By Adelide Kamanthe Mutinda (2010 MPP/ED, Kenya)

Han Soo Hyok (MAM, 2009 Korea) is a Masters of Asset Management (MAM) student at the KDI School. While being a student is a full-time task for some, he is engaged in another full-time job as a director at the Yonhap Infomax Ltd, which is a subsidiary of the Yonhap News Agency. Before moving to his current position, Soo Hyok had been working for Yonhap News Agency since 1987 until 2000 when he moved to a newly spun-off company, Yonhap Infomax Ltd. Between the two equally demanding occupations, he balances himself by dividing his time into two parts: weekdays are devoted to work and weekends exclusively to studies. You can usually catch a sight of him in the library on weekends, even in late evenings. His hard work seems to have paid off, since Soo Hyok made the Dean’s List for summer semester 2010.

Yonhap Infomax, a subsidiary of Yonhap News Agency that launched in 2000, is the specialized arm for financial news, data and analysis. They donated state of the art Infomax equipment to the KDI School in 2009, as well as to Seoul National University and other institutions in the country. The donation was admittedly a marketing strategy to familiarize potential consumers with the technology, but it also helped the faculty and students gain easier access to raw financial data, which is particularly useful for research and event study.

Many would wonder why Soo Hyok would decide to return to a student life with years of experience and a successful career under his belt. In response to the question, he recalls the Asian financial crisis in 1997 and global financial crises in 2008-2009. He was shocked and disappointed that all the media, observers and financial experts had seemed to have been caught unaware. They not only failed to predict and prevent those crises but also to mitigate the aftereffects. It made him realize the need to learn about the practical side of the financial market. He felt his knowledge on the financial market was insufficient to cope with the challenges of a rapidly developing global financial system. The financial technology and jargon that had evolved with the advent of financial innovation and globalization such as CDOS (Collateralized Debt Obligation) and CLN (Credit Linked Notes) convinced him that he needed to improve his knowledge on the practicalities of the financial market in order to provide better services for his clients.

One might ask what made him choose the KDI School once he decided to pursue further education. “I have many friends working in the financial sector and they strongly recommended KDI School to me,” Soo Hyok explains. In particular one of his close friends who is currently working for a financial management company spoke highly of the strength of KDI School’s academic programs and the faculty with whom he still maintains good relations. He actually wrote his recommendation letter to the KDI School.

Soo Hyok’s advice for the KDI School students is to work closely with other students in order to attain a successful student life. He stresses that he has learned a lot from his fellow students and feels indebted to them. He also adds that it is important not to miss any classes and try to participate in every class and appreciate the professors for their work.

Soo Hyok is also an avid runner and usually runs 10km on Saturday mornings.