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Product cover image for Samsung Electronics Company Ltd.: Striking a Balance Between Operation and Workforce

Samsung Electronics Company Ltd.: Striking a Balance Between Operation and Workforce

Ekta Sinha

Product #:W38692
Supplier:Ivey
Discipline:General Management, Human Resource Management
Setting:South Korea, 2024
Details:Case (PDF) • 8 pages • 2025-01-28

Subjects:

Negotiation strategiesLabor relationsEmployee engagementLabor unionsLabor lawsStrikesLeadership and managing peopleOrganizational cultureManagementOrganizational behavior

Industries:

Information technology and telecom sector

Geography:

South KoreaAsia
Your Price:$10.54

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In May 2024, South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Company Ltd. (SEC) faced its first-ever strike in its 55-year history, as the National Samsung Electronics Union called for a one-day work stoppage on June 7, 2024, to demand better pay. The strike targeted SEC’s semiconductor division, which produced critical components like memory chips, universal serial bus drives, and camera sensors. This division, once a leader in global semiconductor revenues, had fallen to third place by 2023, trailing Intel Corporation and Nvidia Corporation, and recorded its largest financial loss since the company’s founding. Amid mounting challenges from the artificial intelligence (AI)–driven market and declining revenue, the strike intensified pressure on SEC’s leadership. Jun Young-hyun, head of the semiconductor division at SEC, framed the AI era as both a challenge and an opportunity. The strike underscored the need for SEC to manage labour negotiations carefully to mitigate operational disruptions and safeguard its competitive position in the semiconductor industry.

Learning Objectives

This unprecedented strike (industrial action) at SEC demonstrates the need for organizations to better understand employee relations (ER) and copartner with their employees to achieve organizational outcomes. The case also highlights the strategies of collective bargaining negotiations to adopt robust practices that benefit both the parties. Further, it underlines some benefits and disadvantages of industrial actions and workers’ right to form a union. After working through the case and the assignment questions, students will be able to do the following:

  • Describe the intricacies of ER within the context of intense and competitive conditions.
  • Develop an understanding of a union and its need.
  • Understand the advantages and disadvantages of industrial actions.
  • Understand the process of collective bargaining to reach to a win-win situation.
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Case Study: Samsung Electronics Company Ltd.: Striking a Balance Between Operation and Workforce (English version) | Ivey Publishing