• Korean Journal of Family Social Work
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• no.53
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• pp.117-159
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• 2016

This is a case study with the objectives of performing an in-depth investigation of the development process, outcome, and the factors related to the development process of Jinggomdari-the self-help group for divorced single parents at Wolgye social welfare center. Document review, in-depth interviews of the member/practitioner/middle manager, and participatory observations were performed and qualitatively analyzed. The results showed that the development process of Jinggomdari consisted of 4 phases including initiation, formation of basis, growth, and expansion/independence. Two categories including 'nurturing abilities and growth as an individual or within families or communities' and 'beyond Jinggomdari, into society', 6 subcategories, and 31 concepts were derived as the outcome. In terms of the factors related to the development process and outcome, 6 categories including 'members participating with sympathy despite various issues', 'outstanding and stabilized leadership', 'commitment of the practitioners showing utmost efforts despite shortcomings', 'effective functions as the hub supporting the low-income divorced single parents families based on the institution's firm determination', 'mixed group showing cautious but synergistic effects', 'dilemma of managing the low-income divorced single parents self-help group and lack of manual for management', 20 subcategories, and 61 concepts were derived. Management issues concerning low-income divorced single parents' self-help group was discussed based on these results.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.248-258
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• 2021

The study analyzed the financial determinants of corporate R&D intensity that require more attention from academics and practitioners in the Korean capital market. Domestic small and medium enterprises (SMEs) may face with developing substitutes by making more R&D investments in scale and scope, given the unprecedented economic conditions such as the limitation of importing core components and materials from other nation(s). KOSDAQ-listed SMEs were selected as sample data, whose R&D expenditures may be less than those of large firms during the post-global financial turmoil period (2010~2018). Static panel data model was applied, along with Tobit and stepwise regression models, for examining the validity of results. Logit, probit, and complementary log-log regressions were also employed for a relative analysis. R&D expenditures in the prior year, the interaction effect between the previous R&D intensity and high-tech sector, firm size, and growth rate were significant to determine R&D intensity. Moreover, a majority of explanatory variables were found to change between the years 2011 and 2018, while time-lagged effects between the R&D intensity and growth rate exist. Results of the study are expected to be used for future research to detect optimal levels of R&D expenditures for the value maximization of SMEs.

• Korean small business review
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• v.42 no.3
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• pp.123-144
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• 2020

This study attempt to use secondary data from KIS-Value to understand how rapid globalization strategy affects BGF's performance defined five categories such as sales volume, return on investment, net profit per employee, increase in sales, and increase in net profit per employee. In particular, this research defines the BGF based on the export ratio within five years after the establishment and classifies BGF into three levels according to 25%, 50%, and 75% concentration of exports. The main results of this study were first, the rapid internationalization strategy was proven to have a sales effect in the short and long term, and in particular, the short term effect was more significantly compared to the long term effect. However, the impact on the return on investment(ROI) of BGF was found that the more stringent the BGF level, the more short-term effect on ROI, but the longer-term effect was diluted according to time. Third, the sales growth rate is significant in the short-term depending on the BGF level, but do not have long-term effects same as ROI. On the other hand, the growth rate of net profit has shown that the BGF strategy has a negative (-) effect over the long term. In particular, the higher the BGF level, the greater the negative impact on the increase in net profit.

• Journal of Technology Innovation
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.139-169
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• 2023

This study analyzes the effects of firms' technology innovation(patent applications) on employment(number of workers and proportion of high-skilled workers) and corporate performance(sales per worker), while considering the two-way causal relationships between these variables. We used the three-stage least squares(3SLS) estimation to examine system of equations in which the dependent variables affect each other with a two-year lag wherever relevant, and applied it to firm-level panel data of Korean manufacturers with 100 or more workers. Our data covered the period of 2005-2017. Exogenous variables, such as firms' managerial and other characteristics, were controlled as explanatory variables. The identification variables for each equation included firms' R&D intensity, labor cost per worker(or operation of firms' own R&D center), and investment on worker training. We find that firms' patent applications increased number of workers, proportion of high-skilled workers, and sales per worker; the causal relationships in the opposite direction were also significant. Evidently, firms' technology innovation is critical to the growth and quality improvement of employment as well as sustainable corporate growth.

