Korean or Western titles, that is the question

The Korean title system, the Western title system or a mix of both; the question is, which one is better? In the end, it depends on what the company wants to achieve.

“Some people might say that one is better than the other, and the more we study it, the more we find that there is no system that supersedes any other,” said Zuellig Pharma Korea president Christophe Piganiol.

The head of the pharmaceutical giant has been studying the different systems with the aim of better understanding what drives the inner workings of a business, while contributing to a better business environment.

“In the cultural view of Korean titles, it’s very much seniority based. In functional (Western) titles it’s very much position and contribution based,” he said. “So the concepts are very different.”

For a company to decide which system best suits their needs, Piganiol explained that they need to ask the simple question of “What are the things we want to improve or address? What are the things we think we can do better?”

He suggests putting down the pros and cons of both systems and further the questions.

“What is the real issue you are trying to fix? Is it a salary issue? A motivation issue? Is it a communication issue? Do you want to motivate your people? How do you motivate your young talents?”

Some of the challenges Western companies, or international middle- to top-management, face are trying to understand the local system and how to bridge the divide.

“Korea has a strong culture, thousands of years old, that is different from Western culture and even if you have a very specific title system based on function, you have to realize the environment you’re working in,” he told The Korea Herald.

Zuellig Pharma Korea president Christophe Piganiol (Yoav Cerralbo/The Korea Herald)

Piganiol added that some companies decide to follow their worldwide structure mostly for simplicity’s sake, but from the Korean employees’ mindset, this is difficult to understand because they have a hard time identifying themselves in a system that has no title.

“It’s part of the language in Korea, it’s part of the social network, so these are some of the difficulties that people have and everyone has to find a way to bridge that gap one way or another,” he noted.

Another challenge found in the local system is how to engage performance in a system that rewards based on seniority.

The answer could be found in an old Korean adage which, roughly translated, says “I have eaten more rice than you have eaten salt.”

Piganiol also stresses communication with employees.

As a member of the Human Resource Committee of the European Union Chamber of Commerce, Piganiol explained that they can help foreign management better understand the system while assisting companies to adjust to a possibly better system that might suite that company or department, if need be.

By Yoav Cerralbo (yoav@heraldcorp.com)