'Spirit of challenge leads to success'

WK Group President William Kim

y Kim Tae-gyu

WASHINGTON ― WK Group President William Kim, 43, says his key to realizing success in America was his love of challenge.

“Failures did not dwarf me. Because I learned from experience, I didn’t get crestfallen. As long as you do not give up, you can rise again,” Kim said.

WK Group is engaged in a variety of fields, including international investment and development as well as trade.

“I like optimistic people. Instead of just complaining about difficulties, you need to try things in a spirit of challenge. Then, you will be able to reap fruits.”

In his mid teens, Kim crossed the Pacific with his family who returned South Korea after a year. Kim opted to remain in the “land of opportunity.”

And he proved that success of the individual in the world’s No. 1 economy is based on his cornerstone asset ― self-confidence.

“Even when I was not that good at English, I applied to work as a cashier in a hamburger restaurant while most of my Korean friends who spoke English more fluently were satisfied with working in kitchens,” he recalled. “I was full of self- confidence.”

Kim has always dreamed of starting his own business and toward that end, he specialized in marketing at George Mason University.

After working in the financial sector for a while, he established a tofu restaurant in the U.S. capital in 1998. He sold it five years later at a profit to become a man of means in his early 30s.

Yet, he did not rest on his laurels and took on a bigger financial project, investing in real estate. This earned him substantial wealth but he faced a disaster when the subprime mortgage crisis hit the nation in 2007.

He did not give in and kept chasing business opportunities and his WK Group got back on the right track.

Last year, he was elected as the youngest regional head of the World Federation of Overseas Korean Traders Association (World OKTA) by taking charge of the Washington branch of the organization for successful ethnic Korean entrepreneurs around the world.