What was your earliest memory? I have a snippet of memory from when I was five or six. I was riding on my uncle’s cart, pulled by an ox, gazing at the night sky strewn with stars and dreaming of travelling across heaven.
Did you go through training/university or straight into work? After high school, I majored in economics at university, interrupting my studies to complete 29 months of military service, which is mandatory for every able-bodied South Korean man. I served in the army.
Who have been your mentors? My closest mentor is my sister, who is in her late 60s and still lectures at a university. As eldest of six siblings, she led the way by setting the standard and made a lot of sacrifices for the family. My mentor at HHI is my “big boss”, who has a knack of quickly grasping the crux of the matter and never fails to make wise decisions.
Ambition or talent — which is more important? However outstanding your talents, if you lack a will to put them into action, they would be useless. Since drive and determination arise from ambition, ambition is more important.
What would you have done if you hadn’t gone into shipbuilding? My parents wanted me to be a lawyer and I dreamed of becoming a judge or a prosecutor. However, when I was about to graduate from high school in 1974, South Korea was in turmoil, so I thought it would be better to get a job related to economics rather than politics. If I had not joined HHI, I could have taken a job at the Central Bank or become a civil servant responsible for economic matters.
Your biggest extravagance? Dining with people whom I can relate to well over good food and wine at a beach, riverside or lake.
How do you relax? I watch football, other sports and classic movies on TV. I jog or go hiking on nearby mountains. When I find time, I like to go out for a round of golf.
What would you like to own that you do not possess? I try to make quick, insightful decisions at work, but I find myself hesitating in the face of enormous risks and challenges. At times like that, I wish I had guts like those great business founders who had great foresight and decisiveness.
Where are you happiest? As a businessman, I am happy when I realise my goals against great odds. However, I am most happy personally when I travel with my family. I spent so much time travelling for business for almost 40 years, so I value spending quality time with my family.
Sam Hyun Ka was born in 1956 and graduated with a BA in economics from Seoul’s Yonsei University in 1982, the year he joined the ship sales department at Hyundai Heavy Industries.
Between January 1988 and March 1991, he was with the South Korean shipbuilder’s Oslo office, before returning home and studying law at Korea National Open University in 1992-1993. In 2003, Ka was made vice president, rising to executive vice president in 2011. For the next two years he was managing director of HHI’s London office. Promoted to senior executive vice president, he went on to become chief operations officer in Seoul, chief marketing officer of the shipbuilding division and head of the group’s ship/offshore marketing division. In 2016, promotion to president followed, and then two years later to president and chief executive of HHI, the posts he still holds.
Between 1998 and 2002, Ka was a member of the legal committee of the Asian Football Confederation, which led to his becoming tournament director of the Korean Organising Committee for the 2002 World Cup co-hosted by South Korea and Japan. Ka describes helping to organise the tournament as his greatest achievement. He later held roles in the Korean and Asian soccer worlds that culminated in being made senior vice president of the East Asian Football Federation from 2005-2010.
What would you change in shipping if you could? I would first focus on establishing a smart shipyard through digitalisation and automation. Then I would develop new vessel designs with next-generation propulsion systems like electric motors, hydrogen or any carbon-neutral fuel at less cost, so as to commercialise them quickly.
Is politics important to you? A lack of political stability would bring instability to business, so politics is important. Nevertheless, with many leaders pursuing unstable, protectionist policies, I find myself asking if politics is good for business.
Which four people, living or dead, would you like to invite to dinner? My greatest curiosity is how great economic thinkers would view their own theories today. I would invite four economists who arguably had the greatest impact on world policies: Adam Smith, John Maynard Keynes, Karl Gunnar Myrdal and Milton Friedman.
What would your 20-year-old self say to you today if you met? He would be flabbergasted. In the mid-1970s, when South Korean society was full of pent-up aspirations for democracy under a dictator’s thumb, most students thought getting a government job or joining a big corporation was shying away from the reality of the world, so the man I have become would have been unimaginable to me in my 20s.
What keeps you awake at night? Thinking about how we can overcome the shipbuilding crisis.
What are your favourite song, book and film? My favourite songs are: Dancing Queen, by Abba; and Let Me be There and Physical by Olivia Newton-John. Books that have inspired me are from the East and West: a Chinese classic, Romance of the Three Kingdoms; Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables; and Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. I love movie classics like Ben-Hur and Gone with the Wind, but recently I enjoyed watching the Avengers series and the Korean Oscar-winner, Parasite.
What is the most important lesson you have learnt? You need to be fair-minded, cool-headed, discreet but timely in making decisions and putting them into action quickly and decisively.
What are your best and worst characteristics? I have always tried to keep my cool, get a grip on the matter and make a speedy decision to deal with it — although it may not have been the best. I wish to communicate closely with members of my organisation, but find it difficult due to time constraints.
What is your greatest achievement so far? I believe it is in the field of football. In the mid-1990s, I was closely involved in South Korea’s bid to co-host the 2002 World Cup with Japan. Then I became tournament director of the local organising committee. I felt immensely rewarded when Fifa declared the 2002 World Cup “one of the most successful tournaments in its history”.
What has been your greatest disappointment? It is frustrating that HHI Group, the world’s number one shipbuilder, has not contributed much to overcoming the economic crisis in global shipbuilding, although we are doing the best we can through painful restructuring and business realignment.
What ambitions do you still have? I hope to find work helping young people as well as the socially disenfranchised when I retire. To that end, I would like to study sociology and environmental issues.
