Executive Post Graduate Programme 2016-17

International Immersion Program

Individual Report on Experience in Korea

Submitted By
Ankur Tyagi (1614015)

Contents
The Respite after grueling Term 2-International Immersion program in Korea...........2
Day 1-Gyeongbokgung Palace................................................................................3
Day 2-Doing Business in Korea -KAIST.....................................................................4
Day 3-Brexit, Seoul Tower and Korean Gaming Industry..........................................5
Day 4-Samsung, Korea Exchange and Nanta Performance.....................................6
Day 5-Korean Entertainment Industry, Microsoft Korea, CGV movie and Itaewon...7
Day 6-Mahindra Korea, SsangYong Visit and Dongdaemun.....................................8
Day 7- Namdaemun and Myeongdong....................................................................9
Day 8-Design Thinking and McKinsey 7 step method............................................10
Day 9-India and Korea Relations and SsangYong Motors.......................................10
Day 10- DSME, Korea Exchange (BUSAN) and Haeundae Beach...........................11
Day 11- Samsung Innovation Museum..................................................................11
Day 12- Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Korea...............................................12
Day 13- tto boja KAIST.......................................................................................... 13

The Respite after grueling Term 2-International Immersion

program in Korea

After finishing my term 2 exams on 19th Aug16 I did the last minute check of
the packing for the International Immersion program from 20th Aug to 2nd
Sep16. The total time to Korea took almost 24 hours albeit 2 stops in
between at Hong Kong and Taipei. We were received at the airport by the
students who had been assigned the duty to look after the logistics and other
arrangements of our stay. The Airport in Korea was pretty clean and big as
expected from any International airport. One thing I noticed at that time was
that one of the student, Martin (This was the English name that some of
them used as they realize that pronouncing and remembering their name is
a bit difficult for us), made sure to interact with almost everyone while we
were waiting for some of our group members who were coming in different
flight. This was a conscious effort from him and made me rethink about the
pre conceived notion I had that Koreans are shy and conserved people.
Our journey back to Hotel took approximately 1 hour and even though I was
tired, I made sure to remain awake as I wanted to see the city on our bus
ride. The city roads had good amount of cars even though it was pretty late
and this was the first signal I got for the night life of Seoul. Our base for the
next 15 days was Gangnam family hotel in Gangnam. We were greeted by
the hotel staff on our arrival at the hotel and their manager even gave us a
welcome note and distributed our room keys. After such a long journey we
could barely prepare ready to eat and thereafter we took our deserved
sleep.

Day 1-Gyeongbokgung Palace

Next morning, I woke up for breakfast and then slept to take extra rest. After
waking up pretty late, I realized that two groups had already left for their
expedition to utilize the Sunday that we had. So I with three others like me
decided to see the Gyeongbokgung Palace which the other groups had also
planned to see. We walked to the nearest metro station and took the metro
for the Palace. The metro was pretty crowded but yet peaceful, mainly
because most of the people were busy with their smartphones barring some
older people but they were also either silent or sleeping. Very few people
were talking to each other and even if they were, it was in very low voices.
This was in sharp contrast from India like Delhi Metro, even though we were
only 4 guys, our voice was still distinct and loud although we did try to keep
it low. The Palace was next to the metro station and was made in typical
Korea style. This palace had a long history of being attacked and damaged
by enemies and then restored. The palace was right in the middle of the
Seoul skyscrapers and this gave me a glimpse of the past and the future of
Korea at one place.
After spending about 2hrs at the Palace, we headed towards the nearby
Bukchon village but due to us taking a wrong exit at the metro we ended up
in a different market which was full of Korean eating joints and we decided to
explore the market. We landed at a place where we hoped for evening
snacks, and after some initial struggle to explain (due to language barrier) to

the restaurant owner we were able to have some food and then we headed
back towards our Hotel and called the day off.
Day 2-Doing Business in Korea -KAIST
We had an early lunch next morning in order to reach the KAIST campus on
time. At the campus we were received by Professors Betty Chung, overall
coordinator of the program and Associate Dean Young Gul Kim. Professor
Chung the 1st lecture on Doing business in Korea and some insights into the
Korean culture as she being a Chinese faced such culture difference when
she first arrived in Korea 15 years ago. She laid emphasis on the capability of
being comfortable with being uncomfortable in an uncomfortable
environment and then she explained a model for personal Growth and
change. She also introduced us to the nuances of the Korean culture and
particularly we learned about two characteristics of Koreans- Noonchi (ability
to read between lines) and Jung (showcase of intimacy and care).After lunch
we had an interesting session from Professor James Rooney who had Irish
roots but after travelling to 60 countries believed in World is my Oysters.He
gave us a never heard before insight into the India and Korean ties dating
back to 48 AD when a princess from India, Heo Hwang-ok, arrived in Korea
to marry a Korean King, Suro of Geumgwan Gaya. Today, about 10 percent of
Koreans are said to be the offspring of this union. He also told us about the
fact that how much Koreans love coffee and that too at cafes, thus explaining
the fact that I had noticed a coffee shop every 50mts in Seoul streets.

