Merck Korea CEO stresses 'shared value'

Merck Korea CEO Michael Grund talks about his philosophy of corporate social responsibility activities in Korea and how the firm uses CSR to create common value with its Korean partner companies during a recent meeting in this file photo. / Korea Times file

By Kim Yoo-chul

Korea is home to two technology powerhouses ― Samsung Electronics and LG Electronics ― and the country has long been regarded as the place for next business opportunities by foreign firms especially those who have specialty in industrial materials.

As both Samsung and LG identified OLED, which stands for organic light-emitting diode, as their next revenue streams beyond conventional LCD displays, Merck emerged as one of the companies to benefit most by a strategy shift by the Korean tech giants.

Given its firm position to manage advanced materials as all of which will be OLED applications ― OLEDs are used in TVs and smartphones; however, they will be used in vehicles and flexible devices because they don’t need to have backlight ― Merck believes Korea is a huge market.

But Merck Korea CEO Michael Grund only doesn’t care about its regional performance sending more dividends to its headquarters in Germany as he focuses more on co-growth with its Korean business partners for sustainability.

“Merck Korea has advanced efforts in ‘creating shared value (CSV)’ and these efforts can break down to several areas ― science education, cultural support and community activities led by the company and/or supported by employees on a voluntary basis,” the managing director of the Korean affiliate of German firm said recently. Merck is the top German company in terms of total assets.

Unlike other foreign companies operating here such as IBM and Microsoft, Merck has been “very active” to promote its detailed corporate activities for the local community.

Among others, Grund is proud to see that its programs to support Korean artists have been receiving warm response since the launch of the program.

“The practice began in Germany at Merck’s headquarters and its creative approach has reached Korea. The company hopes to broaden the fandom of Korean art and hence establish a foundation to help develop the country’s visual art,” said the executive.

He believes that the initiative aims to help more people get to know Korean artists and their artwork through the calendar.

Grund said it’s his personal philosophy to boost corporate strategy responsibility (CSR) strategy in order to be recognized as a localized company, though its originality was German.

He mentioned seven elements need to be considered when a company prepares for CSR. “They are a paradigm shift in concept as a corporate citizen,” Grund said.

According to his observation, it is a ― strategic intention for value orientation to ensure market creation and social change, leadership to provide a vision among industries and members of society, commitment from the management, a supporting group which creates a basic CSR framework to lead the entire organization and issue management ability to define how CSR will be applied and managed by function.

The two others are ― interaction with stakeholders to enable cooperation between organizations and stakeholders and transparency to disclose all of these activities.

Grund agreed that donations can be an activity of CSR. But the executive says CSR is much more than donations as it is more about a “mindset” which is embedded in everything the company is doing.

“It is not an isolated one-time-activity, but striving for sustainability. But how does this work in reality? Typically we observe three phases. First, a CSR value system is created and materialized into policies like a code of conduct and a suitable decision making structure. Second, resources are allocated, a program is started. Third a system is installed to monitor, report and communicate the CSR performance continuously,” he said.