Vice Minister of Employment and Labor Kwon Gi-Seob discussed cooperation to provide work experience
opportunities and other employment support programs with Microsoft on November 7 (Monday).
This meeting took place in coincidence with the visit of Kate Behncken, Vice President and Lead of
Microsoft Philanthropies to Korea.
The Ministry of Employment and Labor and Microsoft established a partnership to support youth
employment, starting with Microsoft’s membership of the Youth Jumpstart Program designed by the
Minister to support young people to fast settle into the labor market. The company also participated in the
Minister’s K-digital training program in September and has since provided an MS AI School program to
foster young digital talents.
At today’s meeting, both sides decided to further strengthen their cooperative relationship with a
view to providing young people with various work experience opportunities going forward.
Vice Minister Kwon Gi-seob explained that young people want to have more job experience opportunities
as companies hire workers increasingly on an irregular basis with more demand for experienced workers.
He also suggested that Microsoft participate in a "Youth Work Experience Support Project" to be
introduced next year.
Vice Minister Kwon emphasized, “As the participation of businesses is key to providing youth with more
work experiences, the government will make a continued effort to encourage more companies to join this
effort, following in the footstep of Microsoft.”