Is Your Organization Globally Inclusive? Answer these 3 questions…

During the past several months I have had the privilege of working with several global organizations to improve the inclusivity and diversity of their leadership teams. While many companies are working to build more inclusivity, few organizations have truly cracked the code of how to apply this consistently and equitably across global teams, functions, and businesses. Colleagues Yang Zhang, Arlene Roane, John Fu and I have been discussing new ways to think about how leadership can become both more global and more inclusive. Here are three questions we think people should ask about their own organizations:

1. Does your leadership team represent your current (or better yet, future) global business?

Last week Joe Biden said he planned to appoint a “cabinet that looks like America.” Corporate leaders should likewise build teams that look like, and represent, the diversity of their global businesses. Although many firms are focussing on increasing diversity, few pay enough attention to the diversity of the senior team. I am currently talking with a global manufacturing firm about their Inclusion & Diversity initiatives. The company earns one-third of its $16B in annual revenue in Asia-Pacific and predicts this will grow to 50% by 2025. The CEO, in the most recent annual report, stated that “our greatest asset is our people” and that the firm has made a strong commitment to building a “culture of inclusion and belonging where everyone feels empowered...” This company’s 60,000 employees are indeed culturally and geographically diverse: it has a large data and finance center in India, a fast-growing R&D facility in China and strong sales and technical support capacity on five continents. Their executive team, however, consists of 12 Westerners: all 12 are Caucasian, 11 are men and 10 are American. It will be years before they have an executive team that “looks like their global business” unless they radically change how they develop global talent. Only a few companies we’ve worked with have an executive team that proportionally reflects the markets (and diverse perspectives) where earnings are being generated. 

2. Do people in your global organization, regardless of cultural background or geographic location, have equal access to leadership roles?

Developing a leadership team that looks like the global business requires that companies develop an intentional Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) approach to how they see, evaluate and develop talent. A friend of mine leads the HR function for a major global automotive firm for markets in the Middle East, Africa, India, and Asia-Pacific. In early November he told me that few high-potential leaders from non-Western markets are offered regional or global roles because of the way the firm evaluates talent. He believes that whole evaluation system has a Western bias. Even though this is a recognized problem there is so much process inertia the system has (so far) proven difficult to alter. He thinks an entirely different evaluation approach will be needed to create true equity for non-Western talent.

3. Are your leaders sitting in the right location?

One way to more quickly create more global thinking in large corporates is by moving executive functions to the place in the world where the most activity in that part of the business occurs. A couple of years ago I learned from a Fortune 50 client that the long-serving Head of Learning & Development planned to retire and the company was recruiting for a replacement. I asked: “What region of the world represents your biggest talent-development challenge for the next five to ten years?” The immediate answer from the Global HR Vice President was: “Asia-Pacific.” I asked why the company didn’t move the role - and with it the global Learning & Development function - from the U.S. headquarters (where it has always been) to Asia. She paused and looked at me with surprise. A minute later she replied: “We aren’t yet ready for that radical a change.” 

2021 presents a unique opportunity for companies to pivot towards global inclusion:

As the world emerges from the current pandemic in 2021 companies would do well to re-think how they look at their talent and organization from an inclusion, equity, and diversity perspective. Widespread adoption of remote communication technologies means "location bias" is a far smaller justification for centralized functions than ever before. Building an executive team that “looks like” your business requires that senior leaders act quickly to identify and eliminate systemic bias in how their firms recruit, evaluate, and develop global talent. For inspiration read what Schneider Electric, the venerated European firm is doing in this South China Morning Post interview with CEO Jean-Pascal Tricoire. SE’s global executive team is located in Hong Kong, not the historic headquarters in Paris, because the business potential is strongest in Asia. The company has a decentralized management structure with global leaders dispersed in different regions. This means talented candidates anywhere in the system have access to leadership roles without needing to relocate. Others might do well to consider how to transform their own talent models to be more inclusive and more global. Future success (even survival) may well depend on it!

For ideas on how to build Inclusive Global Leadership teams and strategies please reach out to David Everhart.