After the lecture we were taken to dinner venue where KAIST hosted a
welcome dinner for our batch. We got opportunity to interact with Korean
students who had been coordinating this entire program during their holidays
as college and schools have their break at this time of the year.
At the hotel we hunted for a suitable place to eat at the nearby market and
finally landed at Mano Indian restaurant where we had enough to eat as per
our choices. The Gangnam market was pretty busy and was filled with Young
people enjoying after their day of hard work.
Day 3-Brexit, Seoul Tower and Korean Gaming Industry
Our day started with a breakfast discussion on Brexit at Hyatt hosted by
Indian Chamber of Commerce Korea(ICCK). The topic was Brexit is Official
what does it mean to you? The event was organized by Mr Dilip Sundaram,
Chairman ICCK and President Mahindra Korea. There were many esteemed
guests from the industry and the speaker panel consisted of David Fellon,
director at Deloitte Hong Kong, Dr Chong Hoon Park, Head of research at
Standard Chartered Bank Korea and Dr H Chong Kim, senior research fellow
at the Korean Institute of International Economics Policy. The speakers put
forth their point of view on how Brexit will affect business in Britain and what
impact it will have on business relations with Korea and India.
After the seminar we were taken to the Seoul Tower which is a 236-meter
communication and observation tower located in central Seoul. The platform
from where the tower is situated provides a beautiful view of the high-rises of

Seoul on one side of Seoul. All of our batch took lot of photographs there and
it was interesting as we were the only groups who were dressed in formals at
a tourist spot.
We also saw a show at the deck where performers in full Ancient Korean
soldier attire stood and showcased the Korean culture. We took a lift to reach
the top of the Tower from where the entire Seoul was visible. The view from
there was amazing as all the daunting high-rises now looked so tiny. We had
our traditional Korean lunch at the Tower and even though it was difficult to
find vegetarian food in their buffet nonetheless it was a new experience to
try Korean food.
After lunch we headed to KAIST where we had a lecture on Korean gaming
industry by Ms. Savannah Han, the VP of EA for the Asian Market. Her insight
into the gaming industry were fascinating and she duly explained the nature
of gaming industry which is quite unpredictable and cyclic in nature. She also
pointed out that big firms like EA are many times slow in reacting to changes
and are risk averse which sometimes play as a disadvantage for them.
Day 4-Samsung, Korea Exchange and Nanta Performance
Our first lecture was to be given by Samsung Global Strategy Group(SGSG)
by Mr. Dominique Vincent, Principal with SGSG and Stefano Invernizzi,
Principal with SGSG. They gave us an overview of their group about how they
fit into the scheme of things at Samsung, how they recruit people for their
group and career progression of the people in their group. After that they

gave us an insight into their process of conducting case interviews in a group

by giving us a problem and asking one of the group to role play the case in
front of the batch. This was a very valuable exercise as I am sure that the
feedback they gave will be very useful for us when we sit for interviews in
the near future. After lunch we had a lecture by Prof Inkie Hong on Global
Energy Geopolitics. Prof Hong is a highly respected personality in the
industry, he had served Korea Stock Exchange twice as CEO, he was
president of Daewoo Shipbuilding and Marine Engineering Co. Ltd and a
recognized expert on financial markets in Korea. He told us about his visit to
IIM-B and his affection for IIM B students. After the lecture he accompanied
us to the visit to Korea Stock Exchange. At the exchange we were given a
brief insight into the history and how it all started in 1899 as a rice and bean
trading exchange. The exchange employees were very helpful and warm
throughout the visit and even gave us a surprise gift at the end, the printed
photographs that was taken in the beginning of the visit. Thereafter we
headed towards the last session of the day, part of the Cultural event, NANTA
performance at MyeongDong. I had no idea what is Nanta before this event
but I must say the show was amazing. It was a comedy musical show with a
story with little or no dialogues. The best part of the show was that the music
was all produced by the performing artists using ordinary kitchen cutlery like
pots, spoons and pans. After the show we headed to our hotels a little tired
and hence called it a day after dinner.

