Why Are Global Skills Important

Global Skills:

“We continue to come across many employers who continue to view outsourcing as a challenge. Companies may derive cost benefits from outsourcing, but these often come at the expense of quality service and ultimately corporate reputation.”

Sunita Singh Maclaren
Founder and President

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Why Are Global Skills Important?

Just as the digital revolution and adoption of technology skills became a foundational business skill over the past 20 years, Global Skills are increasingly becoming a key skill set for the 21st century. The reasons are clear:

International business continues to seek global employment solutions, whether through outsourcing, developing virtual teams across continents, retaining local talent or sending senior staff to administer projects abroad, prompting the need for effective and cohesive multi-cultural awareness and communications.
Increasingly, key functions are being consolidated and outsourced to specific locations. As more companies outsource to various providers around the world, Global Skills take on increasing significance as job functions will require us to engage with numerous cultures.
Given the complexity and increased emphasis on issues such as Corporate Social Responsibility, employee safety and effective relationship building among global partners and teams, infusing Global Skills plays a demonstrative role in fostering a company culture.
From small business owners to the world’s largest corporations, products and services are being packaged with an array of specific inputs from many parts of the world. Without Global Skills, these long-distance teams quickly find their levels of professional competence being called into question.

The fact remains that the pace of globalization has broadened both entrée into markets previously untapped, while raising debate, misunderstanding and misperceptions concerning sustainability, preservation and cultural integrity.

Challenges many companies are facing as a result of increased cross-border activity and partnerships result in tensions, loss of productivity, strained working relationships and lost investment.

In fact, according to various studies, the majority of cross-border mergers and acquisitions fail due to cultural and communication issues. Data indicates that cross-border mergers focus on operational, technical and commercial synergies, while paying little attention to the very crucial yet less tangible assets including business culture, human capital skills and communication. One need not look further than recent examples of strained mergers such as Daimler-Chrysler, or Danone’s joint venture in China to understand why Global Skills are a priority and not a business afterthought.

Whether a direct investment, merger or strategic partnership, business leaders require Global Skills to effectively integrate senior management and workforce, foster cultural compatibility and raise job competency and performance.