two of us,” he told me, “because we didn’t understand Korean.”
As they prepared to get on the plane again, K.T. glared at a vice
president.
“You can get on the corporate jet if you think you’ve done your job.”
The vice president declined to board.
“Well, I’m sure we can get you a ticket on a commercial flight,”
someone told him.
Later, Pete and two hundred other executives had flown in for
Samsung’s annual meeting of global executives. The first foreigner to be
promoted to such a high level, Skarzynski was the lone Westerner in the
room, unable to speak the language or understand the cultural nuances.
Little did he know the “global meeting” was going to be more like a
Communist Party self-criticism session. He took his seat next to an
interpreter, who whispered translations into his ear and explained how
things worked. The translator informed him that everyone in the room was
seated in order of rank and performance. Top global executives sat up front
at the bigger tables, country managers behind them. About forty rows back
in the auditorium, near the exit sign, were the heads of the lowest-
performing subsidiaries.
“I was in row seven or eight,” Skarzynski said, relieved.
The chief financial officer from the feared financial unit that was close
to the chairman took the stage bedecked in a flower bouquet and the
Korean flag.
“I didn’t really prepare anything to talk to you about. So you know
what? If you have any questions, why don’t you ask me some questions?”
Silence.
“You could hear people breathe,” Pete said. “You could hear someone
try to hold their cough in. Everyone had their heads down a little. This went
on for three minutes. Dead silence for three minutes.”
Finally the CFO broke the silence. “If you don’t have any questions for
me, I have a few questions for you.”
He called on an executive. The man stood up, terrified.
“Could you tell your colleagues in the room why you decided to buy all
that material? Since you weren’t able to sell it, you had to discount it, didn’t
you?” the CFO said. “Please explain to everybody your strategy and what
your thoughts were on this.”