Day 5-Korean Entertainment Industry, Microsoft Korea, CGV movie and

Itaewon
Our day started with a lecture on Korean Entertainment industry by Prof
Young Gul Kim. He gave us knowledge of the Korean Entertainment Industry.
K-pop or Korean Pop Music, Korean movie industry and Gaming comprise
major parts of the countrys entertainment business. He stressed on the fact
that how market dynamics are changing as customer are becoming smarter
and have greater exposure to product knowledge and thus traditional ways
of marketing are changing.
Our second lecture of the day was from Sunny Park, Director of corporate
external and legal affairs Microsoft Korea. She talked about various initiatives
Microsoft has taken and continue to do so, being the tech leaders in the
worlds. She discussed various aspects of technology and also showcased the
importance that Microsoft gives to security of private data of people.
The day ended with a movie experience at CGV theatre where we watched
Star Trek Beyond. The movie is a Sci-fi space adventure and thus Imax
screen at CGV made it a memorable experience.
So far we had heard a lot about the night life of Seoul so we decided to
experience it and decided to visit famous Itaewon street of Seoul, this street
is known for its pubs and nightlife. We checked out the entire street and it
was funny to find that many our batch mates were also in the place night.

My experience of the street made me realize that the younger Korean

generation likes to party a lot. Almost all of the places were full house, the
place where we ended up had even a queue for food and drinks. After having
our share of fun and aware of the next morning class, I decided to call it a
day and took a cab back to hotel with friends.
Day 6-Mahindra Korea, SsangYong Visit and Dongdaemun
The day began with a session by Dilip Sundaram, President of Mahindra &
Mahindra Korea and SsangYong Korea. His session was focused on the
dynamics of running a company and with that he shared his own experience
of taking over at SsangYong at a time when the company was at its lowest
point and what decisions he took. This was a very innovative and interactive
session as he asked us what we would have done if we were in his place.
After the session we had to take our lunch on board our bus ride to
SsangYong motors as it was a one and a half hour ride to the Plant.
At the factory we were given a tour of the facility and it was a first time
experience for many of us, as I had worked in Maruti Suzuki so I was able to
share my knowledge with my batch mates who had questions regarding the
facility. We also had a quick presentation by Sundarrajan Rangarajan,
Assistant MD of SsangYong Motor Company. He talked about Korea and why
they were called Miracle on Han.He also showed videos of a new
SsangYong product, Tivoli and set the context for the session on coming
Monday to be taken by him at KAIST.

After the session we headed back to hotel and with ample time left for the
day I decided to explore another night market of Seoul, Dongdaemun. This
place had a clothes market similar to Palika bazaar in Delhi. The place also
had many malls and the whole place so lit up as it was daytime. Again lot of
people were on the streets enjoying the beginning of the weekend. There
was also a famous design plaza at Dongdaemun which was famous of its
peculiar shape. The plaza had a museum and an Art hall that were closed but
there was a rock concert going on in the place beneath the entrance and the
mood was all pretty ecstatic. There were numerous food trucks and sofas
and chairs for people to sit and relax under the moon. After observing
another facet of night life of Seoul, we headed back to our hotel thinking
about the plans for the next day which was our only break of the Immersion
program.
Day 7- Namdaemun and Myeongdong
I decided to skip the breakfast next morning and took a deserved long sleep.
I had decided to spend the off day shopping for my family so we headed to
famous market of Namdaemun. The market was big market with numerous
options for clothing and accessories. The shopping in Korea was a unique
experience in itself because of the language barrier. This made the
bargaining with the shopkeepers an interesting experience as sellers used
calculators to convey the price and we would type back to tell our price for
the cloth. The vast variety of clothes available in market strengthened my
belief that Koreans especially Women had a very good taste of style and

fashion. We also did some shopping in nearby Myeongdong Market which is

called the fashion street of Seoul. After shopping for the whole day and
experiencing the bargaining style in Korea, we called it a day but not before
having dinner at Taj restaurant at Myeongdong, let me clarify its not the
famous Taj hotel chain from India.
Day 8-Design Thinking and McKinsey 7 step method
Our Sunday started as usual with early breakfast and bus ride to KAIST.As
our program was only for 10days so we had a session on Sunday to make the
most of this opportunity. The entire day session was taken by Mr. Jae Choi,
Senior Vice-President at Doosan. He had worked in Oracle and McKinsey
before and he gave us the insights of the wealth of experience that he had
accumulated.
He gave us a brilliant description of the turnaround store of South Korea, how
companies like Samsung innovated themselves into world leaders by making
better, faster and cheaper products then the market leader Sony in 80s.
Second part of his session was focused on Design thinking and McKinsey 7
steps to solve a problem. He gave us an assignment to explain the above
concepts and the session was overall very productive for us.
Day 9-India and Korea Relations and SsangYong Motors
Our day started with a session by Vikram Doraiswami, the Indian
Ambassador to South Korea. He spoke about Indias growth and the drivers of
growth in the coming future. He stressed on the importance of an effective

