Younger employees at Hyundai Department Store provide guidance to top brass, sharing frontend expertise and fresh perspectives in a bid to foster a more agile, innovative organizational culture. (Image courtesy of Wikimedia)
SEOUL, Mar. 18 (Korea Bizwire) – On a recent morning at Hyundai Department Store’s headquarters, a junior employee took the stage to provide a most unconventional corporate training: instructing the company’s highest executives on how to market to young consumers.
The speaker, a manager from the cultural content team, regaled the audience of C-suite leaders and nationwide store directors with behind-the-scenes stories from putting together an avant-garde art exhibition. Executives listened as the employee recounted how staff had to seek out the artist, share meals together and persistently make their case to secure the installation.
It was all part of a bold new “reverse mentoring” program that Hyundai Department Store introduced this month. Rather than having senior colleagues impart wisdom, the dynamic is flipped: Younger employees provide guidance to top brass, sharing frontend expertise and fresh perspectives in a bid to foster a more agile, innovative organizational culture.
Jung Jee-young, who took over as Hyundai’s president last December, has made such initiatives a priority, convinced that adopting the sensibilities of millennials and Gen Z will be crucial to driving future growth.
After the monthly national store managers’ meeting, for instance, a reverse mentoring session immediately follows, streamed live so all employees can tune in. What was previously an insular, executive-only affair has been opened up, the company sharing its strategic vision and meeting notes transparently across all levels.
The moves represent a striking shift for a traditionally staid retail conglomerate. But with consumption patterns radically reshaped by younger demographics, generational change can no longer be ignored.
To capture the coveted youth market, top-down corporate planning is out; first-hand input from same-age staffers intimately familiar with shifting millennial and Gen Z behaviors is desperately needed.
Lotte Shopping has instituted a similar program, a monthly open forum where employees of all ranks can discuss ideas directly with vice chairman Kim Sang-hyun, highlighting the company’s efforts to create a free and flexible organizational culture through open communication, regardless of position.
Lotte Mart has rolled out an “Idea Go” scheme to commercialize and reward creative proposals from staff. The department store and supermarket divisions have enlisted “junior boards” of younger employees to inject fresh thinking into leadership decisions.
Over at Shinsegae Department Store, a 10-month “Partner Board” pilot program last year assembled junior staffers to share fieldwork observations in monthly meetings, while also benchmarking best practices by visiting other innovative workplaces like Samsung and delivery unicorn Woowa Brothers.
“As the retail landscape transforms rapidly, a more horizontal, open-door culture is seen as crucial for future growth,” said one industry analyst of the profusion of such grassroots initiatives across Korea’s major retail conglomerates.
M. H. Lee (mhlee@koreabizwire.com)
