Kakao union members who launched a partial strike chant slogans in front of Kakao’s Pangyo Agit in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, on the 10th. Yonhap News
The Kakao labor union, which staged a partial strike, has signaled an additional walkout on June 29.
According to Yonhap News, Seo Seung-wook, head of the Kakao chapter of the National Chemical, Textile and Food Industry Workers’ Union, said after marching from Pangyo Station Plaza in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, to H Square on Tuesday afternoon, “We are preparing and will carry out a log-off day on June 29.” He added, “Kakao’s true reform must be made not by management but by the crew (employees).” Seo said, “Whether it will be a full-day strike or a general strike has not yet been decided. The method is under discussion.”
Kakao conducted the partial strike from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. that day. With a break period from noon to 1 p.m., the actual strike lasted four hours.
Five entities participated in the partial strike that day: Kakao headquarters, Kakao Pay, Kakao Enterprise, DKTechin, and XL Games.
The performance-based pay structure is cited as the main reason behind the labor-management conflict at Kakao. Labor and management at Kakao headquarters have differed over a plan to compensate 13 to 14 percent of last year’s operating profit as performance pay, and over whether to include 5 million won worth of restricted stock units (RSU) as performance pay.
The union demanded performance pay of about 10 million won, equivalent to 13 to 14 percent of operating profit, and argued that RSUs should not be counted as performance pay. Management, however, holds the position that such demands would place a significant burden on operations.