Bang Si Hyuk on being bestowed an honorary doctorate from Seoul National University, “I raised BTS by focusing on the essence”

HYBE’s chairman Bang Si Hyuk was presented an honorary doctorate from Seoul National University. 

On April 28th, Bang Si Hyuk attended the award ceremony for the honorary doctorate in Business Administration at Seoul National University and delivered a speech. As a former Aesthetics major at Seoul National University, Bang Si Hyuk said, “I never learned business administration through a formal curriculum. My management was done with difficulty by combining lessons I learned from failures in the field and knowledge acquired from books.”

He continued, “Looking back, the decisive reason why our company has survived until now is that I myself gave it a diagnosis and prescription that I should focus on the essence rather than solution.” As Bang Si Hyuk raised BTS and is the mastermind behind their success, it can be connected that his management philosophy was the basis for the fact that they were able to rise to their current position.

He added, “The No.1 goal of a company is to survive. We should pursue survival with continuous growth and a long-term vision, not a one-dimensional survival just to exist.”

Seoul National University conferred the degree considering Bang Si Hyuk’s contribution to the growth of HYBE into a global company and expansion of the Korean culture and arts industry. According to Seoul National University‘s degree awarding regulations, honorary doctorate degrees are given to those who have made special contributions to academic development or significant contributions to the improvement of human culture. Bang Si Hyuk is the only person to be awarded this degree in the field of pop culture.