Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Anna_Louise]

I've just taken my passport down to the Korean embassy in London to get my E2 visa, which apparently will be ready by Monday. However, I'm unsure of what to do about booking my flights. My school has requested that I arrive asap, so I'm meant to be flying out next Wednesday. I'm kind of torn between booking a flight with the chance that something may go wrong with my visa, or between not booking anything until I get my passport back on Monday and just hoping that there are still seats and the prices don't go up. (The school are reimbursing me for flights so I really don't want to have to pay out for anything massively expensive). There are still seats on tomorrow's flight available and the prices haven't changed so I'm not sure how risky this would be. I'd just be interested to hear what anyone else in the same situation has done as I cannot make up my mind! Many thanks for any help

[Leilam]

What if you do book a flight then something goes wrong with your visa app., who's gonna reimburse you then? I'd wait for the visa to clear first.

Maybe u can book now and make a date change if necessary its cheaper to make changes to your itinerary than buying at a later date.

[bassexpander]

From experience:

Virtually EVERY Korean school will make it sound like a life and death situation that you appear at their door immediately. You are experiencing your first exposure to what we call the "bally-bally." In English, it literally means, "hurry, hurry!"

As a general rule, it is very Korean to:

1. Not plan
2. Put things off until the last possible moment (or later)
3. Begin a new project (task) with little or no forethought, and then fix issues/difficulties/problems as the project progresses.

Again, it is very Korean to procrastinate while finishing a task. It is also very Korean to begin a new task with little planning or thought about potential pitfalls.

In the former case, we can call such procrastination laziness, and likely the result of just plain ignorance. In the latter case, this begins with some task given by the boss to the employees -- probably a task that was not well-planned. In both cases, a Korean lack of planning, combined with a dictatorship top-down management style, lead to a stressful log jam for those assigned the task to deal with. The only way to fix it is "bally bally."

This is a lesson in Korean inefficiency, and explains why Koreans work more than people from most any country in the world, but also employ some of the least efficient workers on the planet.

Case in point:

A friend's school president just woke up one day and had a revelation that his school would begin an early-morning English program between 8 and 10 in the morning. Foreign and Korean teachers/professors were rushed into an "emergency meeting with the president" before lunch, and told (not asked) that they would begin teaching these extra classes the following week. The president, a "brilliant man," educated at one of Korea's most prestigious universities, already had it in his mind that each foreigner would be teaching 4 to 6 extra hours per week. This "brilliant man" gave no thought as to if he even had teachers available to teach the classes, what their contracts specified, or how many students would be interested in signing up for said course. Can you see the problem? Welcome to Korea. Such things happen everywhere, from the largest university, to the public school, to the small family hagwon.

A Korean boss often doesn't feel the need to bother with such petty details as schedules and plans. He's the boss, and what he wants done should get done - end of story. In my friend's case, there were no meetings to plan what would be taught (until the course was underway). The situation became an immediate disaster, and as he anticipated, the first semester of the course was a total waste. Teachers couldn't fit the hours in their schedules because they were too busy teaching other courses during those times. The Korean office staff (underlings) were left to stress over how they were going to fill the hours demanded by the president, while the foreigners were laughing at the sheer stupidity of the situation. Some flat-out refused to teach because they considered it a breach of contract, much to the terror of the 20-something office staff caught between the president and the teachers.

Students dropped the courses in droves. Classes began with 30 students, and within 3 weeks, had dropped to an average of 5 per class. The teachers were worried that the boss would blame the failure on them (luckily, this didn't happen). I have, however seen similar situations end up getting an employee fired, or not renewed.

You have just read a story of poor Korean management style, lack of planning, and the "bally bally" way of hurrying to complete the task at the last possible moment. It is a part of life here in Korea. If you teach here, you WILL experience it daily, weekly, or monthly in some shape or form throughout your tenure here.


NOW FOR YOUR SITUATION:



The choices you are left with are:

1. Rush things, stress yourself, and put your money/sanity in jeopardy.
2. Take the time necessary, and simply tell them you're processing things and will be there as soon as you can. Don't allow them to worry you.

Choose number 2. Always choose number 2. The job will still be there, because they will have little choice. If for some reason you lose the job because they can't wait another 2 days, then I can tell you from experience that you can count your blessings that you didn't end up working there. If they threaten you that they will hire another teacher, then tell them to do so. Look for another job. I can't stress this enough. You don't want to work there.

Don't let yourself get sucked-down into their inefficient way of doing things. They will never change. It's part of their culture. In half a decade of choosing number 2, I've held out some hope that staff might learn to give us some lead-time before expecting us to complete a task.

They have never learned, and I have come to the conclusion that they never will.

[Anna_Louise]

Cheers. I just called the airline and they'll hold the flight at that price for me for 48 hours-and there are loads of seats left anyway so I'm a bit less worried. Thanks again