Lack of local leaders

Asia’s future leaders missing out on promotion.

Finding the ‘right’ people with the right skill sets to be successful, both in the Asian context and internationally, is notoriously hard.  The rapid rate of development coupled with competition between western multinational companies and successful large Asian  companies ensure that this is ever more difficult.

The sun may be setting on Asian leaders

A new report, entitled: Adopting an Asian Lens to Talent Development calls for companies to develop a more targeted approach to talent development in the region. Carried out by Community Business’ Diversity & Inclusion in Asia Network (DIAN), it found that the current management level demographic heavily underrepresents Asian talent in the region. In fact, leadership roles are often held by highly skilled and experienced executives transferred from the corporate headquarters of western multinationals to manage and drive operations in emerging markets in Asia, as has been established practice for many years. As a result management positions in the  markets of Hong Kong, China, Singapore—and to a lesser extent India—contain a glaring lack of local talent. In addition, many multinational companies admit that within their Asian branches leadership and advancement opportunities that should be presenting themselves in due course to Asian employees are not materialising; Asian leaders are not only inadequately represented in leadership roles at a regional level but also at a global level.

Kate Vernon, Managing Director of Community Business and co-author of the report remarked, “There is a concern that approaches towards talent development may not be truly inclusive and that companies are potentially overlooking key Asian talent in the pipeline.”

The premise of the research was that many of the obstacles are rooted in traditional ways of operating, and an overreliance on ‘Western approaches’ that may no longer be appropriate to the expanding global context. The study sought to challenge that, calling for companies to ‘adopt an Asian lens’ by examining the strengths that Asian talent can bring to organisational success, scrutinising talent assessment processes to ensure they are not inherently biased and developing targeted approaches to development that meet the needs of talent in this region.

Leading companies are beginning to examine their approach to talent development—taking steps to better understand their Asian  workforces and scrutinising their talent assessment processes to ensure they are appropriate to the local context. Vernon noted, “As more companies understand the significance of Asia to their market strategies, they are recognising the urgency of attracting and retaining top talent and building a strong pipeline of future Asian leaders.”