Samsung: Rebirth through Fire: Lee Byung-chul's Decade of Reform

Author: Jin Chenghong
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-05-01
Features: Created a world-class brand value of up to $10.8 billion, revealing a large amount of Samsung's important internal documents for the first time! The best management practices imitated by corporate giants, leading Samsung to become a world-renowned first-class international enterprise, the "Samsung Spirit"! The fastest-growing brand among the top 100 world-class brands! Samsung is the symbol of the revival of "South Korean enterprises," and Lee Byung-chul's "Everything except my wife and children must change" became the slogan of reform. This book reviews Samsung's ten years of reform, objectively analyzes its driving force—Lee Byung-chul's management philosophy—and documents Samsung's transformation into a globalized "New Management" myth, providing answers to the question of how companies can survive in a rapidly changing global economy. This book compiles Samsung's rare and important internal documents, meticulously compiled through long-term interviews and editing. It reveals step by step how Samsung evolved from a South Korean enterprise into a world-renowned first-class global enterprise, as well as its reforming ideology, methods, strategies, and obstacles during this transformation. Over the past decade, Samsung faced the changes of the late 20th century, driven by the crisis awareness that "without the strength to compete with first-class enterprises, survival is impossible," and embarked on a series of powerful reforms and thorough transformations. The reform's signal was the innovation of work hours—the "7-4 system"; followed by decisively destroying $5 billion worth of substandard products to break free from inertia; adopting the "re-hiring laid-off employees" strategy of bringing back the defeated; upholding the belief that "reward systems can activate organizations and unleash individual creativity," and implementing it decisively; vigorously cultivating internal talent and training globalized talent with international education to become PhD-level professionals. Samsung's new management engine for the new century never stops. Samsung's "New Management" continuously drives reform to make Korean products world, elevate service to the level of advanced countries, and refine its management system to match that of first-class enterprises. This innovative spirit of change and reform has not yet subsided. Through reform and innovation, Samsung not only aims to become an enterprise that surpasses first-class enterprises but also strives to become a highly respected global enterprise. It is a relentless, ongoing "progressive" state. Currently, Samsung is once again immersed in "preparing for management," not because of unprecedentedly high profits but because it continues to explore how to survive in the future and seeks another path for change. What Samsung cares about is the future. We hope that through Samsung's successful implementation of reforms, not only the financial industry but the entire society can find the direction and methods for reform.