The Competencies of Global Managers

There is increasing evidence that large scale globalization is rendering traditional ways of doing business largely irrelevant. It is a growing need for managers to become global

managers with a global perspective. For a company to become more global, its leaders must develop competencies that go beyond what is familiar in the home country (Yamaguchi, 1998).

In Staneck‟s (2000) study, it stated: “the market is now the world and managers within firms must have the competency to grapple with complex issues and possess the confidence to carry out global initiatives.” (p.232) Kendia and Mukherji (1999) suggest that a global perspective

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consists of a global mindset supported by appropriate skills and knowledge.

Mainly, there are two different approaches of the competencies of leaders who effectively direct operations that span a world of diverse cultures, capabilities, and customers (Morrison, 2000). The first approach is company-specific competency models. Morrison (2000) stated that the multinational companies as diverse as IBM, AIG, Citibank, Black & Decker and Deloitte & Touche have identified company-specific leadership attributes that apply around the world by their long-term human resource management teams. However, there are two problems: (1) the number of competencies indentified. For example, Chase Manhattan Bank tracked almost 250 competencies while IBM‟s leadership model contains eleven; (2) the identification of characteristic that are not mutually exclusive and competencies that can be assigned to multiple characteristics. The employees had poor acceptance of some leadership models because of the complex combination and internal inconsistency. Besides, Morrison (2000) also mentioned that some senior managers, with political pressure, would influence the content of company-specific models and have an interest in defending and perpetuating their own leadership approaches. Therefore, the second approach, academic global leadership competency models, will be mainly discussed as the following.

Moran and Riesenberger (1994) surveyed 49 senior U.S. managers who were business school‟s international advisory committee. They identified 12 different competencies, associated with implementing global strategies, which were organized around four

characteristics: attitudes, leadership, interaction, and cultural understanding. The three global leadership competencies included the ability to (1) facilitate organizational change, (2) create learning systems, and (3) motivate employees to excellence (Morrison, 2000).

Rhinesmith (1996) structured the competencies of global leaders into three main

responsibilities: (1) strategy and structure, (2) corporate culture, and (3) people. There were two characteristics, knowledgeable and analytical, two skills, manage both in complexity and

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competition, two actions, drive and balance, and two mindsets, embrace both a global picture and a balanced picture, within the responsibilities of strategy and structure.

Brake (1997) developed the “global leadership triad,” a model of global leadership. The primary characteristics are: (1) relationship management, which has five components of change agency, community building, conflict management and negotiation, cross-country communication and influencing; (2) business acumen, which includes competencies of depth of field (an ability to switch perspective from global to local), entrepreneurial spirit,

professional expertise, stakeholder orientation and total organizational astuteness; (3) personal effectiveness, which includes accountability, curiosity and learning, improvisation, maturity and thinking agility.

In Black and Gregersen‟s (1998) research, global managers must have: (1) unbridled inquisitiveness; (2) personal character, emotional connection and integrity; (3) duality, capacity for managing uncertainty and unique ability to balance tensions. The attribute

pertaining to inquisitiveness is one of the striking differences between managers with national characteristic and global managers. In their study, leaders have intelligence but are not all necessarily inquisitive. Inquisitiveness supports behavior or values that include adventure, curiosity, and open-mindedness. The emotional connection is a function with three steps.

Having a sincere interest in and concern for others is the first process. Second, do an effort to really listen to people. Having an understanding of different viewpoints is the final one.

Integrity is described in terms of ethical behavior and loyalty to the company‟s values and policy. In their study, global managers were most effective when they consistently maintained the highest ethical standards in personal and company matters. A successfully global manager has a capacity for managing in changing conditions. Besides, global managers must balance various tensions while they encounter the pressures for both globalization and localization.

Finally, global managers need to be more savvy in both business and organizationally. Global business savvy makes managers to explore worldwide market opportunities and global

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organizational savvy makes managers have intimate knowledge of their firms‟ capabilities and their ability to assemble resources to apprehend market opportunities.

