Linda Myers' expatriate assignment failure at SK Telecom in South Korea

Business Case

Defining the Problem

The position with SK Telecom in South Korea "seemed like a dream job" for Linda Myers, who would become one of the first American female executives in the South Korea (p. 124). Yet Myers, and her organization, underestimated the importance of understanding the nuances of Korean culture. Myers had worked abroad as an expatriate before and assumed that all countries outside the United States would pose similar challenges. She was wrong to make this assumption. "Although she'd been in new cultural situations before, this one seemed more difficult to navigate," (p. 124). If Myers had been more willing to consider what Korean business culture would be like, she might have avoided some of the problems that occurred. "Her experience prepping clients to work for Western multinationals in China and other countries did not easily translate to her situation in Korea," showing the importance of treating each situation, and each new country or culture, differently (p. 126).

The problem is not Myers' alone, though. She had "no official orientation" and no detailed guidance from her superiors," (p. 124). This is an organizational issue, stemming from poor management decisions related to human resources. Moreover, Myers felt "isolated," as she was not given any opportunity to form relationships with her new colleagues in Seoul (p. 124). Moreover, human resources managers failed to choose someone who might better fit in with the Seoul business culture than Myers, if they were determined to avoid a comprehensive orientation and training program. "Her straight- forward American style was at odds with the polite formality of her Korean peers," (p. 125). There were also clear issues of role clarity that were never addressed in a fruitful way: "And she eventually realized that she and her new employer had different ideas about what her role would be," (p. 125).

Ultimately, Myers failed because human resources managers failed to do their job right. Ironically, Myers had worked previously in "a boutique consulting firm in Washington, DC, that helps multinationals such as Hewlett-Packard and ExxonMobil develop cross-cultural training programs," (p. 125). Myers should have seen what was coming when she accepted the position with SK. Instead, she failed to confront the gender issue immediately. The South Korean partners had "assumed" she was male and she might never have confronted them about this to find out if they had an issue working with a new female executive (p. 125).

Proposed Solutions

1. Perhaps Myers could have consulted with Korean people and Korean-Americans before going, and taken some Korean language lessons. Simply reading books was not enough for a personal orientation to the culture. Self-education would have taken the place of a more formal orientation. However, a more formal orientation would have been appropriate in this and other cases.

2. Myers should have requested more role clarity and asked what her colleagues and superiors at SK Telecom expected of her. She thought they wanted more radical change than they did; and "they intended her stint to be relatively short," (p. 126). She should have tried to glean as much information as possible so that it was clear what was expected of her. It would have been appropriate for Myers to ask for clarity before accepting the position hastily.

3. It was important to maintain her position of power by respecting Korean high power distance in this scenario. When she dropped her formal title, Myers was not respecting Korean culture. Instead, she was imposing American values on the Korean organization. As Avcan, Kanungo, et al. (2000) point out, it is important to refrain from creating human resources strategies from the perspective of only one culture or only in the context of "Western values," (p. 193). Myers could have been more effective and left a greater mark on SK Telecom if she had been more willing to participate in the company on their terms.

4. Although much that went wrong was cross-cultural issue, some things were not and were more common-sense. "Not every communication failure is a cross-cultural issue" (126). Likewise, Myers could have been more effective if she had greater role clarity and if she communicated her ideas in ways her colleagues understood. One non-Korean colleague said: "They didn't implement anything that she did -- and she had some great ideas." (126). This means that it was not necessarily a cross-cultural communication issue but a more global issue that was the problem.