Business managers agree that Korea is badly in need of such a shift. The nation transformed from one of the world's poorest countries to an economic powerhouse through decades of industrialization. The Korean miracle was driven by manufacturing, construction and engineering in which its industrious workers excelled.

Those times are drawing to a close and the nation's economic gravity is already in technology sectors.

Business results have shown that hard work does not necessarily mean high productivity. In fact, Koreans work longer but are less productive on average than their counterparts in other OECD countries, according to research by the Korea Productivity Center in 2008.

Koreans lag far behind in smart working. Despite the country's highly advanced IT infrastructure, Korean workers who telecommute account for a meager 0.7 percent of the workforce.

The portion of people making use of the smart work system reached 49 percent the total working population in the Netherlands in 2007 and over 15 percent of in the U.S. in 2008.

Not only business, but the government is coming to terms with the new need for change.

At the forefront is President Lee Myung-bak, a former business executive. The president presided over a special committee last month to discuss how the government will vitalize smart work in bureaucracy and how society will better cope with a low birth rate, aging society and youth unemployment.

During the meeting, he unveiled plans to raise the number of smart workers to around 30 percent of the total working population by 2015.

To do so, the government plans to encourage telecom carriers to increase the number of WiFi areas across the country to around 53,000 by the end of the year and introduce a new broadband network, about 10 times faster than now available, by 2015.

If carried out as planned, the policy is expected to save workers an average 90 minutes of commuting time each day and 1.6 trillion won ($1.3 billion) in transportation fees, while saving 111 tons of gas emissions a year.

Korea still has a long way to go. Experts say that the smart work system has not been as utilized here as in other countries due to the prevalent corporate culture which emphasizes face-to-face communication as well as the lack of business structures that support such system.

Ahn said that there is a strong need for Korean companies to change their perception of smart work -- that flextime working contributes to not only employee satisfaction but also elevates their productivity.

"A better work-life balance makes room for creativity for them, thus enhancing their work concentration and accomplishments by using time and costs effectively and earning private time to develop themselves and spend time with their family," he said.

Local enterprises need to adopt a more strictly performance-based evaluating system, where employees are evaluated by their performance rather than their working hours.

The change is most palpable in recent trends of large companies giving workers longer leave.

Lee urged public officials to take longer holidays mentioning their vacation deficit in a meeting held earlier this year.

Leading local oil refiners including S-Oil, GS Caltex and SK Energy have also been encouraging their employees to take a vacation for two weeks in a row this summer.

S-Oil in particular made such policy mandatory for all employees starting this year. It was intended to prevent lower-rank staff from being excluded from such policy.

"We wanted to support our employees to maximize their work efficiency by refreshing themselves and to work on self-improvement during the vacation," an S-Oil spokesperson said.

The idea was proposed by S-Oil CEO Ahmed A. Subaey who emphasizes work-life balance. It was also aimed at promoting active communications among the company's staff by experiencing taking over others' job while they are away, according to the company.

And the responses have shown that it worked.

"This actually brought some unexpected positive results. We found our employees finding new fields of interest by experiencing other jobs which probably they have feared or have been reluctant to take in the past," the S-Oil spokesperson said.

SK Energy, meanwhile, is pushing such two consecutive-week holiday system led by its CEO Koo Ja-young. The CEO recently emphasized the importance of holidays by posting up a message on a company website that encouraged executives to take the initiative to take long vacations first. Koo added that he plans to take a two-week holiday himself with his family this month in the message.

Oil refiners said they plan to settle the system and increase the participation rate of their employees in the near future.

But despite the idea's novelty and good intentions, oil refiners are among a small number of local enterprises that actively encourage longer vacations.

Taking long holidays is still considered quite unusual and uncomfortable among young workers as well.

"It seems like an ideal policy. But realistically, most of us don't work in an environment where we can take long vacations nor do we feel comfortable about doing so because of our bosses," said Byun Ju-sun, a 25-year-old computer software developer.

-The Korea Herald/Asia News Network