Saad Masood
Thomas Friedman defines globalization as the integration of markets, finance, technology, and telecommunications in a way that is enabling each one of us to reach around the world farther, faster, deeper, and cheaper than ever before. And at the same time, globalization is enabling the world to reach each of us farther, faster, deeper, and cheaper than ever before. To top it all globalization also creates super-empowered people. This accelerates the operations at global companies to a hectic pace. Their employees shall be making decisions at a pace faster than ever to compete with others. Hence, and as prescribed in the originating opinion pieces in this series, there are certain courses of action that are not only helpful but are essential for a global organization to manage the onslaught of globalization. To that end the following write up recommends a policy tripod on which the structure of a global organization can be setup.
Consensus Building
Generating a consensus is difficult in a local organization at the best of times. It is exponentially difficult in a global organization. With sprawling offices and conducting business across the globe comes the added headache of some very intangible dimensions. Regional offices cannot exist in isolation. They are entwined into the local cultural and social landscape. Hence personnel in these regional locations display mannerisms that are indigenous to that region or location. Similarly, the local politics of the region also affects the traits of the working population. All this means is that the regional components of a global organization might be operating on different ‘wave lengths’ owing to their local environment. Hence generating consensus on a global way forward for the organization might be difficult to achieve.
Consequently, a specific policy of consensus building will tend to rectify this situation where different actors within the global, as well as regional, organization push for generating an agreement between disparate groups of the organization and creating an atmosphere where common ground, rather than localized differences, is sought after.
Diffusing Empowerment
Empowerment is a key facet of a flexible, global organization. In a global organization personnel are spread across the globe in different time zones. This results in a greater turnaround time on almost all actions. A manager based in the Americas working on a solution with development resources housed in Australia must wait for some time before he can get information that allows him to make a decision. Similarly, the reverse is also true. This induces skewed timelines, extended working hours and unmitigated resource constraints. All of which amounts to affecting the bottom line, not to mention other intangibles such as client satisfaction, brand name and company prestige.
A purposeful policy of empowerment will allow an environment of confident decision making to prosper in the global organization. This would allow regional resources to take make wise choices on the spot rather than waiting for a 24-hour turnaround for more information and confirmation. Although difficult to implement, this policy will be helpful in environs where inherent decision making is weak. It will also have the added benefit of grooming confident individuals in the global organization who will help the organization, and in turn the business, to move forward. Initially mistakes might be made but in time this would be curtailed in favour of wise decisions. As the adage goes, good judgement comes from experience and experience comes from bad judgement. As a corollary, an empowered global organization will also fare well in front of clients, partners, competitors, analysts, and investors.
Embracing Diversity
People are always a key to a successful organization. This piece of wisdom is even truer in a global organization. As the personnel stem for a variety of diverse cultures, regions, and locations it is important that diversity is encouraged and embraced within a global organization. One of the biggest advantages of this smorgasbord of personality and culture is that it brings with it different approaches to the same problem. Different people view things differently owing to their cultural or social leanings. This can be beneficial in a global organization where a problem can be solved in a multiple of ways. With its slogan ‘the world’s local bank’, HSBC embraces diversity to the hilt. It claims that it uses local knowledge to not only solve local issues but also to help regional problems elsewhere. Diversity is a ‘use it, don’t lose it’ feature.
A focused policy of encouraging and embracing diversity will allow the global organization to benefit from the rich experience, including the differential problem-solving techniques, of the various organizational regions and the people belonging to them. An upshot of this policy will be that local knowledge will always be available for the organization to use in expanding the business in that region.
The time ahead will bring different challenges, but the assault of globalization will not recede anytime soon. Thus, the only organisations to survive effectively will be the ones that have thought long and hard to include CDE – Consensus, Diversity, and Empowerment – policy options in their vision for the future. Nothing less will suffice!
