CEO COLUMN

Published Jul-2022, [No.278]
Subject Clean Culture




During the President, Mr Moo-Hyun Roh, Lawyer Jung-kyu Park who served as the 'Senior Secretary to the President for Civil Affairs' published a collection of prose, and the title of the book was "While cleaning..." He spent his summer vacation at an acquaintance's villa in Jeju Island, and when the owner started cleaning in the morning, he was embarrassed to stay still, so he quietly picked up a broom.

Sweat poured out as He swept the room and mopped here and there, and He thought, "It would be nice to do this as a morning exercise," so He was happy hitting his knee. He tried various morning exercises such as jogging, tennis, golf, and swimming but had not been able to last due to weather, cost, and laziness. And then he chose 'cleaning the house' as a dawn exercise,

He woke up his son, who was doing the computer and sleep late, and sat down at his desk. Also helping his wife with family work and making her happy, He came to the conclusion that cleaning is becoming a Key for family peace and harmony. Above all, cleaning the house was helping to relieve stress caused by work and being a refreshing way to work, which was so great for mental health.


After cancer surgery in 2005, I have been training for the Gukseondo every morning for preventing recurrence and enhancing immunity, and the cleaning of the 100§³ training center was always up to my teacher. I can't blame the selfish idea of Seoulites saying, "Why do I clean in spite of I pay my dues?" But I first picked up a rag because I thought it was not a disciple's duty let my teacher clean who teaches us.

Since about 50 people trained seven to eight times a day, the training room could not be kept clean due to sweat and dust, but one person's example moved the trainees' hearts and their participation moved little by little. Now, when the training is over, everyone holds a broom, and the atmosphere that 'the cleaning of the training room is not the teacher, but the trainees have to solve it themselves' has spread, and it has been settled as a clean training room.

Small sacrifices lead to concessions and consideration for others, and the newly moved 'Pangyo Training Center in Nature' is blooming with beautiful flowers, and the training center seems to be turning into a warmer atmosphere with cultivating vegetables such as lettuce, cucumber, peppers, and celery.


While working as LG Factory manager, I often visited and received training from Japanese companies to learn and benchmark where their industrial competitiveness comes from and how long-lived companies can emerge for 100, 200 or even 1,000 years.



Along with the honesty of the Japanese and the craftsmanship of selling only one well, the habits of cleaning were deeply rooted not only in individuals but also in companies, factories, and various groups. There was no single cigarette butts and garbage found in amusement parks such as Osaka Castle. Also I don't find any parking violations anywhere in the city. And every factory I visited was clean, and the raw materials, equipment, and various tools were well arranged.

The source of the world's best quality, high productivity and price competitiveness that no other company can match is the 5S activities of organizing and cleaning. A picture of a broom attached to the back wall of a small business company's CEO's desk seems to represent everything.


One of the Japanese corporate CEO, Hidesaburo Kagiyama, who is famous for cleaning restroom. He graduate of a rural agricultural school and founded Royal Company, a manufacturing and sales company for automotive products named Yellow Hat, and grew into a blue-chip mid-sized company with 1,000 employees and sales of 1 billion dollars.

The company started its day with the cleaning of production sites, offices, and product warehouses on its way to work, and in particular, the cleaning of the restroom was up to CEO 'Kagiyama'. Many people can't help but admire the sight of him wiping the floor of the restroom as well as the inside of the restroom with his bare hands.

With the success of the Royal Company, They have developed a training program called 'restroom cleaning and corporate management', and CEO and executives of Japan are learning and practicing how important cleaning plays in corporate management.


There are countless stories about restroom cleaning. Professor Shriman, a professor of economics at the University of London in the United Kingdom, was first asked to clean the restroom when he went to India's Gandhi to learn about his studies. The Shriman protested, "Why do you waste my talent and time on this?" and Gandhi showed himself cleaning the restroom every day, saying, "I want to know if you can do small things on your own."

In 1909, the principal of the Japanese Military Academy did not know, why the Chinese cadet restroom, which was dirty even after nagging, suddenly became clean. He secretly watched the restroom at dawn, and a student brought a water basin and soap and started cleaning, and he was Kai-shek, Chiang who came to Japan from Taiwan to study.

When the principal asked why you came out alone to clean up while everybody sleeping, He said, "People make fun of me that Chinese restroom are the dirtiest. I'm cleaning for the honor of my country." Kai-shek, Chiang practiced strict self-management and morality, but he was kicked out to Taiwan after losing from the Communist Party of Mao Zedong due to corruption.


