Multi-nationals Scramble for Chinese Mainland Talents

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Thursday, September 26, 2002

Multi-nationals Scramble for Chinese Mainland Talents

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Trans-national firms on the Chinese mainland are ceaselessly improving their remuneration and compensation packages to attract and retain Chinese mainland talents they hire, as competition for such talents intensifies.

The phenomenon emerged Thursday at a panel discussion on the final day of the Forbes Global CEO Conference entitled "Reassessing the Business Blueprint" held at Grand Hyatt in Hong Kong. Panelists drawn from well-known multi-nationals focused on expanding Chinese skilled labor, investing in their education and finding ways to retain the best and brightest.

Mark Steele, president of ITT industries in China said, "I think localization is the key to success. It is important for the best and the brightest talents to see a long-term, viable career path with the company. So, we have to be competitive for our compensation benefits and retention programs.

"We focus a lot on benchmarking with a lot of other multi-nationals to try and ask what type of packages are competitive. And over time we are improving our retention programs."

Bill Henderson, a managing partner of Egon Zehnder International, said findings of a recent consultancy research of his firm showed that managers and senior managers trained locally in the Chinese mainland are particularly well-versed in market knowledge of China and they are also highly result-oriented.

"They are also very strong in the market knowledge, and their ability to really get under the skin of the market to understand alot of the complex issues that the expatriate Chinese sometimes have difficulty with.

"And they are also very strong in customer focus and team work and collaborative skills," Henderson said.

Expatriate Chinese, on the other hand, are strong in the areas of strategic thinking, leading change, commerce and general management skills, he added.

Chairman and CEO of the Esquel Group, Margie Yang, who owns garment factories all over the world, said China is the country that she finds "has the most abundant talents".

"That's because we can have the choice of the local, as well as the overseas Chinese that have come back, including Hong Kong Chinese," she said, adding that she hires graduates from both abroad and local universities.

"Different types (are meant) for different roles," she said.

Yang said in training her managers, she prefers to rotate them from country to country in order to broaden their exposure.

Mark Steele said one way he helps develop the leadership skills of Chinese talents is that he would place them in challenging positions where they can demonstrate their capabilities and develop their skills.

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