Coaching draws changes from within
Re-printed from The Korea Times. Article by Park Jin-hai
Kim Jong-choul, country manager of American semiconductor systems provider, Particle Measuring System, says all his life as an engineer and CEO of a research center has been about problem-solving.
“Planning and executing to solve problems, my focus has always been on how to solve the task and I never paid attention to the people,” he said during an interview with The Korea Times at a cafe in Seoul, Monday. “After all, it is the people who solve the problem. I looked at the numbers, yelled at poor performing subordinates and gave direct orders about how to solve the problem. In the process, anger and frustration have hurt both sides.”
Then Kim says he realized that his attitude made those subordinates even more small, passive and prone to cause more problems. “I suddenly realized that I had brought in smart people and used them below their capacity.”
Kim says that realization led him to study “coaching,” which is a fairly new academic area in Korea, at Kookmin University. And he now has been heading I&C Partners, a coaching and consulting agency, since 2015.
“Just like a sports coach, good coaching helps a person or organization change and grow to its best on its own,” he said.
Kim added that when people blindly chase after material wealth and constantly want more and more, it eventually brings about corruption and conflicts. “Coaching helps people find the meaning of life and allows them to become happy.”
Kim says he wants to use his coaching skills to make small- and medium- sized enterprises (SME) healthier. “I believe that for our nation to take another big step, we should nurture healthy SMEs. Most of the companies still deal with people as parts of a big machine and their growth solely depends on the hands of owners due to the lack of financial resources and talents,” he said. “By making those companies adopt coaching skills in management and personnel, I ultimately would like to draw changes and growth from within.”