When he heard that his daughter-in-law had cheated, he sent a gift to her birthday, and there was a pistol in it, and the daughter-in-law killed herself with that gun. Kai-shek, Chiang served as Chinese president for 48 years. He was able to take power for a long time because of strict self-management such as clean the restroom himself.


The first company culture of LCC is the cleaning culture. Among them, the Clean Day activity, which takes place every Thursday morning at 8 AM, All Employees are put into each production site with the slogan 'Let's warm up with simple gymnastics and make a beautiful and clean company like the picture'.

In the early days of its establishment, it was cleaning the production site, but now it is cleaning raw material racks, manufacturing mixers, storage tanks, charging and packaging equipment, and various size parts. Cleaning for maintain the optimal condition of the facility is up to the production team's engineers and female employees but the participation of office workers in cleaning the facility seems to be motivating themselves 'Let's keep it cleaner'. Also it is creating the Synergy as well.

We also operate a 'Warehouse Clean Day' that optimizes the storage status of raw materials and products by regularly cleaning the product warehouse, raw materials, box warehouse, and tank yard of Bulk raw materials once a month. In addition, we conduct 'Clean Floor' activities once a month to clean the floor of the factory that may be contaminated with raw materials and semi-finished products. It plays a big role in preventing microbial contamination of products by keeping the floor clean same as at home.


Tuesday is Landscaping Day, and we also work on weed removal and prune tree in each department for about 20 minutes every week.

If necessary, weeding service personnel will be deployed, and grass mowing, pest control work, and prune of juniper trees and roses will be outsourced, so the employees will only act as owners of various landscaping management.

Roads around office buildings, welfare centers, and factories, garbage warehouses that are not usually touched, utility rooms and air conditioning rooms, water quality restoration centers, and drains of treated discharge water will also be cleaned.

Our LCC operates a 'painting team' consisting of four to five people, and we regularly paint simple walls, tank yard facilities, and rack facilities in various warehouses. It is a painting activity for small parts that are difficult to outsource which serves as a preventive preservation for facilities as well as clean and beautiful factories.

In addition, the female employees in charge of the subsidiary material warehouse regularly clean the pallet of the raw-material in spring, preventing foreign substances from being mixed due to pallet contamination. In addition, we clean not only the office, conference room, and rest room where we work, but also the lavatories and shoes by ourselves.


The cleaning of restroom, which started when I worked as a factory manager of LG, continues even after I founded LCC. The manager's initiative also leads to a change in employees' consciousness, but my small sacrifice and consideration make feel comfortable to my colleagues and above all, I can relieve stress from work and refresh my mind.

While running a company, I think about what kind of leader is suitable and what kind of leader is desirable in a factory where blue collar and white collar work together.

Authoritarian leadership that directs and controls can never be accepted. Only Servant Leader who is willing to take the lead in difficult tasks, sometimes at sacrifice and concession, who discusses, helps, and takes care of his subordinates, can demonstrate true leadership.

Therefore, I make a conclusion that it is the leader's basic duty to clean restrooms and smoking rooms, clean production facilities together, and prune trees and landscape management.


When I visit universities, elementary, middle, and high schools due to special lectures or scholarship payments, I feel sorry to see coffee cups and tissues at lecture rooms, and campus scattered with various garbage.

I imagine what would happen if university professors, principals, and vice principal took the lead in cleaning for one or two hours a week. Classrooms and campus will be clean, and students will be able to organize themselves and bring about the effect of personality education that considers friends and neighbors.


The sales team in Seoul once thought about what to do about cleaning and landscaping. Unlike other departments, it cleans, organizes on its own and arranges flowers and places them inside and outside to make a comfortable and good image to visitors. Going one step further, we manage the 'Big blue lily turf flower garden' in front of the building, spend a lot of money to plant flowers, weed, remove garbage and fallen leaves, and prune to keep them clean and beautiful.

The management of the 'Big blue lily turf flower garden' can be done at the management office but some employees' complaints about unnecessary work disappeared. And it makes us think that our small sacrifices can help to our neighbors and brighten the world. We practice Article 10 of the company's mission statement, 'We fulfill the social responsibility of charity and service'.


There are many company cultures in our LCC. Many corporate cultures have been strengthened, changed, and developed over the past 20 years, including investment about 5 million dollars in computer network for speed management, impossible of accounting fraud through transparent management, welfare system for employees to realize their dreams, and efforts to improve quality and price competitiveness..


In the future, if we grow into a small but ultra-high-quality company by realizing our vision of 'To be an one-hundred year company though export', 'Cleaning Culture' is the biggest contributor to this. In addition, it should not be forgotten that in order to continue this, the initiative of executives, including CEO, must precede.






CEO BAIK, SUNGCHUN

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