Oasis Search, Talent Think Tank: Balancing Global and Local Strategies, Guildford, UK, 10 May 2012

Article Type: Resources From: Strategic HR Review, Volume 11, Issue 6

A current concern on many senior talent professionals’ agendas is the importance of developing talent strategies in-line with global and local pressures and ideals, whilst taking into account the deepening Western recession and the impending threat of the Eurozone crisis. This Talent Think Tank, held at Ericsson’s offices in Surrey in the UK, presents a series of insights in relation to this issue, and more specifically on how to approach successful global strategies.

Many organizations cultivate strategies around developing a high performance culture and building leadership capabilities. They focus on attracting the best talent to deliver on customer expectations, reducing attrition rates and evoking high levels of trust with shareholders. However, addressing these areas from a global stand-point comes with its challenges. For example, what cultural reservations and differences exist between countries? What resistance are organizations facing with global mobility? Can someone be global talent if they are not globally mobile? Is your local and global talent strategy consistent and aligned? And finally, how do you engage these global talents?

Our members, senior level talent experts, identified the following six strategic areas for balancing global and local talent strategies:

• 1.

  Cultural understanding – Incorporate employee activities to open cultural understanding across the business and to enable individuals to understand the overall business strategy. Breakfast meetings, informal communication and involvement from the CEO proved popular.

• 2.

  Focus more on “how” – Stay focused on how you want to develop your talent to achieve your desired outcome, and not simply the process of what you will do.

• 3.

  Get pro-active – Build a focus on development and growing talent, and enable your leaders to build a culture that enhances the capabilities of people and enables them to realize their potential through coaching and recognition.

• 4.

  One size doesn’t fit all – Too often employees can be expected to move where the business needs them without considering what they want. Take time to understand their circumstances, and their motivation to move towards a global position.

• 5.

  Fitting roles and opportunities to people – When hiring or developing your talent, don’t focus only on fitting people to roles but be flexible to find the right opportunities and shape roles to suit a person’s strengths.

• 6.

  Consider options – If you move your local talent to a global arena, consider what options are available around mobility and remote working. What can you offer your global talent to enable them to consider the opportunity around what works for them?

The HR Think Tank Series is a collection of free invitation only networking events held exclusively for senior level HR professionals, currently in the UK and Singapore. For more information telephone +44 (0) 207 11 88 444.

Katie BarrMarketing and Events Executive at Oasis Search.