• Korean Business Review
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.53-80
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• 2006

This research has been accomplished to build up the growth strategies of Kangwon district's small & medium-sized construction firms. For this purpose, we made an investigation of the present situation and status for existing regional small & medium construction firms by analyzing data. Based on the results from this study, the following growth strategies are suggested to gain their competitive advantages. Firstly, most of all, the role of the top manager is the most important factor since most of the top manager for the small & medium-sized construction firms coincide with the owner the firms. Secondly, the specialization strategy is to establish. Above all they concentrate their business capacities on core business. Then, this growth strategy should be based on the selective escalation of functions in order to maintain an appropriate level of construction works. Thirdly, the specialized skills and skilled workers are ensured for competitive advantages. For human resource development, they should train workers to be multi-functioned on the assumption the they could stay at firm until they wish to retire. Finally, the government must also spare no effort to encourage the small & medium-sized construction firms to build up it's competitive power and cultivate it's spontaneous generation power though the reformation of system related whit the small and medium construction industry.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.16 no.5
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• pp.1-14
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• 2021

Innovation and Scale-up of Start-up companies are becoming important national tasks. In the past, it was spread the start-up policy paradigm such as 'Start-up America', 'Start-up Chile', 'Start-up Britain' to overcome the recession globally. However as the economic recovery has become more visible recently in advanced economies, it is shifting from a start-up support policy to a scale-up oriented policy paradigm such as 'Scale-up America', Scale-up UK', 'Scale-up Denmark'. It is necessary to enter the scale-up phase beyond the start-up phase to increase the number of high-quality jobs and to continue economic growth. Therefore, it is necessary to grow the start-up into a strong medium-sized company and to lay the foundation for survival. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to consider the antecedent factors that influence the scale-up aspiration for the start-up firm to grow into a scale-up company, and empirically identifies the differences between the stages of economic development and entrepreneurs in the country. In order to accomplish the purpose, this study predicted scale-up by aspiration which is a predictor of scale-up behavior because it is difficult to achieve visible growth in a short period of time due to the characteristics of start-up companies. In order to empirically explore these relationships, the data were collected from nascent entrepreneurs who have less than 3.5 years of the Adult Population Survey(APS) among the subjects surveyed by the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor(GEM) and the national economic development stage are divided into Innovation-driven, Efficiency-driven, Factor-driven type economies. For the test hypotheses, this study adopted the multi-level model analysis for comparison between national economic development stages and using the R 3.5.0 program. The results of this study are as follows. There is difference between the national economic development and the entrepreneur in the relationship between innovation orientation of entrepreneurs and scale-up aspirations. As the economy of the country develops, the innovation activity of the entrepreneur becomes more active. Since start-ups are heavily influenced by entrepreneurs, there is a difference in the degree of aspiration depending on how innovative an entrepreneur is in the same environment. In terms of the relationship between innovation orientation and scale-up aspiration, the fear of failure was found to differ between national economic development and entrepreneurs. The fear of failure differ from country to country, and this is one of the important factors affecting entrepreneurial activities. It is expected that the factors influencing the growth of the start-up companies which are identified through the results of these studies, will be used to create a suitable scale-up ecosystem according to the national economic development stage.

• Journal of Intelligence and Information Systems
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• v.16 no.4
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• pp.43-65
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• 2010

