Barbarians At The Gate

Abstract

It is natural and empirically the case that as companies move out of the export stage and put more direct investment into foreign operations that they send expatriate managers from their home country, whether that home country is the United States, Germany, France, Japan, or wherever.¹ However, if firms are going to be successful in the regionalization stage, they need to tap into local and regional knowledge and leadership talent to make the adjustments in product, processes, services, solutions, etc. that fit the needs of the local environment. And as firms move from the regionalization into the globalization stage, they need to tap into the best and brightest talent regardless of passport. This is because no nationality has cornered the market on global leadership talent in general, let alone specific global talent in design, marketing, HR, strategy, or manufacturing. Thus, for companies to move from the export to the regional stage, when it comes to critical human capital, they must overcome their home country national bias. urthermore, in order to move beyond the regional stage to the borderless global stage, they must become passport blind.