It’s a place where a single business trip can mean driving hundreds of kilometers toward the horizon, and where you need to be prepared for unexpected encounters with wild kangaroos on the road. At the same time, there is also the everyday scene of everyone heading out to the lawn with sandwiches in hand during lunch break. A day at Hyundai E&C’s Sydney Branch, the foothold for expansion into new markets across Oceania, is just as dynamic and full of energy.

But the scenery is not the only thing that has changed. As the team navigates the gap between Korea’s “hurry-hurry” pace and Australia’s business culture, which places importance on process and procedure, the Sydney office engages in close and intensive coordination every day. We introduce the vibrant working lives of the Sydney Branch team, a strong hub connecting headquarters with the local market and a group building a true “global one team” by bridging cultural differences.

It All Begins with Opening the Map

The Sydney Branch serves as a hub for Hyundai E&C’s business expansion, opening up new possibilities across the vast map of Oceania. Its primary mission is to explore Australia’s expansive market and identify opportunities in power transmission and distribution, residential development, renewable energy, and infrastructure. The office also plays a pioneering role by engaging directly with local government agencies and global companies, helping transform potential projects into viable business opportunities from the earliest planning stages. It is currently advancing a range of initiatives, including a high-rise residential development in Chatswood, Sydney, bids for local power grid public-private partnership projects, and reviews of potential acquisitions involving solar power and energy storage system projects. Through these efforts, the Sydney Branch is steadily strengthening Hyundai E&C’s business foundation across the continent.

#Outback Story 

700 km Beyond the Horizon: A Struggle with Wild Kangaroos

Because our work takes place across such a vast continent, our business trips can be quite extraordinary in scale. Recently, I traveled to a remote site about 700 kilometers from downtown Sydney to inspect a potential location for a solar power and energy storage system (ESS) project. That is farther than a round trip between Seoul and Busan. After getting off the plane, I had to rent a car and drive for more than four hours each way, heading straight toward the horizon. It was a truly long-distance journey.

With no roadside lamps at all, the surroundings were completely dark. I had to keep scanning the road to avoid suddenly hitting wild kangaroos, which are a common hazard on Australian roads, as I made my way through the vast interior where even my smartphone signal disappeared. Fortunately, as long as I kept following the seemingly endless highway and the road signs along the way, small towns would eventually come into view. Once I reached one, I could get a signal again and continue my journey.

Safely guiding colleagues from headquarters and partner companies, who are unfamiliar with local conditions, away from the dangers of the wilderness is also part of our dynamic daily routine and one of our hidden special missions.

#Not gone yet? 

Passion in Action: Lighting Up Sydney

As the front line of Hyundai E&C’s expansion into new markets, the Sydney Branch is a place where time always seems to fly. Not long after I began working there, I was sitting in front of my monitor late into the night, dealing with a flood of urgent tasks, when one of the office cleaners came over and asked,

“Haven’t you gone home yet?”

It seems that the sight of the Hyundai E&C office still lit up late at night, along with the dedication of its employees, left quite an impression.

Given the nature of global business, where business environments from around the world converge, one of the defining features of our branch is its flexible work schedule. This allows us to maintain seamless connections not only with headquarters and local offices, but also with multinational stakeholders. Our experience in staying on course while collaborating flexibly across different working paces has become a valuable asset, enabling us to lead projects with unwavering confidence even in unfamiliar markets.

#When You Get a Chance 

Balance Between “Ppalli-Ppalli (quickly, quickly) and “Respect”

As we began working more closely with our local partners in Australia, the first challenge we encountered was finding the right balance between the pace of work and the procedures involved. Unlike Korea’s fast-paced business culture, where schedules tend to move forward quickly, Australian companies take a much more careful approach, going through thorough reviews and building consensus among various stakeholders. Because of this detailed process, progress initially felt somewhat slow, and we had to adjust our pace accordingly.

Even when writing a single email, I had to pay close attention to the nuances of the wording. A direct, efficiency-driven approach can easily come across as pushy. So I decided to begin with a friendly explanation of the background. After clearly and transparently outlining why the schedule matters to the overall project, I add a polite line at the end of the email.

“When you get a chance.”

This subtle difference in phrasing has become the key to smoothly bridging the gap between different business cultures.

#Can We Talk? 

Grab a Sandwich and Head to the Nearby Park

Our team gets together once or twice a week for casual in-office meetings to talk through potential risks ahead of time. When the weather's nice, we'll sometimes grab our sandwiches and head to the park in front of the office. Under Sydney's brilliant sunshine, we build up our teamwork by swapping little details from our daily lives, like weekend plans, sports, and travel.

With how high the cost of living is in Australia, these daytime chats on the lawn have turned out to be a better way to build trust than fancy dinners. In those moments, the tension of living abroad and working in a new environment naturally started to melt away.

That strong sense of synergy that pulls us together, where everyone rallies around each other and says, "Let's tackle this together" whenever unexpected obstacles pop up mid-project, is ultimately what got forged through these moments of connection.