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Shinhan, Hana, KB embrace workforce mobility
By Park Hyong-ki
Local financial holdings companies are moving to create digital culture within their organizations to be "less conservative" and more "active and engaging."
This is part of efforts to spur employees' creativity and dialogue that best fit the new digital age.
They are further embracing and promoting workforce mobility, enabling more freedom for its employees to work anywhere by taking advantage of technology such as cloud computing and tablet PCs.
Cho Yong-byoung, chairman of Shinhan Financial Group, told his employees not to come to the office for a day, but instead visit exhibition centers, art galleries and watch musical performances to gain insight.
The chairman has called this new work system, "Insight Day," which will be held once every fiscal quarter.
"We will start holding the day beginning next month in an effort to change our work culture to be more creative," said a Shinhan Financial spokesman.
Chairman Cho said anyone can share their "ideas and insights" gained through cultural experiences via the group's internal bulletin board.
Those with "exceptional and creative ideas" will definitely be used to map out the group's business strategy, he added.
It said the firm could expand the Insight Day for employees of the group's subsidiaries after the group tries it out first.
Hana Financial Group Chairman Kim Jung-tai has launched a so-called "shutdown system," which means no work afterhours.
Also, the group said it is the first financial company here to adopt a paperless and mobile organization by having "its data be as mobile as its workforce."
"Lights go off exactly at 7p.m. Employees gain energy to work as much as they rest and refresh," said a Hana Financial spokesman, adding there is a separate space with lights for those who inevitably have to work later.
"The employees can sit anywhere they want and work by just connecting to our internal cloud system."
Hana Financial said by giving this kind of freedom and choice, people can sit next to someone they have never talked to, gain new relationships and come up with something creative and interesting as they strike up a conversation.
The work environment sort of emulates that of Google or startups where it is normal to see people work anywhere in the campus just with their laptops, the spokesman noted.
KB Financial Chairman Yoon Jong-kyoo has also told his employees and executives to come to their meetings with no paper in their hands.
If they must come and feel the need to jot something down, he asked them to bring only one sheet of paper.
Above all, the group said the chairman wants to make meetings "short, focusing on achieving effectiveness," urging all to come prepared and ready for discussions. Also, he told them to "bring their own coffee" if they have to drink during the meeting and not give each other the silent treatment during discussions.
"We have been practicing this for some time. Since our conference rooms are equipped with tablet PCs, they can just come in and log into them," said a KB Financial spokesman.
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