Lotte Group Holds First In-Person VCM Meeting in 2 Years
About 70 Attendees Including External Recruits
Chooses Jinaewon Renovated After 29 Years Instead of Headquarters
Shin Dong-bin, Chairman of Lotte Group, will preside over the first executive meeting (VCM) of the new year at the Lotte Human Resources Development Institute, which has been renovated for the first time in 29 years. After about two years of reducing offline attendance and switching to video conferences due to the spread of COVID-19, Lotte is resuming face-to-face meetings at its talent development hub, marking the start of full-scale ‘talent management.’
First VCM of the Year to Discuss Business, HR, and Marketing Strategies
The Lotte Group’s first half VCM meeting, held on the 20th from 1 PM for about four hours, will be attended by Chairman Shin, Lotte Holdings Vice Chairmen Song Yong-duk and Lee Dong-woo, as well as heads of the Food, Shopping, Hotel, and Chemical business headquarters (HQ), and representatives from various affiliates, totaling around 70 participants. About 100 planning executives from Lotte Holdings and its affiliates will also join the meeting online.
Also attending are Kim Sang-hyun, who is set to officially take office next month as head of the Distribution HQ and Vice Chairman of Lotte Shopping, An Se-jin, the newly recruited General Manager of the Lotte Hotel Group last year, and Bae Sang-min, head of the Design Management Center. These are figures personally recruited by Chairman Shin last year as part of his emphasis on breaking Lotte’s pure-blood system and personnel reform.
Participants will review last year’s business performance and discuss this year’s economic and industrial outlook as well as business plans by sector. Since Chairman Shin emphasized active implementation for innovation in his New Year’s address, it is expected that he will issue strong orders to overcome the performance crisis, including specific execution plans for new business investments, design strategies, and organizational culture improvement.
Notably, this meeting marks the resumption of face-to-face meetings after about two years since the first half VCM held in January 2020 at Lotte World Tower in Jamsil, Seoul, which had shifted to video conferences with reduced offline attendance due to COVID-19. The choice of the Lotte Human Resources Development Institute in Osan, rather than the headquarters at Lotte World Tower in Jamsil, as the meeting venue is also interpreted as reflecting Chairman Shin’s strong will for talent management.
Earlier, in his New Year’s address this year, Chairman Shin emphasized the importance of talent leading the group, stating, "In a converged environment, a culture must be established where the best talent can demonstrate their capabilities regardless of seniority, gender, regional or educational background."
Reopening of the Cradle of Lotte’s Innovation Leaders
Before holding the VCM, Lotte will hold an opening ceremony for the Osan campus of the Lotte Human Resources Development Institute. Meeting attendees, including Chairman Shin, will participate in a hand-printing ceremony, commemorative tree planting, and a campus tour.
The Lotte Human Resources Development Institute is a talent development facility established in 1993 on land donated by the late Shin Kyuk-ho, Lotte’s founder and Honorary Chairman, who purchased the site with his personal assets. To respond to future environments and create a space for creative learning and communication, Lotte began a renewal project in August 2019, investing 190 billion KRW.
The newly opened Osan campus covers approximately 60,000 square meters (18,000 pyeong) of land with a total floor area of about 46,000 square meters (14,000 pyeong), consisting of three buildings (one learning building and two dormitory buildings), tripling the total floor area compared to the previous campus. The learning building has 49 classrooms and can accommodate up to 1,475 people simultaneously. Considering the communication style of the MZ generation (Millennials + Generation Z), classrooms are designed for free discussion, with a circular lecture hall featuring tiered seating and a 300-inch large screen for video conferencing. The dormitory buildings have 286 single rooms, with some flexible rooms added to accommodate up to 482 people.
With the enforcement of the Serious Accident Punishment Act and the increasing importance of thorough corporate safety management, a safety experience center has been created to raise safety awareness among employees. Using virtual reality (VR), employees can virtually experience falls and fire scenarios. To respect diversity, prayer rooms and dormitories exclusively for people with disabilities have been provided, and a career consulting center will be operated to support retired employees in their new lives.
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