Learn more about the Custom Programs

Yeon Hoe Moon
Roy Kyoung Cheol
SK Group Executives Learn To Go Global
Yeon Hoe Moon, or "David," as he's known in these parts, is a human relations team leader with a background in law. Roy Kyoung Cheol, a marketing manager with a degree in chemistry, goes by "Kevin."

There's a reason why they have adopted typical American names. Moon, Cheol and 16 other experienced managers and team leaders from SK Corporation, one of South Korea's largest diversified conglomerates, came to the UW Business School in spring of 2005 for an intensive, four-month management education that was customized for their company.

"All of the managers at SK want to be selected for this program," says Cheol. "It is a great honor and a great opportunity."

This is because they are being groomed to become global leaders in the ambitious organization. And global leadership means operating comfortably in the de facto language of global business.

"At SK, we are very focused on entering international markets," says Chang Hyun Im, assistant manager of SK Academy, which has sent SK managers to the UW for the past five years. "Wherever they go in the organizations, they will have to be global leaders."

Their stay in Seattle was an immersion in full-bodied MBA topics that include global marketing, global strategy, finance and accounting, international business, supply chain strategy, corporate entrepreneurship, negotiations, ethics and leadership. And also English, which dominated the first month of the program.

SK's program is one of many Custom Programs that deliver tailor-made courses to organizations who wish to educate groups of executives and address key strategic business needs. Executive Education takes the word "custom" seriously. Programs range from an afternoon leadership seminar that works through a company-specific case to a year-long management immersion program that runs like an industry focused MBA curriculum.

Companies at home and abroad have entrusted the Business School with their Custom Programs for more than 50 years. The roster of domestic clients includes Microsoft, Nordstrom, PACCAR, Weyerhaeuser, Starbucks and Boeing, which has sent managers to the venerable AIMS partnership program since 1962. International clients include Japan's Daiwa Securities Co., Inc., and Fujiwara Co., The Bank of China, Taiwan's National Chengchi University, R.O.C., Korea's LG Corporation and POSCO, the Electricity Governing Authority of Thailand, and Russia's Valtex International Corporation.

For foreign clients, like SK, the program also brokers a total residential experience. Weekly excursions took the most recent class of SK executives to a Seattle Mariners game, Mount Rainier, Chateau Ste. Michelle Winery, even an SK golf tournament with Business School faculty at the Washington National Golf Club.

But the focus was on their classroom work, which was considerable. By the fourth month they were tired and a little homesick, but also riding a precipitous learning curve. The SK students closed the course with team presentations, delivered in excellent English, on entrepreneurial projects that incorporated the new theories and techniques they had learned from the Business School's premier faculty. One team planned an expansion of SK's asphalt and construction businesses into China to take advantage of its rapidly developing infrastructure.

Another synthesized best practices of several telecom giants toward globalizing SK's own extensive telecom business. Another created new means of motivating SK employees through "formalized" use of informal recognition.

These were real takeaways for students and company alike.

"This program has been a very good chance for us to understand the knowledge, and what skills we need to develop in the future," Moon says.

"It's just the beginning for them," Im adds. "They will continue to develop from this experience."