Read on to learn more about these three rising talents from Korea’s national teams.

Up-and-Coming Table Tennis Champ, Jihee Jeon

Since the Seoul Olympics in 1988, China has dominated table tennis with their successive gold medal wins. However, by challenging China, Korea has been able to grow legendary table tennis champions, including Namkyu Yoo, Junghwa Hyun and Seungmin Ryu.

From the emerging group of players, Jihee Jeon from the POSCO Energy Women’s Table Tennis Team is a standout. As a member of the Korea national team, Jeon displayed her prowess in the sport at this summer’s Olympic games.

Jeon, who was born in 1992, used to be a member of the Chinese national junior team but became a naturalized Korean citizen in 2011. She decided to come to Korea because of her desire to play internationally. She was an outstanding player in China as well, but would have had to compete against 30 million players for a spot on the national team.

After arriving to Korea, she has been leading POSCO Energy Women’s Table Tennis Team onto winning major international games. The games she has participated in include the Spanish Open, Czech Open, Argentina Open, Chile Open in 2015, and the Hungarian Open and German Open in 2016.

By placing first and second in all her games and building up an adequate number of points, she was able to qualify for the Olympics by ranking 11th in the world overall. POSCO Energy supported Jeon for her debut at this summer’s Olympics.

Seulchan Lee, Jeonnam’s “Chan-dragon”

Under the leadership of coach Taeyong Shin, the Korean national football team performed with remarkable results during their matches at the Olympics.

Do you remember the player who assisted Hyunjoon Seok’s goal during the pivotal game against Germany? After the 41st minute in the second half, Seulchan Lee served as the hero of this dramatic play by helping Seok score his goal.

Lee is a 22-year-old player who started his career with Jeonnam Dragons in 2012, which is based in his hometown, Gwangyang. He has a long history with Gwangyang, graduating from the town’s elementary, middle, and high schools – and now, ultimately playing for the Jeonnam Dragons in the K-League.

Although small in stature (he is 172cm and 65kg) with a round and friendly face, his ability should not be overlooked. Because of his strong defensive skills, he played as a fullback in the Olympics this summer.

With great determination and remarkable skill, there is no doubt that this will be the last we will see Lee play at a major international event.

A Skilled Striker, Changjin Moon

Known as “a royal prince of coach Taeyong Shin,” Changjin Moon has been acing the field during the Olympic football trials.

The 24-year-old from Pohang who usually plays for the Pohang Steelers as a main striker, is regarded for his offensive skills and precise goal-shooting. He graduated from Pohang Jecheol middle school and technical high school, and played for the Pohang Youth Club. To maintain his hometown spirit, he now plays for the Steelers.

He showed promise as an attacking midfielder during the Olympics this season, scoring goals in warm-up matches against Denmark and Sweden. We will be sure to keep an eye out for his remarkable football skills in future events.

We were only able to catch a glimpse of these three players’ exceptional skills during the games this summer, but with their natural ability, training and hard work, Jeon, Lee and Moon are not names to be ignored in upcoming seasons. Following high expectations, these stars will only become brighter in the time ahead.

These Boots Are Made for Playing

The Most Important Olympic Metal

Gold, Silver, Bronze and Steel

Be sure you never miss any of the exciting steel stories from The Steel Wire by subscribing to our blog.

Jonathan, the Travel Bug Meets Korea and POSCO

Hello, Jonathan. Could you briefly introduce yourself?
Hello, I’m Jonathan, and I’m originally from the US. Actually, it’s almost by chance that I ended up living in Korea. Wanting to travel and see more of Asia, I first came here as an English teacher. My plan was to stay only for one year, but then one turned into two, then three… While studying in graduate school here in Seoul, POSCO’s Global Internship Program came to my attention, and I decided to take the program for three weeks. Upon graduation, this experience turned into a job opportunity, and it has now been more than eight months since I joined the company.

You are working in the API Steel Sales Group. Can you tell us a little about what you do?
Primarily, I focus on supporting various sales activities in the API Steel Sales Group. This includes gathering market intelligence, responding to price inquiries and keeping an eye on the production status of bids we have won. Sometimes, there are surprises as well. Last week, for example, an inspector from one of our biggest Latin American end users made a surprise visit to Korea. She spoke no Korean and only minimal English, while the interpreter who joined us didn’t know very much about our specific product or the technical vocabulary related to steel. In the end, our communication was a mix of Spanish, English and Korean, with good doses of laughter and gestures to fill in the blanks. Personal contact like that makes the everyday routine of sales work worthwhile.

Do you communicate in English at the office?
I use both English and Korean. There are no major issues affecting communication between me and my group members. They speak English fairly well, and I put a little extra effort into listening since I know that English isn’t their mother tongue; same goes for when I speak in Korean.

There must be a corporate culture gap between the U.S. and Korea. When do you feel the difference the most?
First of all, I had never worked in a big company before joining POSCO, so I don’t really know if the differences I see are due to different culture or simply company size. In my previous job, if there was a problem, I could talk directly to the president. I would just knock on his door and go right in to talk to him. At POSCO, this is unconceivable – things have to travel up through the hierarchy; appointments have to be scheduled; official reports written up – it is all fairly bureaucratic. That seems to be the biggest difference that I see.

