[EchoHoon] Illusions about Foreign Companies

I mentioned that I would post career content for foreign companies on Friday, and I am finally posting it today. Actually, last week was difficult due to a business trip, and today is a holiday, but I hope this helps students and juniors who are challenging to get a job at a foreign company.

First, I'm going to talk about the fantasy about foreign companies. I started my first job at a foreign company. I chose a foreign company because I had preconceived notions about Korean corporate culture. The biggest reason for me would be the drinking culture. I chose a foreign company because I thought it would be better than Korean companies, where the atmosphere felt stifled due to the military and drinking culture.

The culture of US IT big tech companies such as Google, Meta, and Apple is known to be flexible, so I admired this culture and tried to get a job at these companies. In fact, I heard that those companies are all flexible and don't consider it important whether you drink or not.

I thought all foreign companies would be like that. But not all are like that. And not all Korean companies have a rigid culture.

✅It varies depending on the company
Each company has its own culture. These days, company culture is becoming really important. Therefore, we can often see cases where they hire positions that were previously difficult to find, such as internal communication managers and organizational culture managers. What is the reason for hiring these positions? This is because each company has a different industry, a different culture that suits its characteristics, and they want to create, maintain, and improve that culture.

Google and Meta are different, NetApp and AWS are different, Continental and BMW are different, and so on. Each company has a different culture. Even foreigners who enjoy a free life and culture cannot have the same culture in a uniform way.

✅It depends on the company members
It naturally differs depending on who the company members are. It varies depending on the mindset of the company CEO, the head of HR, the head of each department, or your boss, depending on the team, and depending on each branch. Of course, the headquarters will try various methods to maintain the same culture. However, the characteristics of each country cannot be ignored.

Since the US and Korea are different, even a foreign company may reflect Korean cultural characteristics. As the saying goes, blood cannot be deceived, if it's a foreign company made up of Koreans, there's a very high possibility that Korean culture will exist to some extent. An attitude that can acknowledge these aspects is needed.

✅You can't be 100% satisfied
No matter how much I want to work at companies like Google or MS, I can't be 100% satisfied. A company is not a magical space that satisfies you 100%. And the reason I admire those companies is because I haven't been directly involved in them. Of course, a person who is employed there can continue to be 100% satisfied and admire them. However, satisfaction may decrease due to the reasons mentioned above.

I think 100% is difficult to achieve in terms of company satisfaction. There will definitely be a part that is lacking, even by 1%. There may be various reasons, such as commuting distance, time difference culture with headquarters employees, the possibility of layoffs, and frequent organizational restructuring. Nevertheless, I think that the secret to surviving at work is to see the good parts while working at the company.

✅A company is a company
As the name implies, a company is a company. As mentioned earlier, a company is not a space that tries to satisfy us 100%. Of course, there is an HR team that constantly strives to improve the satisfaction of company employees. However, fundamentally, a company is a profit group that works and increases sales.

Moreover, foreign companies have entered each country to do sales. It may be a situation where we have to compete more fiercely with local companies than the ease we thought of.

Nevertheless, there are benefits that foreign companies give us. Even if it's a foreign company, there are parts that fit and don't fit. It would be good to carefully consider what is good for me, and if there are any disadvantages, whether there are parts that offset that point for me or the company I am going to work for.