Diplomacy Journal Lee Jon Young | (Exclusive Interview)
"In the upcoming year of 2024, I will do my best to build a predictable audit environment and encourage active management to innovate the organizational culture of KSPO," said Ha Hyung-joo, the standing auditor of Korea Sports Promotion Foundation (KSPO), on Dec. 28.
In an exclusive interview with Diplomacy Jopurnal, Ha said, "It has been five months since I was appointed as the standing auditor of the KSPO, and I have improved my understanding of the KSPO's business through reports from each business unit, and I have set the audit philosophy and direction so that the role of audit in the management aspect is not a check, but a support.
"Not long ago, I participated in the Korean Audit Congress to examine the direction and transition of auditing, and as the mid- to long-term audit strategy was established, I completely reorganized our future audit direction.”
He added, "Therefore, in the upcoming 2024, I will do my best to build a predictable audit environment, encourage proactive management, and innovate organizational culture."
The following is the full-text of the Diplomacy Journal’s interview with Ha Hyung-joo, the standing auditor of KSPO.
Question: Congratulations on your recent appointment as the standing auditor of the KSPO. Could you tell us a little bit about your new position?
Answer: First of all, I am honored as an athlete to be appointed as the standing auditor of the KSPO. Based on my field experience as an athlete and educator, I will do my best to ensure that the values of fairness and common sense in physical education are taken for granted and that the KSPO becomes an organization that can be trusted by the people.
Q: In people's minds, you are remembered as a gold medalist in judo at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. What made you decide to apply for the position of standing auditor of the KSPO?
A: I have been a professor at Dong-A University since 1987, served as dean of the College of Arts and Sports for six years, and have been cultivating students for more than 35 years. But now I want to use my experience at the university, as well as my experience as a member of the Busan City Council and a mediator at the Busan District Court, to make a small contribution to creating conditions where people can always improve their health through physical education.
Q: Please describe what kind of organization the KSPO is from your perspective as a standing auditor.
A: The KSPO was established to commemorate the 24th Seoul Olympic Games and to carry out projects to promote national sports.
The 1988 Seoul Olympics, in particular, broke the international community's prejudice against Korea as a divided and developing country and laid the foundation for Korean sports diplomacy and globalization. Although Korea was later than its competitors in the bidding process, we were able to win the bid and instill a sense of pride in the Korean people through all-round diplomatic efforts and a constant spirit of challenge that Korea can do it.
I believe that the KSPO is the legacy of the Seoul Olympics, which laid the foundation for the international community to overcome the East-West Cold War divide through sports.
When I was a professor, I understood the KSPO as an organization that promotes projects to revitalize physical education in everyday life for the people, but when I was appointed as a standing auditor, I realized that the KSPO is an indispensable and important part of the Korean sports world.
Through fundraising projects such as sports promotion voting rights (Sports Toto) and bicycle race and boat race, it raises about 2 trillion won a year for the National Sports Promotion Fund, and promotes public sports welfare projects such as the National Physical Fitness 100 project, where anyone can receive free physical fitness measurements and exercise prescriptions, and the construction of national sports centers in cities, counties, and districts nationwide.
Meanwhile, we are working to revitalize the sports industry by providing financial products for sports companies, supporting business operations and employment, and starting businesses. We are also working to deliver the legacy of the Seoul Olympics to the people by building the Olympic Sports Complex, which was completed in November, and transforming the stadiums and Olympic Park used during the Seoul Olympics into a complex leisure space with sports culture.
I feel rewarded to have the opportunity to be part of the organization that has inherited the spirit of the Seoul Olympics, and I will fulfill my role as the standing auditor as a management partner to help the organization's projects run smoothly.
Q: It's been five months since your appointment, can you tell us what you've been focusing on over the past five months?
A: Since my appointment to the KSPO, I have improved my understanding of the KSPO's business through business reports from each business unit, and since the organization is promoting multifaceted business, I have set the audit philosophy and direction so that the role of the auditor in the management aspect is not a check but a support to help the business execution.
To this end, we actively utilized the pre-consultation system to explore the direction and strategy of the business with the audit office before the business departments carried out their work, and derived adjustment plans to stabilize the operation of the trustee of the Sports Promotion Voting Rights (Sports Toto).
We also introduced the 'Safe Lawyer' system, a non-real name proxy reporting system that allows lawyers to communicate with the Audit Office on behalf of public interest reporters without worrying about exposing their identity.
In the future, we will continue to actively promote our role as a management partner by establishing additional business-related systems, as well as other systems to communicate with employees in the course of their work, in addition to providing them with principles to follow.
Q: Please tell us about your plans for the upcoming 2024 term as the standing auditor of the NISPA.
A: Not long ago, I participated in the Korean Audit Congress to look at the direction and transition of auditing, and I completely reorganized our future audit direction as the mid- to long-term audit strategy was established.
In 2024, I will do my best to build a predictable audit environment and encourage proactive behavior to transform our organizational culture.
First, to build a predictable audit environment, we will standardize the types of risks by business area and enhance the risk prevention system in collaboration with the management planning department so that employees of the KSPO can voluntarily verify risk factors. We will activate pre-consultation to set the direction of work by considering relevant laws, regulations, and recent issues before proceeding with the project, and expand business participation-type daily audits through auditor participation at the beginning of the project.
In addition, to encourage active administration, we plan to establish and operate the Active Administration Innovation Committee (tentative name), which is composed of internal and external experts with expertise in each business, and hold autonomous system improvement evaluation competitions where employees of the corporation autonomously identify system improvements and reflect them in their work, and continue to discover systems that allow employees to actively participate in audit work, such as the Audit Idea Contest, where employees first propose audit ideas and reflect them in the business.
As mentioned above, the role of the auditor is to ensure that the entire process and performance of the work is predictable in the actual department, and predictable performance means that the work is carried out with common sense. We believe that this is the core value of a public institution, and we will faithfully fulfill our role as a management partner to help the KSPO become a fair and common sense organization in 2024.
I hope you will keep an eye on the KSPO in the future, and I wish you, Diplomacy Journal subscribers, a happy new year.
