The Driving Business Advantage in Mexico by Selectively Upgrading Executive Talent

The lingering challenges that have touched everythere are multitude of quality unemployed executives,
region in the world economy have exerted athere are also the usually underperforming executives
combination of financial pressures on businesson the market. Companies cannot risk making bad
enterprises in Mexico. The road to economic recoveryhiring decisions. For this reason, organizations need to
and sustainable prosperity will require Mexico to decidehave a methodical and comprehensive executive
how best to stimulate its national economy in the facesearch and selection process, which ensures an
of the global recession, to address the devaluation ofattractive and successful partnership for both the
the peso, and to balance its dependency oncompany and candidate.
manufacturing exports to the United States. Add toThe companies that make hiring global talent their
this challenge the rising security issues related topriority, as well as including among their key objectives
Mexico's ongoing drug war, and one begins toprograms to develop global leaders, will have an
appreciate the implications on business growth and theadvantage over their competition. To gain that edge
flow of future foreign direct investment into thecorporate "C-level" management have been weeding
country.out the 'B' and 'C' grade managers and hiring or
The good news is that Mexico has already undergonepromoting the so-called 'A players' whom they can
several economic catastrophes, which seem to give itdepend on to lead in times of crisis. This is a result of
an edge psychologically. Some sectors, such astop executive leaders needing to identify key
pharmaceuticals, energy and certain consumer goodsexecutives, build strong teams and get more out of
sectors, have done well, or have at least maintainedmanagers who now have fewer resources.
sales growth, despite the economic downturn.It seems, however, that decisions about upgrading
The current economic challenges - felt most acutely intalent in times like these is, within many organizations, a
the financial services and automotive sectors - havematter of individual decision-making rather than a
already ushered in some important structural changesthoughtful, consistent approach to improving
that will help it compete long into the future. Theseorganizational performance. Most companies doing
reforms are forcing Mexico to design a strategicbusiness in Mexico do not have well-defined talent
economic development program that involves themanagement strategies and/or succession plans, and
participation of government and the private sector. Thethis remains one of the major human resources
government has taken steps, through publicchallenges in the country.
investments, to preserve jobs and improve security forExcept for a few multinationals that are more closely
employees. And companies are trying hard to takealigned with the strategies of the home-office, most
advantage of their existing resources and to be moreorganizations are losing talent because there are no
productive.defined retention programs, career tracks or leadership
Given that human resources remain the single largestdevelopment programs. Typically, the Mexican
intangible assets on corporate balance sheets, it's notbusiness culture has produced leaders with a more
surprising that some Mexican companies see potentialautocratic leadership style, some of whom remain and
in creating workforce efficiency and making theirclash with up-and-coming, high-potential talent. In
teams and leaders more productive. Mexico as aMexico, the time has come to align human
country, with its close proximity to the United Statesperformance with business strategy.
and Canada, as well as being one of the gateways toToday, more than ever, it is increasingly important to
the rest of Latin America (especially the northernestablish effective communications within teams;
countries), needs to develop internationally orientedinspiring and involving all team members to focus all of
leaders to increase its competitiveness.their efforts towards a common goal in the most
Finding leaders who are fully bilingual and multiculturalproductive and efficient ways.
and who can fully understand and adapt to a U.S.- orLooking ahead, if the current recession and economic
European-owned organization is not easy. Althoughcrisis rebounds as is expected by early 2010, many
there are more executives available in the market,companies may be caught short of key executive
there is still a demand for multicultural, multilingual,talent in the near future as we have already seen
executive talent with experience working and/orgaps in organizational structures where management
studying outside of Mexico. At the C-level and onepositions that would normally be filled internally do not
step below, few want to risk a move to a companyhave the adequate talent pool and need to be sourced
that is less economically stable. And because Mexico'sfrom the market.
population is young, even fewer have had theThe pace of future business growth will continue to
experience of managing or leading in a severehinge on the region's ability to develop, attract and
economic crisis, even though they may have beenleverage the right business leaders who can drive
working during the previous downturns.talent equity and sustainable business advantage. For
Companies across Mexico would be well served toemployer organizations across Latin America now,
remember that simply because there are moredriving toward sustainable business advantage may
candidates available in the job market does notsimply be a matter of vision and a commitment to find
necessarily mean the talent pool has increased inthe next opportunity.
depth. In an economic environment like this one, where