[Asia Exclusive] Sung Daegyu, CEO of Shinhan Life: "We Will Complete Integration and Leap to World-Class"

Shinhan Life - Orange Life, Second Year Under One Roof
Challenging Merger of Both Companies, Reforms Including Unified Titles and Office Environment Improvements

Sung Dae-gyu, CEO of Shinhan Life, is giving an interview with Asia Economy at the Euljiro headquarters in Seoul on the 24th. (Photo by Shinhan Life)

[Interview with Jeong Jaehyung, Head of Finance Department at Asia Economy, summarized by reporter Lee Changhwan] "We plan to soon complete the integration of HR (personnel system) and IT (computer systems) and officially begin our leap to become the top insurance company in Korea."

Seong Daegyu, CEO of Shinhan Life, stated in an interview with Asia Economy at the Euljiro headquarters in Seoul on the 24th, "The company integration process that began last July is now in its final stages."

Shinhan Life was launched last July through the merger of Shinhan Life Insurance and Orange Life. Seong, the inaugural CEO of Shinhan Life, expressed how challenging the integration process was after the launch of the merged entity. He said, "I drank many harmony drinks with union members from both companies, and the stress was so intense that I even developed high blood pressure."

Seong, a rare case of a former bureaucrat serving as CEO in a private financial company, successfully renewed his term at the end of 2020. He gained recognition for his expertise and experience in insurance through his work mainly in insurance departments at the Ministry of Finance and Economy and the Financial Services Commission.

He said, "Strangely, I kept returning to the insurance department even after being assigned to other departments, to the extent that it was called the 'insurance swamp.' I tell junior bureaucrats that while some may aim for promotion to senior positions by going to key departments, it is also fine to go to positions where they can develop expertise."

-You look much more relaxed than when you were at the Financial Services Commission.

△Today, I have been managing my facial expressions since morning because of the media interview. The integration of HR and IT was very tough. I even suffered from high blood pressure, which I never expected. The merged corporation was launched in July last year, and I was diagnosed with high blood pressure in August, just a month later. During a health checkup, my blood pressure rose far above the normal 120/80 mmHg.

-Did your body give you any warning signs?

△Although the corporation was merged, the unions of both companies remained separate, so I drank many 'harmony drinks' with union members and worked hard without feeling any symptoms. When I first measured my blood pressure, the result was printed out, and I thought the person before me forgot to take their result. I never imagined it would be that high. My wife told me that health is the top priority and advised me to quit being CEO and rest.

-How is your health now?

△If you have high blood pressure, you have to keep taking medication. I have been taking it continuously since August last year. I exercise regularly and do not drink alcohol. With such management, I have improved a lot now.

-How did the integration of Shinhan Life Insurance and Orange Life proceed?

△We first unified terminology and job titles so that employees could feel they were under one roof. We also improved the office environment. We created an open-plan structure by removing partitions to foster communication and built a smart office allowing work anywhere within the company network, expanding it company-wide. We are innovating not only strategies but also daily operations. We implemented 'Work Delete,' which completely removes unnecessary tasks, and 'Work Diet,' which eliminates duplicate and inefficient tasks, improving over 150 items within two months and continuing to operate these initiatives.

Sung Dae-gyu, CEO of Shinhan Life, is giving an interview with Asia Economy at the Euljiro headquarters in Seoul on the 24th. (Photo by Shinhan Life)

-What was the most difficult part of the integration?

△Shinhan Life Insurance was a domestic company, and Orange Life was a foreign-affiliated company. Almost everything was different. When there is a big size difference, the larger company absorbs the smaller one, causing fewer conflicts, but both companies were similar in size. Also, Shinhan Life had strengths in telemarketing (TM) sales, while Orange Life had strong insurance planners (FC). Their main business areas, salary systems, vacation cultures, and rank structures were all different, so we continuously worked on merging these systems into one.

-Any anecdotes?

△For example, right before the Chuseok holiday last year, employees from Orange Life worked only the morning shift and left at lunchtime, while Shinhan Life employees worked the full day until the afternoon in the same office, showing cultural differences. Shinhan had six rank levels, Orange had five. Since ranks are being reduced, we unified them into four. The HR integration work we are focusing on now is about merging these cultures. Once the HR integration is completed and followed by IT integration, Shinhan Life will be truly unified.

-When will the IT integration be completed?

△Due to ongoing uncertainties such as COVID-19, to ensure customer service stability and system completeness, we postponed the final IT integration launch from early February to mid-May. Initially, our schedule was a bit tight.

-You seemed to have worked often in insurance departments during your time as a financial bureaucrat.

△It was the 'insurance swamp.' I started working in the Insurance System Division at the Ministry of Finance and Economy in 1994 and spent much time in insurance departments. After studying abroad, I was assigned back to insurance departments, and even when I went to other departments, I returned to insurance. I was also head of the insurance division at the Financial Services Commission and served as president of the Korea Insurance Development Institute before joining Shinhan Life.

-There are few former bureaucrats who have become CEOs of private insurance companies. Did your experience and expertise in insurance during your bureaucratic career help?

△It definitely helped a lot. I thought it was a swamp, but it gradually solidified, and now I can stand firmly. Nowadays, specialists with expertise in specific fields are more valued than generalists who know many tasks. I tell junior bureaucrats that going to positions where they can develop expertise is also good.

-Still, many aim to become ministers or vice ministers, right?

△Of course, some aim for ministers or vice ministers and go to key departments like financial policy, but that is not the only path. A senior colleague at the Financial Services Commission had an opportunity to go to the Anti-Money Laundering Organization and was unsure, so I told him to go. Since it is an international organization with a limited term, I explained that anti-money laundering work has become very important and that developing expertise there opens many opportunities.

Nowadays, the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU), which handles anti-money laundering, is popular among public officials. It used to be considered a quiet post for a break, but times have changed.

Sung Dae-gyu, CEO of Shinhan Life, and virtual human Rozy (Photo by Shinhan Life)

-In the advertising market, Shinhan Life's virtual human model 'Roji' was a big hit. How is the internal evaluation?

△We broke the old-fashioned formula of insurance advertising and discussed candidates who could express the digital and AI image Shinhan Life aims for, as well as celebrities preferred by the MZ generation (Millennials + Generation Z).

Then, we gathered employees' ideas to use a virtual advertising model for a young, lively, and sophisticated image and boldly chose 'Roji' as the virtual advertising model. Until last year, Shinhan Life's teaser videos had about 6 million views, and the main advertisement surpassed 10 million views on YouTube within 20 days of release, making the choice of 'Roji' a masterstroke.

-You have been managing Shinhan Life, including Shinhan Life Insurance, for four years. What are memorable events and goals for this year?

△Above all, launching a new company called Shinhan Life through the merger of two companies is the most memorable. Many things happened, but the real beginning is now. This year, we plan to further advance to become a leading insurance company by fully establishing ourselves. We will strengthen multi-channel sales competitiveness in TM, face-to-face, GA, bancassurance, and create tangible results in new business areas such as digital, healthcare, sales subsidiaries, and global markets, making 2022 a year to leap to a first-class insurance company.

-The insurance market seems to face difficulties due to low birth rates and aging population.

△As the population decreases and the elderly increase, insurance companies inevitably face difficulties. Therefore, we must pursue overseas market expansion. The Chinese insurance market is a no-answer market, and Southeast Asia is the most accessible market for Korean financial companies. We established a local corporation in Vietnam. Collaborating with Shinhan Bank and Shinhan Card, which have already entered the market and achieved great results, we expect to turn a profit in about eight years. Foreign insurance companies that entered Korea also took about ten years to break even.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.