Lee Young-hee Promoted to President
Samsung Electronics has promoted a female executive to president for the first time in its history.
Lee Young-hee was promoted to president of global marketing for the company's Device eXperience (DX) division. She was previously head of the Global Marketing Center of the DX division.
She is the first female president at Samsung, the country's biggest conglomerate, to come from outside the founding family.
A marketing expert from L'Oreal, Lee joined Samsung Electronics in 2007 and was promoted to vice president in 2012. She is credited with successfully promoting the company's Galaxy brand mobile phones. She has long been expected to become Samsung's first female president.
Samsung expected Lee's promotion to inspire other talented female employees to challenge themselves to climb to the top post.
Including Lee's promotion, Samsung Electronics announced on Dec. 5 a reshuffle of top executives, which was conducted for the first time since the group's de facto leader Lee Jae-yong was promoted to executive chairman of the company in October.
Samsung did not appoint a new head for its home appliance unit, a position that has been vacant since Lee Jae-seung resigned in October for undisclosed "personal reasons."
It has maintained the existing two-member CEO system of Han Jong-hee and Kyung Gye-hyun to promote management stability in an uncertain internal and external environment.
On Dec. 2, the company notified some executives of their layoff. Observers say Samsung will aim to reduce the number of executives and give big promotions to talented and highly performing employees.
According to multiple sources, Samsung Electronics informed dozens of executives of their retirement beginning from the morning of Dec. 2.
Insiders of the Korean business world predict that Samsung Electronics will carry out a year-end personnel shake-up sequentially, starting with the appointment of new presidents on Dec. 5. Samsung Electronics recently began to implement policies to tighten the belt due to a complex crisis. It is expected to gradually dial up executives’ retirements starting this year while increasing the total number of employees.
Industry watchers think that there is a high possibility of the company selecting young talents in their 30s and 40s, women and outsiders as new executives. Immediately after a National Liberation Day amnesty set chairman Lee free on Aug. 15 of this year, he toured domestic and overseas workplaces and had a series of meetings with young employees of the so-called MZ generation (those born in the early 1980s to early 2000s) and employees who are working mothers. Changes may be made in the memory semiconductor and semiconductor foundry units as the management has decided to focus on expanding market shares and developing technology without reducing production even in a slump in the world semiconductor industry.
On taking office as chairman on Oct. 27, Lee posted a message on the company bulletin board instead of his inaugural address, saying, “Samsung’s most important values have been human resources and technology since its foundation,” adding “We need to hire people of talent who can change the world and develop the world-class human resources regardless of their genders or nationalities. Unfortunately, over the past few years, we have not been able to make progress. Now is the time to be bolder and have a more enterprising spirit.”