Facing a complex environment driven by a decade, many companies are adopting new strategic frameworks such as Customer Relationship Management system to achieve sustainable profitability as well as overcome serious competition for survival. In many business areas, CRM system advanced a great deal in a matter of continuous compensating the defect and overall integration. However, pharmaceutical companies in Korea were slow to accept them for usesince they still have a tendency of holding fast to traditional way of sales and marketing based on individual networks of sales representatives. In the circumstance, this article tried to empirically address current status of CRM system as well as the effects of the system on the performance of pharmaceutical companies by applying BSC method's four perspectives, from financial, customer, learning and growth and internal process. Survey by e-mail and post to employers and employees who were working in pharma firms were undergone for the purpose. Total 113 cases among collected 140 ones were used for the statistical analysis by SPSS ver. 15 package. Reliability, Factor analysis, regression were done. This study revealed that CRM system had a significant effect on improving financial and non-financial performance of pharmaceutical companies as expected. Proposed regression model fits well and among them, CRM marketing information system shed the light on substantial impact on companies' outcome given profitability, growth and investment. Useful analytical information by CRM marketing information system appears to enable pharmaceutical firms to set up effective marketing and sales strategies, these result in favorable financial performance by enhancing values for stakeholderseventually, not to mention short-term profit and/or mid-term potential to growth. CRM system depicted its influence on not only financial performance, but also non-financial fruit of pharmaceutical companies. Further analysis for each component showed that CRM marketing information system were able to demonstrate statistically significant effect on the performance like the result of financial outcome. CRM system is believed to provide the companies with efficient way of customers managing by valuable standardized business process prompt coping with specific customers' needs. It consequently induces customer satisfaction and retentionto improve performance for long period. That is, there is a virtuous circle for creating value as the cornerstone for sustainable growth. However, the research failed to put forward to evidence to support hypothesis regarding favorable influence of CRM sales representative's records assessment system and CRM customer analysis system on the management performance. The analysis is regarded to reflect the lack of understanding of sales people and respondents between actual work duties and far-sighted goal in strategic analysis framework. Ordinary salesmen seem to dedicate short-term goal for the purpose of meeting sales target, receiving incentive bonus in a manner-of-fact style, as such, they tend to avail themselves of personal network and sales and promotional expense rather than CRM system. The study finding proposed a link between CRM information system and performance. It empirically indicated that pharmaceutical companies had been implementing CRM system as an effective strategic business framework in order for more balanced achievements based on the grounded understanding of both CRM system and integrated performance. It suggests a positive impact of supportive CRM system on firm performance, especially for pharmaceutical industry through the initial empirical evidence. Also, it brings out unmet needs for more practical system design, improvement of employees' awareness, increase of system utilization in the field. On the basis of the insight from this exploratory study, confirmatory research by more appropriate measurement tool and increased sample size should be further examined.

• Korean small business review
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• v.31 no.1
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• pp.73-88
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• 2009

This study examines the characteristics of 24 Korean hidden champions such as key success factors, core competences, strategic problems, and desirable future directions. The study categorized them into 8 types with Danny Miller's four trajectories and top manager's decision making style(rationality and passion). Danny Miller argued in his book, Icarus paradox, that outstanding firms will extend their orientations until they reach dangerous extremes and their momentum will result in common trajectories of decline. He suggested four very common success types: Craftsmen, Builders, Pioneers, Salesmen. He also suggested common trajectories of decline:Focusing(from Craftsmen to Tinkers), Venturing(from Builders to Imperialists), Inventing(from Pioneers to Escapists), Decoupling(from Salesmen to Drifts). In Korea, successful startups appear to possess three kinds of drive: Technology-drive, Vision-drive, Market-drive. Successful technology-driven firms tend to grow as craftsmen or pioneers. Successful vision-driven and market-driven ones tend to grow as builders and salesmen respectively. Korean top managers or founders seem to have two kinds of decision making style: Passion-based and Rationality-bases. Passion-based(passionate) entrepreneurs are biased towards action or proactiveness in competing and getting things done. Rationality- based ones tend to emphasis the effort devoted to scanning and analysing information to better understand a company's threats, opportunities and options. Consequently this study suggested 4*2 types of Korean hidden champions: (1) passionate craftsmen, (2) rational craftsmen, (3) passionate builders, (4) rational builders, (5) passionate pioneers, (6) rational pioneers, (7) passionate salesmen, (8) rational salesmen. These 8 type firms showed different success stories and appeared to possess different trajectories of decline. These hidden champions have acquired competitive advantage within domestic or globally niche markets in spite of the weak market power and lack of internal resources. They have maintained their sustainable competitiveness by utilizing three types of growth strategy; (1) penetrating into the global market, (2) exploring new service market, (3) occupying the domestic market. According to the types of growth strategy, these firms showed different financial outcomes and possessed different issues for maintaining their competitiveness. This study found that Korean hidden champions were facing serious challenges from the transforming economic structure these days and possessed the decline potential from their success momentum or self-complacence. It argues that they need to take a new growth engine not to decline in the turbulent environment. It also discusses how firms overcome the economic crisis and find a new business area in promising industries for the future. It summarized the recent policy of Korean government called as "Green Growth" and discussed how small firms utilize such benefits and supports from the government. Other implications for firm strategies and governmental policies were discussed.

