3rd Gen Defect

Cho Hyun-ah, former vice president of Korea Airlines.
Cho Hyun-ah, former vice president of Korea Airlines.

 

In light of the incident centering on then-Vice President of Korean Air Cho Hyun-ah, an event which was eventually dubbed “peanut turnover,” major conglomerates seem to have started actively taking control of their younger generation leaders.

It is generally thought that the 2nd to 4th generation family members of the owner families of Korean conglomerates, or chaebol, are extremely inclined to view the company as their private property.

Moreover, occasional complaints arise from within companies claiming that the children of the owners seem destined to wield the authority of management in the future, yet they “hardly know anything about what happens on the spot.”

Another criticism is that the inheritors of the company pay no attention to difficulties suffered by members in the organization, as they have usually ascended to executive positions by their early 30s. They experience a series of light-speed promotions that prevent them from learning much about the company.

Business circles are coming to an increasingly dominant consensus that the sons and daughters of owner families should receive ‘hard training’ in order to at least prevent another Cho Hyun-ah incident from happening again.

Some major companies are actually seeking to change the atmosphere, like designating field service as an essential part of the management lessons of the members of the owner’s household.

A source in business circles stated, “We are concerned that anti-chaebol emotions might spread throughout the entire society,” demanding, “Disoriented ownership of a few companies need to be remedied, and owners should show increasingly fine examples of themselves on the spot.”

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