A Culture of Integrity Created by Public Officials The Effect Maximized Through Employee Participation
Gapyeong-gun, Gyeonggi Province (Governor Seo Tae-won) is attracting attention by expanding ‘integrity’ beyond a mere slogan to a practical action movement.
Gapyeong-gun (Governor Seo Tae-won) is attracting attention by expanding 'integrity' beyond a mere slogan to a practical campaign. Photo by Gapyeong-gun
According to Gapyeong-gun on the 18th, the county held the inauguration ceremony of the ‘Integrity Promotion Team’ on the 5th and has been conducting a relay-style ‘Integrity Connection’ campaign. The content is insightful and humorous, making it a hot topic.
‘Integrity Connection’ is a campaign in which public officials directly express integrity-themed acrostic poems, slogans, pledges, and other messages through various formats such as posters, card sections, banners, and videos. After one department participates, it nominates two other departments, which then must carry out the ‘Integrity Connection’ within five days and designate the next departments in turn.
At the inauguration ceremony, the goals of the Integrity Promotion Team were shared, and the first participating departments were the Small Business Support Division and Cheongpyeong-myeon. Subsequently, all departments plan to spread a culture of integrity throughout the organization by delivering creative integrity messages. In particular, the ‘Integrity Connection’ posters and banners produced by each department are posted on the public officials’ administrative network ‘Saeol Bulletin Board,’ where their entertaining yet sincere commitment to practicing integrity has become a topic of interest.
The first nominated department in the relay, the Small Business Support Division, created comic-style posters tailored to each team’s characteristics with themes such as ‘Integrity Pay,’ ‘Integrity Express Delivery,’ ‘Integrity Energy Recharge,’ and ‘Integrity Heungbus,’ and posted them on the Saeol Bulletin Board. Cheongpyeong-myeon humorously depicted a conflict over a ‘red ginseng box’ delivered as a departmental gift by parodying the movie ‘Spring in Seoul.’
Employees responded that sharing ideas during the production process naturally became an opportunity to reflect on the meaning of integrity. Lee Jin-gyu, an official from Cheongpyeong-myeon, said, “While preparing for ‘Integrity Connection,’ I realized it was not just a simple campaign but a chance to reconsider the basic attitude public officials should have,” adding, “It also has a great positive effect, such as promoting active communication among employees.”
Governor Seo Tae-won stated, “Integrity is not a formal pledge but requires public officials themselves to feel and practice it,” and added, “Gapyeong-gun will continuously promote not only this ‘Integrity Connection’ campaign but also integrity education and voluntary practice activities to build a trusted public service society.”
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