Provenance, the missing-link to success

This is an interesting conundrum, partially for its simplicity but more so, because within a complex business environment like the Middle East, it is fundamentally flawed.

Skills must be developed over a period of time, and practiced to attain an acceptable level of professional competence. Practice needs to take place within the business arena. Time has become an ever-valuable commodity and this gap between talent availability and business need resulting from high-speed business ramp-up, is one of the reasons why expatriation is an important factor in the success of the region.

There is one main ingredient that is missing and that is provenance.

The difficulties associated with striving to attain superior performance in the global business arena, creates its own unique hurdles. Unfortunately, there is a line of thought that implies resentment towards some of the expatriate workforce from those who mistakenly believe that there is an unfair bias.

This feeling often draws attention to the connection made by hiring staff, for roles that are skills and competency based and as such, this should be the leveler across all the installed talent pool. If selection of managers, were solely based on these criteria and, these alone were adequate to determine their fitness for purpose, then this assumption would make sense. However, it overlooks the fact that at senior level, either at functional head, specialist or business leader, quite often, external requirements mandate the qualifications of the new incumbent.

I have often pointed out that career progression is contingent upon a combination of personal and importantly, external factors. Market drivers, competitive threat, company positioning and brand value, removal of trade barriers, regional growth and the turbulence and instability within the markets, the 'whirlpool' effect, alignment with protocols such as WTO, incorrect business model causing bad hiring decisions, and in addition the impact of external pressure resulting in companies establishing hiring barriers and an uncertain US Dollar.

One of the main effects of WTO compliance is the removal of trade barriers enabling overseas companies to compete with regional based organisations, increasing consumer choice. Locally owned companies are now playing in the international business arena, large domestic companies have become international players with their home base acting as the international headquarters.

Quite often we see that new businesses are formed and are managed by for example, western expats. This has raised questions within regional communities, for if the role has a particular scope and a particular form, then why would there be a bias.

Business is no longer regional, it is international and boundaries are dissolving and overall standards have to improve in order to become competitive, or to be the market leader, or, to simply survive.

This cannot be achieved with inexperienced staff or business inefficiency due to incorrect hiring choices. The ramp-up rates for business is rapidly increasing as the region goes though a phase of re-generation. This ramp-up is disproportionate to the availability of capable, locally available talent. It is becoming increasingly more common to see complex strategic alliances and the establishment of innovative ventures.

In this era of collaboration, driven by for example, the need to become world class or to comply with WTO rules on monopolistic practices, organisations often share intellectual platforms or they establish a combined business form to capitalize on individual business expertise. This implies the need to recruit the best available talent.

There is an increasing number of major projects, with cross border assets and the need for external financing. Project finance comes from a variety of disparate sources often as a part of syndication and amounting to several hundred million US$. Investors such as western- based venture capitalists, will need to mitigate their investment risk, see a return rate in excess of 30% per annum and a workable exit strategy.

Herein lies the answer to some of the questions raised about bias. Many companies are obligated to employ key staff who are not only professionally capable, but who have the right provenance to satisfy their investors.

Regional growth and the move towards a more competitive business platform will automatically filter out those who no longer fit with tomorrow's business model. This is not unfair bias and neither is it prejudicial, it is sound business necessity.