• Asia-Pacific Journal of Business Venturing and Entrepreneurship
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• v.18 no.5
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• pp.241-253
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• 2023

In the current rapidly changing environment, each country continues to make efforts to create jobs and strengthen technological competitiveness. In particular, support and revitalization policies for venture companies and start-ups are known to play a role in increasing national competitiveness. Companies should make appropriate replacements amid growing uncertainties in the environment in which business life is shortened and customer needs are diversified due to intensifying competition. First of all, it is important for companies to make efforts to strengthen their internal capabilities on their own. However, venture companies lack internal resources and capabilities, so support from the external environment is important enough to lead to the survival of the company(Timmons, 1994). Financial support and certification systems are being operated at the national level to strengthen the competitiveness of companies. However, financial support can lower a company's self-sustainability depending on the situation, so non-financial support such as R&D support and start-up education is considered to be helpful in the long term for venture growth(Aghion et al., 2012; Jeon & Ko, 2021). Non-financial support is divided into commercialization, facilities, space, childcare, manpower, and certification systems, and this study confirmed the benefits of the venture company confirmation system, which is a certification system. To this end, the 2021 venture company precision survey data and venture company sales data were used, and analyzed using the SPSS 26.0 package and SPSS PROCESS MACRO. As a result of the analysis, it was confirmed that the level of the management environment of venture companies has a positive effect on the benefits of the venture confirmation system or increasing the level of venture company capabilities, but it is difficult to lead to actual management performance. In addition, it was confirmed that the level of venture company competency mediates the relationship between the level of the venture company's business environment and management performance. As a result, even if the level of the venture company's business environment is positive or venture-friendly, it can be said that companies with internal capabilities to digest support from the external environment increase management performance.

• Journal of the Korean association of regional geographers
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• v.4 no.1
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• pp.77-98
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• 1998

In general, spatial imbalance in regional growth is a major cause of social and political conflicts within a state. In Korea, this inequality has functioned as a threat to the state's integration. With the economic development policies by regional industrialization over the past three decades, most of the industrial activities have been concentrated in Seoul and Pusan metropolitan areas, which are surrounded by Kyonggi, Kyongnam provinces respectively. Compared to these areas, Chonnam and Chonbuk provinces have lagged behind in economic development. Therefore, in order to increase the regional economic development of the southwestern region in Korea, the central government has been enforcing several policies aimed at regional industrialization since the 1980s. The purpose of this study focuses on the regional economic impacts of a newly established industrial estate-Yulchon industrial complex- which would act as a regional growth center in the Kwangyang bay area. The Kwangyang bay area consists of several industrial estates such as Kwangyang Iron and Steel Co. and its related industrial complex, Chuam rural industrial estate, Yeochon industrial complex, and so on. In addition, the Kwangyang container port was constructed in 1997. The Kwangyang bay area has been changing to a new industrial district in the southwestern part of Korea as a result of industrialization policies which were activated by central government. The Yulchon industrial complex, which is expected to be completed in 2001, would draw many manufacturing plants. For example, Hyundai Motors Co. has a plan to locate a new automobile assembly plant within the estate. As the plan has high probability to be realized, it will be interesting to study the effects a new automobile assembly plant and its related production linkages have on the region. This study is to estimate the expected structural characteristics of automobile production activities in Yulchon. The following details will be discussed: the regional economic impacts of a new automobile industry in Yulchon industrial complex, the production linkage formation via hierarchical subcontracting systems, the alternative strategies to promote the growth of regional economies, and the scheme to improve the auto-parts and components industry in Kwangju and Chonnam provinces by establishing auto-mobile production function. Automoblie industry generally gives great influences on not only regional economies but the related industries, for example, the firms producing automotive components. If a new plant producing automobiles and its related firms producing components are to be established in Yulchon, they will affect on the regional development directions and change the regional characteristics of industrial structure. In order to increase the spread effects of the new industry in Yulchon industrial complex, almost all of the automobile production processes must be organized concurrently within a limited range of distance. There is an imperative that the co-operation system should be structured between the assembly firm and many firms producing its components. In addition to those, it would be required such as the effective division of labors between the firms, much more capabilities in the technical innovations, and the reconstruction of interrelationship between the labor unions and the firms' managers.