Human Resource Development in South Korea: Theory and Cases

Chapter 1. Themes and Trends of HRD Research in South Korean Context

Doo Hun Lim, Seung Won Yoon, & Daeyeon Cho

This chapter will present the overview and synthesis of all chapters in order to guide the readers throughout the book. Three major sections will be used to describe the purpose and direction of the book: national and social issues of HRD, sector specific perspectives on HRD agenda, and contemporary issues and trends. Implications for practice and research will be briefly discussed for dealing with major issues discussed from selected chapters.

Part I: National and Social Issues of HRD

Chapter 2. NHRD in South Korea

Jihyun Shim, Yoonhee Park, Hui Jung Chu, & Su Jung Choi

The influence of national level policies on HRD practices has been noted significant. In order to identify the detailed information about what constitutes national HRD, this chapter will discuss the definitions of NHRD, its boundary, and a brief review about its role affecting HRD policies and practices in South Korea. The first section of the chapter will introduce the history of Korean national HRD in the following periods: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s and afterwards. Also, for each period, we will provide economic development, responding NHRD policies for economic development, statistics, and NHRD outcome measures. The second section will describe how Korean national HRD is deployed in terms of its systematic approach, implementation, administration, and evaluation aspects. The next section will comprise explanation on current laws and regulations overarching Korean national HRD. Also, how Korean national HRD policies are connected to labor market policies along with its achievements will be explained. Lastly, challenges and issues of recent national HRD in Korea will be presented including the limitations and new issues emerging in the labor market and industry.

Chapter 3. Aging issues and HRD in South Korea

Doo Hun Lim, Hyunok Ryu, & Chang Sung Jang

For a past decade, South Korea has faced a rapidly growing number of older employees because of aging. According to OECD, South Korea is confronting the fastest aging population among the OECD countries. The working-age population will peak in 2016 but will decrease by more than a quarter by 2050. In particular, the birth rate of South Korea has decreased quickly and aged workforce brings a critical change in the South Korean workforce. People over 65 years old will accelerate the rapid rate of aging. In 2019, 15% of the total population is aged people (older than 65 years old) (Statistics Korea, 2019). Due to the trend of a longer lifespan, many of the older generations are expected to delay their retirement to remain in the workforce. Based on these statistics, the increase of the aging workforce in the labor market has become an emerging and challenging issue for South Korean organizations. In this book chapter, we will discuss the aging issue significantly affecting the workforce of South Korea and various possible solutions to address those issues. Also, we will provide implications for future research and practice.

Chapter 4. HRD in Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises in South Korea

Sunyoung Park, Shinhee Jeong, Eun-Jee Kim

The purpose of this chapter is to examine the current South Korean policies on supporting small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) from the human resource development (HRD) perspective. In doing so, utilizing three core functions of HRD (i.e., training and development, organization development, and career development) as an analytic lens, we will review and discuss the governmental policies available for Korean SMEs. We will also present organizational cases on what and how the supporting policies were applied and contributed to the organizations. Lastly, we will identify both practical and research gaps and suggest fut