What do you want to achieve at POSCO?
I’m currently focusing on learning about industry and POSCO’s business practices. Although it is not certain for now, I hope I can be transferred to POSCO’s U.S. office. POSCO America isn’t very large yet, but building upon the experiences I have here, I would like to expand the company’s US operations.

Affairs related to Central and South America are in hands of Sergio from Colombia

Hi, Sergio. Can you briefly introduce yourself?
Hello. I’m Sergio Alejandro Rub from Colombia. I came to Korea in 2011 and joined POSCO in January this year. I took POSCO Global Internship Program for about two weeks as well. After that, I started working full-time at International Affairs Department.

How did you know about POSCO, and how did you come to apply?
I was living in China in 2009. Back then, one of my closest friend’s father was working at POSCO. Well, that makes him my senior at work now. Anyway, that was my first encounter with the company. When I was doing a postgraduate degree, I was told about POSCO Global Internship Program, so I applied for it.

What do people in Colombia think of Korean companies?
Five years ago, no one really knew about Korean companies. Some people even thought that the major Korean conglomerates were Japanese companies! But now, it has changed a lot and there is an increasing amount of interests in the companies from Korea.

You are working in the International Affairs Dept. What is your daily routine?
I mainly deal with collaboration development in Central and South American nations. My task is to find possibilities for cooperation between POSCO and other companies and governments. My team and I analyze what measures it takes to develop new products, such as which company to work with or how to maintain relationship with governments. Pioneering new market frontier is also one of the International Affairs Department’s operations.

Is there any problem communicating with your colleagues?
Unlike Jonathan, I only use Korean to communicate. And since I only use Korean with native Korean speakers, I gain an advantage in improving my Korean. For any other purposes, I speak both Spanish and English.

Are there difference between working in Colombia and Korea?
Korean companies have different positions like assistant, manager and senior manager, right? In Colombia, there are no titles like that, so everyone’s equal. Also, Koreans go for drinks during weekdays, but Colombians hardly drink before weekends because we think it affects our work. For the past two years, I think I drank at least two or three days during a week.
We have something in common though. Koreans and Colombians both have a craze for soccer. Well, actually Koreans drink beers and eat chickens while watching a soccer match, but Colombians don’t drink much alcohol unless there’s a match for a Colombian national team.

What do you want to achieve at POSCO?
It’s only been three months since I started working at POSCO. So I want to learn more about the company. It would also be fantastic to get to know about the International Affairs Department more in depth.

Working at POSCO HQ as Foreigners

There are 17 foreign nationals working at POSCO at the moment. POSCO’s recruitment process for foreign nationals is undertaken as below. Recruitments are mission-based: in other words, whenever POSCO’s operations require appropriate talents from overseas. Details, such as period of employment, can vary depending on circumstances.

During the interviews with Jonathan and Sergio, we learned a lot from the two POSCO members. Although they are working away from home, Jonathan and Sergio never lost smiles on their faces and were working really hard. Didn’t you get the same impression? ‘Hello, POSCO’ will continue speaking with the POSCO members with different nationalities, so stay tuned!

On November 17th of 2012 a jocular video was uploaded on Youtube: a parody of the famous “Gangnam Style” music video of the Korean singer (now a “world star”), PSY. The parody went viral rapidly, attracting more than 10,000 views in just two days. The video shows professors and students collaborating to create what’s called “POSTECH Style.” POSTECH University (a global leader in science and technology), who sets it priorities in high-quality and high-impact education and research, the institution often exhibits an intricate and a rigid vibe. At a place like POSTECH then, it is unimaginable that students with thick glasses and piles of books hovering over them can dance this good.

Click the image blow to watch “POSTECH Style” >>

So how did this video come about? Let’s take a listen to Professor Eu-Ho Seo from the department of Industrial Engineering, who was involved in both planning and featuring of the video, showing off his “classy” “horse dance.”

“PSY’s ‘Gangnam Style’ has established itself to be a world-class sensation, which reminded me of POSTECH’s outlook also as a growing world-class university. As the two compatibly fit, I was certain that the parody will provide for an opportunity to draw global attention on POSTECH.”

It was the professor’s strategy and the wittiness of the students were what made the POSTECH Style possible. Those who appeared as special guests were member of the POSTECH student clubs like soccer, basketball, cheer leading, tennis, and classical music, etc. Yet, the most contribution to the video was perhaps from ‘Ctrl-D’, the dance club crews who choreographed all the dance moves in the video and pulled off astounding break-dance moves all throughout the parody.

If we have a closer look at the video, we can find various sceneries and interesting parts of the POSTECH University. At the very beginning is the POSTECH Biotech Center, which was established with the collaboration of POSTECH’s outstanding researchers of Biotech studies and POSCO’s high technology. The center helped the development of national businesses and the improvement of human welfare. To put it easy, it’s a center for researching new vaccines in curing incurable diseases such as cancer and septicemia (blood poisoning). Another spot to note in the beginning of the video is the Jigok Pond, one of POSTECH’s most famous attractions for the cherry blossoms during spring flower season. Where the POSTECH girl alike Hyuna appeared to seduce PSY was at the Tae-Joon Park Digital Library, known for it’s a spectacular design which received the Architect Award of the year. You can also see POSCO International Center where POSCO holds international scholarly conferences with scholars from all over the world.

Students and professors hope this video may create global viral like PSY’s original Gangnam Style video, with good will and common purpose. Now, are you ready to shout?

“We’re POSTECH Style!”