What makes a Global Leader ?
An international leader rarely fails because he or she lacked technical skills or business intuition. Instead, a lot of global leaders fail because they lack the management experience, the sensitivity, the interpersonal skills, and the ability to really listen as they managed across multiple cultures.
As the world has become more global, a growing number of organizations, searching to enter new markets to increase growth, have established or expanded operations in international locations. For instance, 40% of WALMART stores are located outside of the U.S. And Toyota, with manufacturing facilities located in 27 global locations, now produces more automobiles overseas than it exports from Japan. But the strategy makers do not always include the HR teams in these decisions and find themselves trapped in a system where the global leaders fail where others would have made the impact.

On their side, HR leaders are seeing the effects of globalization at ground level as they try to resolve various talent management issues, especially the scarcity of talent with the skills needed to help their organization be successful players in the global economy. Organizations no longer have the luxury of concentrating on finding, developing, and retaining talent for a single national economy. Instead, they must now look at talent globally, spanning multiple countries with different values, laws, and cultural norms.
In a recent study of one of our XAVANTES partners, a strong majority of HR leaders foresee, over the next three years, that trade of knowledge and intellectual capital (86%) and goods and services (85%) across countries will increase. They also see that competition for talent with the skills needed to work across borders will grow more fierce (91%). These response rates are consistent with findings disclosed in a recent study by the Economist Intelligence Unit that found that addressing the issue of a lack of local talent in emerging and developing markets represented one of the greatest corporate priorities for 2007 and beyond.

Due to the complexity and multitude of factors that can come into play, there is no one-size-fits-all global leadership development approach. Instead, organizations, whose needs may be as diverse as growing leaders for a manufacturing operation in a single location in Asia or developing a sales manager whose territory covers most of continental Europe, typically need to conceptualize, design, and develop custom-built leadership programs.

Examples or components of global leadership development programs include:
Cross-cultural development programs & training centers for senior managers
In-country leadership coaching after an intensive Skills Gap Analysis
Temporary foreign assignments and experiential training
Performance tracking measurements and systems to ensure that global leaders also succeed at their interpersonal management skills to global leadership.
Global "landing" training that provides the basics regarding country language, beliefs, values, communications, behaviors, and dress/attire.
Compensation and benefit programs

XAVANTES has developed an overall approach, from strategy to implementation, from talent management strategies to local recruitment support in any of the Emerging Countries we are present (please see our list of presence!).

Please refer to our offerings or ask for our brochure XAVANTES GLOBAL HR STRATEGIES & SKILLS here.

Please also refer to the article on Talent Management in Emerging Markets, recently developed by us! Click here to download the pdf

Redesign your HR team before you enter "New Emerging Markets"! When asking whether or not your organization has the talent it needs with the skills it needs, HR also needs to reply for its own teams.As the challenges defining talent management for the present and future have changed, the skills required of HR professionals have evolved, as well.

One theme that emerged over and over again was the need for HR professionals to develop a better understanding of their organizations´ business. They must view themselves as internal business performance consultants and focus on those tasks that are most likely to transform their organizations. Acknowledging this need, some companies might need to redesign their HR function around several HR priorities that correspond to the organization´s key business drivers.

Among these priorities, against which the organization is conducting assessments and providing development opportunities, is the development of HR personnel itself, guiding it through the new challenges. Part of their new role is concerned with the hiring and acquisition of global talent. The biggest challenge is for the company to sustain itself, which is why the major challenge is succession planning to develop the next generation of leaders... As nearly all companies see some fluctuations in the market, scalability is getting more and more important. Six to 12 months out they have to be flexible in terms of scaling up or scaling down their headcounts to meet market demand. XAVANTES is able to support companies in the scaling of headcounts as well as in the redesign of your HR teams!

Please contact us by mail for more information on our trainings and XAVANTES Brainstorming sessions.