[코리아타임즈 10.06자 기사]

"Gaining new perspectives through MBA"

It is a norm that most people going after MBA degrees seek to get ahead of others or move to better-paying jobs. Suk Jae-won, CEO of Paul Bassett, a premium coffee franchise, was one of these typical MBA goers before he enrolled in the KDI School of Public Policy and Management in 2008.

But while at KDI, he realized that there was more to an MBA. He became interested in helping the underprivileged in developing countries. He spent a great deal of time studying how simple business ideas with little capital provide them with jobs and lift them out of poverty.

Suk even went to Singapore in 2009 and spent a year in the city state to learn more about how social enterprises are set up and how to apply market economy principles to teach the underprivileged to catch fish in the developing world.

In an interview with The Korea Times’ Business Focus, Suk shared his MBA experience which led him to become interested in the field of social enterprise. He also talked about challenges he faced while doing an MBA and gave some advice to those who are planning to apply for an MBA.

He earned double degrees from KDI, an MBA and an MPP (Master of Public Policy) in 2011. Suk, who graduated from Konkuk University majoring in food science and biotechnology of animal tesources, started working for Maeil Dairy in 2001.

After getting KDI degrees, he came back to the local dairy firm and was tasked with running Paul Bassett, Mail Dairy’s coffee division. At the time Paul Bassett had only three shops. But under his management, the coffee franchise now has 20 shops, which have become a popular get-together place among young people.

“Before applying for an MBA, I only collected information about MBA programs from books and peoples’ comments. I didn’t really get how it would help my career development,” he said. “But my motivation to gain the ability to understand a variety of business functions and to seek a new experience landed me on the KDI MBA program.”

His previous working experience at a local family farm located in Pennsylvania in the United States helped him to get a position at Maeil Dairy, Suk said. As he went on to a management position at the company, he felt the need to possess an MBA degree for further career advancement.

When asked why he chose the KDI School over other business schools, the CEO said English-based classes and the class diversity were the main reason.

“Various courses at KDI School are conducted in English. At that time, I was working in the overseas business department which required advanced English skills for better communication with foreign clients. And due to the class diversity, I met a lot of people who came from different countries from different fields, especially, employees from government organizations.”

Although he was a non-business graduate and had only a basic knowledge of business concepts, he said he had no problem keeping up with the course material.

“Luckily, at Maeil Dairy, I was assigned many different roles in a variety of departments including planning, marketing, sales and production, which provided me to gain broader perspectives on business issues,” Suk said.

“The rotational assignments at Maeil Dairy helped me understand how all different business functions are correlated and connected together. And an MBA led me to a deeper understanding of business theories by linking back it to the real situation.”

Asked about his favorite lectures, Suk said, “My favorite lecture was marketing management,” stressing that he was inspired by the case study about Grameen Danone Foods, one of social enterprise projects that is conducted by French-based firm Groupe Danone.

Grameen Danone Foods is a social business firm in Bangladesh which is designed to provide children living in poverty with nutritional foods at a lower price.

“I was impressed by Grameen Danone’s business model. The idea of selling nutritious foods to the poor and investing the profits back into the business, rather than paying dividends to shareholders was an innovative business model to me. I thought I could apply this case to Maeil Dairy since the company had a similar project in the 1960s but failed,” he said.

Suk’s interests in social enterprises drew him to Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at National University of Singapore (NUS) in 2010, where he studied for a Master’s in Public Administration (MPA).

“From an MBA perspective, the Grameen Danone project is more like doing business in an emerging market. But from an MPA perspective, it is a business that makes a better society by helping people. Studying for two different degrees simultaneously has enabled me to view one subject from multiple perspectives.”

He decided to defer his MBA at KDI School to explore a new field of business ― social enterprise.

“For a deep dive into this field, I decided to travel to developing countries near Singapore on my own to meet people living in poverty and learn about its local community’s situation while taking classes at NUS.”

He visited over 20 regions in the neighboring countries of the Philippines, Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia and Bangladesh, hoping to map out a good business plan that would help people in extreme poverty. When he stayed in Bangladesh, he was offered a position at Grameen Danone.

“It was great experience working at Grameen Danone for a few months. But one thing that stood out to me while working there was the gap between theory and practice. There was a huge gap between the case study that I learned at school and the real business world. I was less optimistic about implementing social business project for Maeil Dairy afterward,” Suk said.

“I realized that Maeil Dairy was not ready to become a social enterprise. At least the social enterprise business model was not applicable to Maeil Dairy in the immediate future. I figured out that a big firm with huge profits can take the risk of doing social business in emerging market.”

After a year of studying at NUS, he returned to Korea to finish his MBA at KDI in 2011. As soon as he got back, he started working as CEO for Paul Bassett.

He said he has been focusing on human resource management, building new promotion systems and creating an effective employee benefit program.

“A career path for a professional coffee barista is quiet unclear in Korea. Most of them work part-time and coffee chains do not guarantee long-term positions,” he said.

“Compared to other coffee chains, Paul Bassett’s baristas are all regular employees. I think job security and other benefits are the most important factors to motivate employees. If they spend a certain period of time working as a barista with a high performance, we transfer them to headquarters,” Suk said.

The CEO offered advice to people thinking about applying for MBAs while working for a company.

“It is not easy keeping up with the pace of the classes, while working but many people are doing it now. If you are non business graduates but want to gain an in-depth understanding of the business world, studying for an MBA would be the best option,” he said.

He added that an alumni network is probably the most powerful benefits of holding an MBA.

“I regularly meet people including classmates, professors that I met at KDI. You can also build constructive relationships with the professors at the school. I have been working on a thesis about social enterprises with a professor that I met at KDI. I highly recommend the MBA degree for anyone wanting to excel in their field.”