Korean work culture isn’t exactly one of the country’s strong points. With ridiculous amounts of overtime and a top-down culture, being a salaryman in Korea is an extremely taxing prospect. Samsung is no different as far as work culture in its home country is concerned. However, rumours are going around that Samsung is looking to move away from this taxes system in favour of a more startup-like work culture.
In a report by Reuters, Samsung’s executives will be signing a pledge to move away from its hierarchy-based culture and is aiming to move to a working environment that fosters open dialogue. Samsung is also expected to reduce the number of levels in its staff hierarchy and hold more frequent online discussions between business division heads and employees.
Samsung’s move to change its entire work culture is attributed to the company’s rapid decline in smartphone profits as well as the absence of new businesses to drive growth. Thus far, various moves to ease the rigid corporate culture in Samsung have been implemented such as including flexible work hours, loosening dress code requirements and putting less pressure on employees to attend after-work drinking sessions.
While Samsung’s attempts to change its work ethics around, some of the company’s current and former employees are skeptical about the effectiveness of the change. Analysts also say that by shifting to a more startup-like work environment, the company may lose its edge as a fast-execution hardware company.
Whatever the case, it’ll be interesting to see if Samsung is serious about changing its work culture, or it is yet another flash in a pan idea that would be reverted within months.
Source: Reuters
