Being head of Thai Samsung Electronics is not an easy job. To keep himself updated with lifestyle trends so that he can adjust Samsung's marketing and presentation, Kwang-kee Park is drawn to Bangkok's busiest retail centres and crowded shopping malls, yet he is constantly yearning for serenity.

There is another paradox in his existence. This hard-nosed managing director first came to Thailand because of a dream, in which a Thai soldier who died in the Korean War came to him and invited him to visit his homeland.

"When I was in the army, my territory covered a park where there was a monument to the Thai soldiers who died in Korea's war," Park, 44, recalls. "Every morning, I would jog to the statue, which was half an hour away from my barracks."

He thought nothing about his daily visit to the monument until one day, the giant South Korean electronics firm asked for volunteers from the regional specialists on its staff to work in overseas postings, including France, the UK, Saudi Arabia, China and Thailand. Park was one of Samsung's regional specialists.

Those of his colleagues who studied in France quickly offered to go there. Others who had studied in the UK opted for that posting, and so on. Eventually, only China and Thailand were left.

"Then, all of sudden, the dream of the Thai soldier came to my mind," he says. "So I volunteered

to come to Thailand. It's strange, but it really happened to me."

Samsung had developed its regional specialist programme more than 10 years earlier in the belief that if it wanted to be a global player, it had to pay attention to overseas markets, as well as that at home.

Park's first mission in Thailand was to support marketing activities for Samsung's consumer electronics products in Thailand and Indochina from 1991 to 1995. During that time he not only travelled around the country, but he also took a course in meditation in a Chiang Mai temple.

While most expatriates seem to favour mainstream tourist destinations, Park says he prefers small remote villages in mountainous areas, where he can wake to see the mountains shrouded in mist and fog. It has to do with his childhood in a mountainous village in South Korea.

"I'd rather spend time alone," he says. "If I go to a shopping mall and spend one hour there, I feel like I have worked for eight hours.

"I came from a village, so I'm not an urban guy. I love the village culture and I cannot hide that. It's me."

He admitted that during his first years in Thailand, he sometimes felt homesick in crowded Bangkok. "But when I went out of town, I felt relaxed. Sometimes, I parked the car alongside a paddy field and spent two hours there, just feeling relaxed."

But peace and quiet was elusive. After Thailand, he was promoted to chief manager of business operations at Samsung's regional headquarters in Singapore, from 1999 to 2003.

Then he went home to assume the post of vice-president of Samsung's global human resources planning group in Seoul. He was responsible for setting human resources standards for more than 120 offices in 57 countries.

He came back to head up the Thailand operation in February this year.

He says he only ever tastes Bangkok's legendary nightlife when he is playing host to a company guest.

"So the nightlife is also part of my work," says the man who graduated in economics from Korea's Kyungbuk National University and later gained a master's degree in management of international business and marketing from Chulalongkorn University's Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration.

Park knows that his love of meditation sits awkwardly alongside his rule of visiting shopping malls every weekend to keep abreast of trends in fashion, and what's attracting younger shoppers.

"I visit several shops a week. My driver gets very tired as he has no time to take weekends off," Park says.

From his observations, Park believes that Thai people love products with which they can become "emotionally involved". This led him to market the Samsung brand as a lifestyle provider, rather than as a supplier of electrical and electronic appliances.

While in shopping malls, he observes the front decorations of Samsung shops to see if they are attracting customers. If not, he will take a photograph with his Samsung mobile phone-camera, download it on to his personal computer, and instruct those responsible to improve their display.

When asked about the biggest difference between managing staff in South Korea and Thailand, he quickly settles on the Thai custom of krengjai, or fear of offending someone.

"It's something I have to overcome here. When you've got to push the firm to achieve a mission, sometimes your local and organisational cultures are in conflict and krengjai is part of this," he says.

On one occasion he asked his local executives to rank their staff according to performance and found that they had great difficulty in allocating scores. Then, they ended up giving all their staff good scores.

"It's unfair to those who work very hard and perform better than average. They deserve faster promotion and higher wages. Good performance should be backed up by faster promotion and bonuses," he says. "I don't mind how old you are, or your background, junior or senior. In Samsung's culture, what matters is whether you can perform as the management expects."

Park says that some people work for 20 years in the same area and effectively repeat their first year's experience 20 times. They become skilful, but never become an expert, and the way they look at things is unchanged.

"I appreciate people with different viewpoints," he says. "If you don't change what you are doing today, how can you expect a better tomorrow?"

Perhaps Park's expectations of staff are born from the fact that he has shouldered the great expectations of his bosses in South Korea. It is a tradition that when Samsung dispatches executives to look after overseas operations, the bosses give them shoes and a belt before they leave.

"The shoes mean you must walk and walk, until your shoes run out, visiting your customers. It reminds you to work hard. The belt means you must not spend too much."

And while it may some times seem to Park's staff that he is a demanding boss who can quickly create feelings of bitterness in his subordinates, Park tones it down by allowing them to speak out their minds with the help of what he calls the "bomb drink".

This is a punishing mixture of whisky and beer. Park prefers Heineken and Ballantine's whisky, shaken, not stirred.

"When we have dinner together, we call for small glasses of bomb drink, one by one. When it's your turn, you have to say something, like 'Cheer for No 1 in Thailand'. So it kind of reinforces the organisational mission," Park says.

After a few shots, the talk flows and the courage grows. Eventually, his staff members speak their minds as if talking to their peers.

When asked how many bomb drinks he can take, he smiles, squares his shoulders, and says: "All Samsung executives can take over 20 bomb drinks. But here, the local staff members aren't used to it. But they like the atmosphere, because they can speak freely to their seniors."

Apart from spending his time in shopping malls instead of looking for peace of mind, Park dedicates his time to reading history books. One of his favourites is "From Third World to First: The Singapore Story, 1965-2000" written by Lee Kuan Yew.

Despite all, what he loves most is being lazy at home. But the precious opportunities to do this are hard to find because his younger daughter insists on his help with her homework.

Park's wife also comes from South Korea. They have two daughters. The eldest is in Singapore, while the younger one is in Thailand.

"She [the younger daughter] is so demanding and wants everything to be perfect," he says, producing his Samsung mobile phone-camera to proudly show off pictures of the kids. 

Sirivish Toomgum

The Nation