Listen in as Nick Taylor sits down with marketers, makers, entrepreneurs and key voices of innovation in the world of brands & marketing. Each week brings relevant discussions and bite-sized insights on the topics driving shifts in marketing, branding, and advertising. Episodes also offer an insider view into the processes and best practices of founders, entrepreneurs & marketing superstars.
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episode 14: LG Electronics’ Head of Global Corporate Communications, Ken Hong
Welcome to Damn Good Brands. Today, as part of our Influence 100 series in partnership with The Holmes Report, we are speaking to Ken Hong, the Head of Global Corporate Communications at LG.
Ken has been at LG for over ten years. Throughout the course of that time, he has witnessed and led the company through a number of technological and overall changes in the marketing landscape. Ken currently resides in Korea, but his position has taken him all over the world, giving him a very globalized perspective on consumer technology and the state of communications.
We discuss Ken’s philosophy of leadership during comprehensive company evolution, and his overall thoughts on today’s state of communications. Here are some key takeaways from this conversation with Ken Hong:
Study psychology and political science or hire those who have. Ken is very vocal about the importance of lesser-mentioned disciplines that better enable communications professionals, specifically political science and psychology. Ken claims that his studies in both of these fields helped him tremendously as a communications leader since they gave him a fundamentally better understanding of humanity, culture, and therefore communications.
Think global, stay local. Despite working in five international cities, Ken finds that experience in global comms is in low demand, whereas local expertise in any given market is much more valuable. Ken recommends that comms leaders have a baseline understanding of global communications but remain focused on their local markets, since global expertise is rarely important to local clients.
Keep your challenger mindset. Part of Ken’s success comes down to his refusal to rest on his laurels even when LG achieves market leader status in certain categories. In Ken's view, there is no fundamental sense of “having arrived,” considering the speed of change. In an industry like electronics with its diverse array of products, it’s critical to always be cognizant of the brands that aren’t market leaders and keep pushing them forward to remain vigilant.
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