical eco

Employees of Kia Motors promote the company’s new mobile ...

Seoul Summit to determine future of G20

By Chot Jin-seo It's finally here, the G20 summit. Two days from now, many of the world's most powerful people will arrive in Seoul to sit at a roundtable around Korean President Lee Myung-bak. This may surely be an emotional moment for Koreans. But some see economic benefits, too. As a national PR event, some optimists estimate the event will bring direct and indirect profits of more than 20 trillion won ($20 billion) over the long term. That's even better than hosting the World Cup finals or the Olympic Games, they say, though previous experiences in other host nations do not support this argument very well. For the rest of the world, the G20 is nothing like a sporting event but serious business where national interests collide and hundreds of thousands of jobs are at stake. The G20 summit was initiated as an emergency response to the 2008 financial crisis, and still remains so in a sense. History and legitimacy Before the financial crisis, the G20 was a meeting of finance ministers. It had been thought of as an expansion of the G8, the group of rich nations in Europe and

G20 glossary: deciphering alphabet soup of the communique

By Cho Jin-seo G20 Group of 20. This is a meeting of 19 nations with large economies plus the European Union. The G20 mostly deals with economic issues. It is considered as an expansion of the G8, the group of eight economically advanced nations in the West plus Russia, into a more comprehensive group of advanced and large emerging nations such as China and Brazil. Iran, Taiwan and Venezuela are not G20 members even though they have bigger GDPs than South Africa, a member. Sherpa Sherpas are the Himalayan people who are employed as guides for mountaineers, but at the G20 this refers to the official in charge of negotiations at working-group meetings. A sherpa is a deputy for the national leader and the finance minister. South Korea's sherpa is Rhee Chang-yong, formerly vice chairman of the Financial Services Commission. Communique The communique is a joint statement, produced as the final result of each meeting. Each member nation is morally encouraged to follow the agreed instruction on this statement, but this does not it has any legal binding. Writing a commun

Right on the money

Expectations rise for G20 Business Summit By Kim Tong-hyung It appears that the entire nation is behind the whole Group of 20 affair, but organizers of the Seoul Business Summit, frequently dubbed as ``B20,’’ are hoping that locals could remember another acronym. Not that the event, which is to complement the G20 meetings of political leaders and finance chiefs, would be easy to miss. More than 120 global business leaders, including Nestle Chairman Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, Deutsche Bank Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Josef Ackermann and Bosch Group Chairman Franz Fehrenbach, have confirmed they will attend the Nov. 10 and 11 conference that aims to discuss the private sector’s role in strengthening the recovery of the world economy. SK Group Chairman Chey Tae-won, Hyundai Automotive Group Chairman Chung Mong-koo and LG Group Chairman Koo Bon-moo will lead the delegation of Koreans, and organizers are hoping that Samsung Electronics Chairman Lee Kun-hee will make an appearance after working out a schedule conflict. However, a letdown for organizers has been h

G20 leaders set to tackle forex woes

Vice ministers struggle to find action plans By Kim Tong-hyung The Group of 20 countries are vowing to make progress on easing the world’s currency tensions and creating better crisis-prevention instruments as they brace for the landmark summit between their leaders that starts Thursday in Seoul. The G20 process in Seoul effectively kicked off Monday with a meeting between the countries’ deputy finance ministers, and Korea is passionate about having a meaningful agreement on the outstanding issues in place before it hands over the G20 chair to France on Friday. Defusing the escalating currency battle has emerged as a critical objective of the Nov. 11 to 12 summit, with China’s resistance in allowing the yuan to strengthen and U.S. efforts to achieve devaluation through “quantitative easing” at the core of global conflicts. The G20 leaders will also discuss details on adjusting the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) lending schemes to create a global financial “safety net” to prevent well-run countries from slipping into crisis. This is expected to be a key part