SEOUL, KOREA - Under the government’s creative economy policy, a long awaited boom has found its way to the Korean IT world including the software industry.
With the IT boom, the IT consulting industry also found itself much busier than before. Not only is IT needed in every industry in the world, with the rising focus on ‘convergence between industries’, IT is fusing with other industries and is now perceived as an industry that leads the way in Korea’s economic growth. However, IT is double-edged, used correctly it is a valuable ally but used incorrectly and it can cause an irreversible effect. IT construction supervision and consulting exists to thwart this scenario. CEO Choi Ji-Yoon at Korea IT Consulting explained IT consulting. “SW requires much effort to be fixed after launching the complete product, but when discovered in initial stages, bugs can be fixed through relatively less cost and effort.” Choi is currently supervising SWs and is a leader of Korea’s IT and software industry. Korea IT Times interviews Choi Ji-Yoon.
Usage of retired SW manpower and nurturing future talent
Korea IT Consulting’s main tasks are supervision, consultation, and information security, providing an intangible knowledge service. Knowledge can never be achieved without people and Korea IT Consulting regards ‘people’ as their most important asset and considers human resources their business priority. Unusually the average age of a worker is 47. CEO Choi revealed that their business strategy was to recruit the appropriate people from currently an increasing wide source of early retirees. These recruits are prepared with in-depth experience and executive abilities and have become an indispensable asset and core driving force behind the intangible knowledge of the IT consulting service.
Currently 7 percent of workers are over 50 in the Korean SW industry. However, many of these workers work in a different field after retirement. The high barrier and image of being in the 3D-industry (``difficult, dirty, and dangerous’’) has led many to leave the industry. Therefore Korea IT Consulting searches and nurtures talent that are suited for supervision and information security regardless of age. Choi emphasizes the importance of human resources and the realization of the creative economy by saying that “If this phenomenon continues, the leakage of human resources will be massive and can cause damage to the country and to the workers themselves. Korea IT Consulting believes that recruiting and actively using these SW workers is also a part of the creative economy.”
Opening exporting opportunities for Korean software by competition with leading overseas consulting firms
Korea IT Consulting is able to accumulate a great amount of knowledge and knowhow through their 14 years of experience supervising, consulting, and information protecting in the country. With this knowledge as their asset, they have continuously expanded into the overseas market and have also taken the role as a consistent spreader of e-government business and information technology to overseas developing countries. Korea IT Consulting’s efforts to spread information technology have contributed in global affection for e-government construction and IT products incorporating Korean IT.
“Using the experience and knowledge accumulated in the domestic consulting market, we will try to further our knowledge by competing against top overseas consulting firms, and become a bridge where Korean software can be used to export into the overseas market,” says Choi. Korea IT Consulting’s current projects regarding e-government consulting with
Ethiopia, Honduras, and Uzbekistan will be the starting point of Korea’s software industry’s advancement into the world.
IT consulting business helps the overseas expansion of domestic companies. Korean software will be exported and with that SW workers would be able to experience the overseas market for themselves. In recognition for his efforts as a leader and driving force in the Korean IT and SW industry in the overseas market, Choi received “SW man of the year 2013” from the Minister of Science, ICT, and Future Planning.
Cooperation among nations required for advancement into developing countries
Korea IT Consulting’s advancement into the overseas market was very successful. Countries like Honduras, Ethiopia, and Botswana have already started their second consulting business in order to construct a procurement system and an IT center similar to that of the Korean government’s. After the completion of the second consulting business, the main enterprise will be set in order and the overseas advancement of the Korean SW industry will naturally follow.
Many small African countries await the visit of the minister and undersecretaries of Korea, but the truth is that some of these countries are even without a Korean ambassador. Japan actively and regularly sends out ambassadors to contact bureaucrats and show the will to develop the market. Korea, on the other hand, lacks an embassy and has little opportunity to contact government officials in developing countries, creating a hard environment for overseas expansion form the start. “We hope that the Korean government would more actively introduce the Korean industry and keep in touch with government officials to support overseas expansion.” In the future, Korea IT Consulting plans to continue investing in recruiting the retired and nurturing SW suited human resources. They plan to search for recruits and will offer anyone with the skills, knowledge, or talent, the opportunity to work in the overseas expansion or domestic industry and be a part of the exporting team of the IT industry.
The Korean market seems to be overly crowed for Korea IT Consulting. Knowing that Korea IT Consulting has more knowledge than the overall market, they plan to advance firsthand into the global market and sell Korea’s technology and knowledge.
