'Renewed Resolution, Strength'

KOSEF Chairman Kwon calls for upgrading science, technology to a world-class level

Chairman Kwon O-kap, in his New Year speech, said this year is the golden hog year, which came for the first time in 600 years with hope that Korea Science and Engineering Foundation (KOSEF) would have a very good year in terms of its future development and global advances. He recalled that the foundation had a good year last year both at home and abroad. The foundation won the top place in the evaluation of the customer satisfaction service conducted by the Ministry of Planning and Budget, repeating the same honor won the year before. The foundation also won the grand prize, "This Year's Science Technology Organization,"from the National Assembly and the service sector Grand Prize from the Maeil Business Daily.
The chief of the foundation thanked all officers and employees for their hard work for bringing such honor to the foundation in two short years since the KOSEF launched the innovation system in the area of science and technology despite difficult working conditions.
But the foundation faces tough problems this year both at home and abroad despite such great achievements made last year, which does not allow us to relax and continue the current status.
He said KOSEF has many things to achieve such as overcoming competition with similar organizations, securing its clear identity as a professional organization. Futurologist Alvin Toffler, in his new book, entitled, "The Future of Wealth,"warned that time, space, and knowledge will dictate the future when the knowledge revolution comes, in particular the collision of speed in the public sector.
When business firms run 100 miles an hour, the government runs 25 miles an hour, schools 10 miles and politics 3 miles and the legal community just a mile, like a tortoise, according to a report on the United States, he said.
How fast is the KOSEF moving's He asked, with this year being the 30th anniversary of founding and in this connection, we have to renew resolution and have powerful strength. The foundation is set to move into the second stage of its mid-to-long-term vision by 2010. He said he would like to show off three major management plans designed to secure a firm image for the foundation as a comprehensive national R&D management organization leading science and technology development for the country, coping with challenges and changes at the same time.
First, the KOSEF will drastically improve customer service centered on the value management giving priority to customer value.
Second, the foundation will raise the effectiveness of the national R&D activities through strengthened research and planning and result-centered management. It will also make strong the trust in research staff by introducing a regular evaluation system on results of national R&D activity.
Third, the KOSEF will be a leader in transparent management of support organization and science-technology research staff for the sake of ethics-centered management.
Under these measures, he said he would like to address seven major subjects to be pushed by the foundation this year:
First, it is boosting organization brand value. We have to expand the utilization of the electronic clearance system for the successful introduction of "yonku maru"or research floor, innovative and reformative and vitalize the electronic agreement and one-click systems. We also have to boost the organizational image of the foundation by carrying out the commemorative events for the 30th anniversary of founding this year.
Second, we have to make customer value management the most priority for out management. We have to expand the visiting briefing and events related to "KOSEF Day"in order to build customer-oriented research management system and simplify and standardize the research management regulations by industry. We will also expand and reform the customer center to strengthen our customer support and satisfaction.
Third, we should raise the competitiveness of the research results and customer trust in the foundation. We ought to continue to expand the weight of research papers composed with the foundation's support and their quotations in our country's total SCI through a boost in the quality of research results supported by the foundation. We have to maximize our efforts for raising international competitiveness of our research results.
Fourth, we ought to strengthen the capacity of policy planning for national R&D activity. We have to make our professionalism strong building systematic research planning system.
Fifth, we have to strengthen the cooperation network for science and technology. This year, too, we will strengthen our cooperation with science-technology related organizations both at home and abroad and further solidify new cooperative network in the promising areas of science and technology as the representative office set up in China during December of last year in addition to offices in the United States, Sweden, and Japan.
Sixth, we will raise the level of rational management, and effectiveness. We will heighten the BSC based integrated result management system and expand it and build a system to raise the professionalism and business effectiveness of all employees. We will also improve the management-labor relations through dialogue.
Lastly, we will have to put all of those tasks under the mid-to-long term development plan and push them forward strategically. We will continue to promote the mid-to-long development plan set up last year after checking 21 major tasks to cope with changes in organizational environment.
The chairman went on to say that it's been 30 years since KOSEF was founded. He said the foundation should take this opportunity to make a long jump to extend its history to 50 years and beyond and all of you are the witnesses for the foundation's 30- year history and its future.
The chairman hoped that all of the employees will unite together to reemploy the force that made the history to write new history for the foundation .
The KOSEF announced its New Year management plan designed to firm up its new image through the events to celebrate its 30th anniversary of founding and a new jump to pursue its vision to become the 3rd world renowned research organization in 2010. In order to implement the vision, the foundation has set up three management objectives, which are to implement value-centered management, result-centered management, and ethics-centered management, along with the basic organizational management direction.
The KOSEF won the top honor in the category of customer satisfaction and the organization evaluation conducted by the Ministry of Budget and Planning in 2006 following its achievement of excellent management results in 2005.
The foundation also won the This Year's Science-Technology Organization Award from the National Assembly and the 2005 Management Award in the Service Sector from the Maeil Business Daily.
The first task for the foundation's management plan is to train research staff so that they would be able to develop worldly research results and to contribute the national development with the budget of 730 billion won. Funds will be provided to those who have the mid to large experiences of national basic research work with excellent records and also be able to continue to engage in research work for more than 5 years.
Setting up a detained implementation plan and new research subjects and selection plant will be put on public notice from November, 2006 and January, 2007.
The second task for this year is the expansion of support to works related to special basic research. The purpose is to strengthen basic research capacity and train excellent manpower through support for basic research and creative professional area of science and technology with a fund allocation totaling 960 million won. nw

KOSEF Chairman Kwon O-kap, 2nd R, President Baik Hong-yul of the Korea Aerospace Research Institute , 2nd L, President & Publisher Elizabeth M. Oh of NewsWorld, 1st L, and astronaut Koh San, 3rd L, and astronaut Lee So-yeon, 1st R, at the Korea Science and Engineering Foundation (photo right). Chairman Kwon O-kap of the Korea Science and Engineering Foundation (KOSEF).

Officers and staff of the KOSEF participated in the announcement of reform examples for 2006 including the winners holding cash prize checks.