The two key challenges as well as key to success for today’s corporations: R&R. Except it is nothing to do with rest or relaxation for the busy.

Recruitment and Retention of talent are set to be critical success factors as world population changes create a smaller and less skilled workforce within the next decades. Beginning 2008, the talent pool has started  to wane as the baby boom generation reaches retirement. No wonder then that Talent Management has risen to become a global issue, affecting more organisations than ever before. The world around us today is changing, particularly due to the significant technological advancement we have seen in recent years. As a result, the global market is changing along with the requirements to meet market demands: global economies are becoming intellectually based rather than commodity based.

At OCI, we understand the R&R of the talent landscape our client organizations face only too well. Which is why we strive to unravel the mysteries that surround the worldwide market for talent management technologies, which is one of the largest booming aids that will help in the R&R of talent. Many factors are fuelling its exponential growth: a dynamic geo-economic climate that increases focus on the workforce, a changing global labour market, and the need for organizations to transform their workforce and build a climate and culture of performance and innovation, how we communicate, and how we organize the business to take advantage of the possibilities of scale on a global basis… these issues are all challenging in terms of getting the global organization to work.

And like they say, globalization begins at home. So we, at OCI, have decided to go truly global. After 11 years of being a g-local entity, when we serviced our global clients from our local operation in Toronto, we have, since January 1, 2008 become a global operation, with partner offices in Dubai and Bangalore. This enables us to assist our clients in global searches, and help source talent from across the world. We have listened in good faith from our clients and researched that despite nearly two decades of corporate globalization efforts, many organizations still struggle to find senior talent who are comfortable and effective in the increasingly global economy. Most suffer both from a lack of cultural awareness when dealing with employees and partners overseas and from a lack of experience managing increasingly complex processes over long distances. There is no doubt that some insightful corporations have made strides in developing successful global executives, but HR executives continue to be frustrated with the limited or less diverse multi-functional skills available locally.

We cannot cover the entire world in 80 days. But we decided to venture into the two markets where the need for global talent was most pressing: Middle East and Asia. Hence our expansion to Dubai and Bangalore….

More in my subsequent letters….

• Facing The Two Truths

 OXeNHaM Consultants

The Industry