이 기사는 2021년 05월 27일 07:37 thebell 에 표출된 기사입니다.

South Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS) is set to revise its operational rules to ease its job requirements so that those with no experience in investing could apply for its fund management positions, a move seen as trying to address the pension fund’s continued brain drain.

Currently, applicants for the fund’s junior investment roles are required to have one to three years of investing experience. The revision, which will be finalized after soliciting opinions by June 4, will remove this requirement.

“Easing the experience requirement will help fill vacancies promptly and attract a pool of new talent,” said the NPS about the revision, adding that the pension fund will foster asset management professionals by providing recruits with a training program.

NPS is currently hiring for 54 asset management positions, of which 44 are for senior roles and 10 are for junior roles. The deadline for application was May 7, and the initial document screening is underway.

In a jobs posting issued in April, the pension fund revealed the NPS WING’s Program, which NPS said is designed to foster global asset management experts. The program includes on-the-job training for new hires with a focus on overseas investments and opportunities to work at foreign asset management firms and overseas offices.

NPS apparently hopes the program to attract investment talent from Seoul. Since its 2017 relocation to Jeonju – a more than three-hour drive from the capital – the state-controlled pension fund has suffered from an exodus of staff reluctant to leave the metropolis.

NPS had only hired people with at least three years of investing experience. But the requirement was eased in 2019 to one to three years, which will be eliminated entirely with the upcoming revision of the fund’s rules.

The pension fund had 860 trillion won ($768 billion) in assets under management as of the end of February, growing rapidly each year from 558 trillion won in 2016.

In order to manage its fast-growing pool of assets, NPS has continued to increase the number of investment staff from 259 in 2016 to 341 in 2021. However, the pension fund has been short of recruits for the past years, causing each of its fund managers to handle a larger amount of assets compared to its global peers. (Reporting by Hee-yeon Han)