Supply chain as a backbone for sustained growth. He talked about various

initiatives currently being taken by Indian government in infrastructure
building in roadways, railways, inland waterways, coastal shipping and civil
aviation. The second half of the day has a session by Mr. Sundarrajan
Rangarajan from SsangYong. The session was mainly focused on the three
projects that SsangYong had given to out batch as part of the Immersion
Program. Last session was taken by Mr. Parth Sharma, the chairman for
Defense and Shipbuilding at the Indian Chamber of Commerce in Korea and a
senior vice president at the Kangnam Group. He talked about the state of
Shipbuilding in India and how Korean companies can help India with its need
of naval ships. He encouraged the group to look into this area as this is a
huge opportunity to set up business alliances between India and Korea.
Day 10- DSME, Korea Exchange (BUSAN) and Haeundae Beach
Our day started early as we had to catch flight to Busan. Our session was
hosted by Korea Stock exchange at Busan. The first lecture was taken by
Second session was a brief one taken by Mr. Kwang, Vice President at DSME.
He gave us brief about DSME and its various shipbuilding projects especially
Yamal Project in Russia. This session was followed up by a very short session
on Korea exchange. This concluded our academic part of the day and we
reached to Haeundae beach. We had a gala time at the beach as we dipped
in the blue ocean and let ourselves free. We had 3 hours at the beach and we
made the most of it by swimming and sightseeing around the beach.

Day 11- Samsung Innovation Museum

The day started late as groups were given the first half to discuss their
projects with their Project Champions. This day had only one activity
planned, visit to the Samsung Museum. Our time at Samsung museum was
definitely very innovative as we were given a peak into the future of the tech
as well as the past historic moment in the field of tech right from invention of
electric cells and batteries. We headed back to hotel after being in awe of the
museum and Samsung group and its products.
We spent rest of the day in nearby market hunting of a new place to eat and
ended up eating at Ganga Indian restaurant which was worth all the efforts.
Day 12- Innovation and Entrepreneurship in Korea
Our penultimate day in KAIST with a lecture by Prof Zong Tae Bae about the
Innovation and Entrepreneurship. The professor talked about growth drivers
for Korea: Exports, Entrepreneurship and Government focus on Heavy
Industries. He said that Korea has to transform from being a Fast follower to a
creative leader to excel in the post catch-up era. He also presented drivers
for some drivers for Innovations: Sense of Crisis, Emergence of Alternatives
and Planned change.
After the session we were taken to the Incubating room for Social
Entrepreneurship in KAIST where we interacted with students who had taken
Social Entrepreneurship MBA in KAIST and were in the midst of implementing

their ideas. It was a good session for those who were looking to take SE as an
elective in the upcoming term 4 at IIMB.
Last session was taken by Mr. Rich Song, CFO Coupang Korea about the
revelation that is Coupang in Korea. Coupang is an e-commerce company in
Korea and has done exceedingly well in capturing customers in this new
market in Korea. He stressed on the exceptionally efficient delivery model
and the diligence shown by Coupang man when delivering products at
customers doorsteps.
Day 13- tto boja KAIST
At last we had reached the last day of our Immersion program in KAIST and
somehow it seemed that we had been in this college for more than 2 weeks.
Everything looked similar and it seemed like a second college for most of us.
The day began with a session by Ms. Betty Chung as she summarized the
overall learnings of the course and students reflected what they learned
about the Korean culture. Be it being disciplined, Family Oriented,
Hardworking etc. after lunch we had a small certification ceremony as KAIST
presented us with a certificate of participation for this program. The program
was concluded with exchange of gifts and thoughts about the program from
both KAIST members and IIMB students and faculty. At the end we bid adieu
to KAIST with heavy hearts and with hope to see new friends again. This had
been a wonderful experience where we got the opportunity to understand
and see the Korean culture through lectures as well as through our own late

night explorations. Back at hotel we packed our bags in order to be ready for
early morning flight next day to India amid a halt in Hong Kong for a night.