Beginning and Development of Hyundai Glovis Culture

Hyundai Glovis has grown to become a globally integrated logistics company, steadily expanding its business for the past 20 years.
It did not stop taking on new challenges during the pandemic, and continues to accelerate future business expansion.
The foundation that reinforced the history of its challenges and development would be the corporate culture of Hyundai Glovis.
Upon starting the new era of reformation, we would like to talk about the corporate culture
that Hyundai Glovis has established and continues to practice.
Article. Editor’s Office

2018, Hyundai Glovis Builds the Frame of Company Culture

In 2018, Hyundai Glovis established a commitment to ‘Glovis and Glovis Talents that grow together in trust,’ under the goal of establishing a new corporate culture. Trust is an important value which becomes the basis of ethical management; it includes trust of the customers, trust of the suppliers, and trust among the employees. Upon establishment of the commitment, Hyundai Glovis has also set four promotion strategies ─ namely, mutual trust; communication and cooperation; work smart; and work-life balance ─ presenting detailed behavior patterns.

The ‘organizational culture consultation body’ has played a big role in this process. Unlike most of the other companies that set the direction of their corporate culture according to the opinions of the management,

Hyundai Glovis has devoted efforts to listen to the voices of the employees and reflect them in its. To reflect the employees’ wishes in the corporate culture policies, the organizational culture consultation body was formed to plan programs and operate workshops, etc. In addition, a new team was established to take charge of the corporate culture so that the management and employees can communicate through heart-to-heart talks.

Furthermore, in the second half of 2018, they clarified their standpoint under the slogan of ‘It’s a Smart Move, Hyundai Glovis,’ and established a desired talent of ‘Smart Glovis Talent and Sophisticated Glovis Talent.’

After the company settled on the direction toward reflecting the employees’ desires, various corporate culture improvement programs were implemented. First, a code of conduct was disseminated to employees to change the working culture in the four fields of company dinners, work life, work methods, and meetings. Furthermore, a ‘Talk Talk Channel’ was set up for the Glovis workers to express their opinions freely online. In addition, a new in-house broadcasting program called ‘compliment-relay’ was created to encourage warm words between employees; and a ‘casual day’ was designated so that the employees can wear comfortable and stylish clothes instead of formal attire and focus on work. From July 2018, opportunities were created for the employees to talk freely with the CEO over lunch through holding of “Gourmet Lunch with the CEO.”

What would be the most popular program among these among the employees? Manager Lee Moung-ho of the Corporate Culture Team picks the casual day and the gourmet lunch with the CEO. He explained, “Casual day was a program that made us feel the determination of Hyundai Glovis to create a new corporate culture. And Gourmet Lunch with the CEO, which was done in teams, was so satisfactory that the employees thought of it as a Sohwakhaeng (small but certain happiness) in their lives.”

2019, Making Changes through Various Communication Programs

After establishing the framework and the direction of a corporate culture that unites all members in 2018, Hyundai Glovis has carried out more diverse corporate culture programs in 2019. Each program was systemized to connect with each other, and achieved voluntary and active changes among the employees.

The program that started all this was the “CEO Meet-Up.” While Gourmet Lunch with the CEO in 2018 focused on small group meetings with a team, CEO Meet-Up enabled communication between all employees and the CEO in a town hall meeting format. The presentation of the CEO on the direction of the company and the real-time Q&A session were broadcasted live to the whole company, and the employees were able to give their honest opinions and suggestions using the mobile-based audience response system. The suggestions were actually put into practice immediately.

Manager Lee Myong-ho testified that “the casual days were expanded, air purifiers were installed all over the building, and the foundation day was made a holiday after the CEO Meet-Up.” Although all firms emphasize communication, most of them do not take follow-up measures due to realistic conditions. However, Hyundai Glovis has made this honest communication ignite the changes. When the suggestions were realized, the employees started participating more actively. The ‘Smart Move Seminar’ held in each office is also meaningful.

In addition to the changes in the company after the CEO Meet-Up, a different means of communication to make specific changes in each office and team was required. Therefore, the problems in each office were identified through the Smart Move Seminars, and three to four action items were selected to resolve such problems. These action items were made into a poster so that the employees could practice them in daily life, and this led to “TBH (To Be Honest) with the Leader.” This is a program which made the action items from the Smart Move Seminars a little more specific to share with others, and it presented an opportunity to talk honestly about the things that need the leaders’ support.

Bringing all these programs together, the “Official Announcement of Lifestyle” of Hyundai Glovis was held on September 6, 2019. Manger Lim Hee-jin of the Corporate Culture Team explains that the reason for the creation of the lifestyle was that they “needed a promise that could be shared by the whole company, while monitoring the various programs operated in 2018 and 2019. To establish a proper lifestyle, the ideas of the employees and the opinions of the Culture Board CWT were collected, and 11 themes were selected through a discussion with the management. Lifestyle 11, created by the Glovis Talents themselves, is and will continue to be the guidelines to strengthen the corporate culture.

2020, Solidifying a New Ground for Development by Responding to the Variables of COVID-19

Last year, COVID-19 brought chaos all over the world. For the whole year of 2020, employees had to work from home and in the office alternately. They had difficulties working effectively, and their daily lives were also affected. The Corporate Culture Team, which had been working on spreading the corporate culture and operating related programs since 2018, had to spend the beginning of the last year modifying and supplementing the year’s plan.

Manager Lee Myong-ho remarked, “Since 2019, we have been thinking about a cloud-based working system that could bring innovative change in the working methods, such as paperless work, and introduced the G-SQUARE from February last year. We have also operated various change management programs to increase the application.” Through such preparation, a remote working environment was naturally established, and the response to the pandemic was relatively smooth and rapid.

In fact, the CEO Lifestyle Salon conducted by the divisions and overseas branches from April to November was managed through video conferences. And open KakaoTalk chat rooms were made for each division so that anyone could freely express their ideas anonymously. In June, the cloud-based collaborative system G-SQUARE was adopted in earnest, and enabled an easier and more comfortable cooperation while working from home. Through this, the working methods changed greatly from work history management to sharing information between teams and simple e-mailing.

In addition, the Corporate Culture Team quickly distributed the “Work-from-home Guidebook” to help the members working from home, and designed fun events such as giving out delivery app coupons to all employees to comfort them amidst the changes in the environment and increase of work stress. At the same time, the team has produced and distributed the “Lifestyle Guidebook” for all employees to practice Hyundai Glovis Lifestyle 11 created in 2019. Manager Lim Hee-jin commented, “This guidebook was compiled to answer the questions of the employees such as ‘What is the horizontal corporate culture that Hyundai Glovis emphasizes?’ ‘how would the members who practice autonomy and responsibility work?,’ etc. in a more detailed way.” Furthermore, to convey the meaning of the corporate culture to the employees in a more friendly way, the mascots Dori and Taeri were created. These two cute characters deliver the notices of G-SQUARE and appear on the Lifestyle Radio to communicate more intimately with the employees.

This is how Hyundai Glovis has emphasized the corporate culture step-by-step for three years from 2018 to 2020. The Corporate Culture Team that went through the whole process explained, “We are doing our best to make the company better for the employees. Although many things changed over the past three years, we still have a long way to go. While it has not been easy, a word of compliment or encouragement will mean a lot. Please stay supportive of one another.” To deal wisely with the rapidly changing internal and external environments and work with a sense of accomplishment, a solid corporate culture must be provided. When this corporate culture is instilled in the minds of the employees and takes strong root, Hyundai Glovis will establish its position as a company that provides greater value to its external customers through internal customer satisfaction and one that leads the world’s logistics market.