In Black and Gregersen‟s (1999) research, global managers must have the following competencies: (1) drive to communicate (extroverted): A good global managers do not give up having conversation with people while the situation is embarrassed; (2) broad-based sociability: A successful global managers establish social network with local residents no matter shopkeepers or government officials; (3) cultural flexibility: A good global manager is willing to experiment with different customs and being open to local market trends; (4) cosmopolitan orientation: A good manager respects diverse viewpoints and understand that different cultural norms have value and meaning to those who practice them; and (5)

collaborative negotiation style: a good global managers can understand that different cultures can hold basically different expectations of the conduct of negotiation and try to find best solution for both side.

According to Adler and Bartholomew (1992), global managers need to know the worldwide business environment from a global perspective, finding a balance between the simultaneous demands of global integration and national responsiveness (Bartlett and Ghoshal, 1992; Pucik and Saba, 1998). Adler and Bartholomew (1992) suggest that global managers must learn about many foreign cultures‟ perspectives, tastes, trends, technologies, and approaches to conducting business. Global managers need to be skillful at working with people from many cultures simultaneously. In terms of cross-cultural skills, global managers are expected to tread smoothly and expertly within and between cultures and countries on a daily basis, whereas expatriate mangers focus on becoming an expert on one specific culture.

Global managers are expected to overcome an ethnocentric mindset and develop an openness to and understanding of other perspectives, selectively incorporating foreign values and practices into the global operations (Adler and Bartholomew, 1992).

In Sheridan‟s (2005) research, intercultural competency is concerned as the critical need

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for global managers. The International Labor Organization in U.S. (2004) found that 70% of global business ventures worldwide failed due to intercultural differences. Therefore,

Sheridan developed the 7 “C‟s” of the cross-cultural adjustment (intercultural leadership competence): (1) capability: intercultural savvy team members; (2) care: concern beyond bottom line;(3) connection: engaged connection with diverse cultures; (4) conscientiousness:

self-awareness of own culture background and bias; (5) context: situational perspective with no judgment;(6) contrasts: cultural differences in leading and motivating followers; (7) cultural immersion: lived experience in other cultures.

In the study of Cohen (2008), five characteristics of global managers were concerned: (1) global business acumen, which includes the ability to comprehend the business environment in its totality, entrepreneurial skills, financial skills, profit and customer awareness and domain, industry and business knowledge; (2) leadership characteristics, which includes mental and emotional behaviors, self-assurance, energy, enthusiasm, being learning-focused, displaying empathy, common set of core values, integrity, excellence, respect, perseverance and ability to remain authentic; (3) world view, which includes global environment awareness, cultural adaptation, social, political and economic trends, other factors influenced world view responses such as experience with foreign countries, organization size, etc.; (4) people leadership, which includes communication skills, ability to motivate and inspire people, human resource skills, networking and development; (5) business leadership, which includes strategic decision-making, efficient resource allocation, effective time management,

problem-solving ability, ease in managing complexities and ability to stay flexible.

From the early academic researches until now, there are some similar competencies of global managers in each study. To sum up, according to Cohen‟s (2008) study, the combination of each academic approach is as the following in Table 4:

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Table 4 Combination of the competencies from different research The main

1. ability to comprehend the business environment in its totality:

1.1 entrepreneurial skills 1.2 financial skills

1.3 profit and customer awareness (stakeholder orientation) 1.4 domain, industry and business knowledge

1.5 depth of field (ability to switch perspective from global to local)

1.6 professional expertise Leadership

characteristics

1. mental and emotional behaviors 1. self-assurance (self awareness)

2. being learning-focused (desire to learning) 3. extraverted

4. inquisitiveness (curiosity)

5. emotional connection (cosmopolitan orientation) (displaying empathy) (seek to understand others)

2. common set of core values

1. Integrity (accountability) (ability to remain authentic) 2. perseverance

3. enjoy differences

World view 1. global environment awareness

2. cultural adaptation (cultural flexibility) (cross-cultural competence) 3. social, political and economic trends

4. experience in foreign countries (culture) People

leadership

1. communication skills (cross-country communication) 2. ability to motivate and inspire people (influencing) 3. human resource skills

4. networking (community building) (broad-based sociability) 5. unique ability to balance tensions

Business leadership

1. strategic decision-making 2. efficient resource allocation 3. effective time management 4. problem-solving ability

5. ease in managing complexities (managing uncertainty) 6. ability to stay flexible

7. collaborative negotiation style (conflict management & negotiation)

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