A couple of weeks ago McKinsey launched a survey on the organizational challenges presented by social and economic trends. The results for this survey are available now; according to available data McKinsey received 1,317 responses from a worldwide representative sample of business executives.
Top 5 of the most important identified trends are:
- Competition for talent
- Centers of economic activity will shift globally, regionally
- Technological connectivity will increase
- Omnipresent access to information will change economics of knowledge
- Demand for natural resources will grow
One can download the survey results for “The organizational challenges of global trends” as pfd-file here.
January 3, 2008 at 5:55 am
Thanks for doing an excellent job on your blog, it is very informative and links in very nicely with some of the work we are doing on building global competencies for global organizations and their people. Looking at the trends mentioned in this McKinsey report it shows me again that the need for Inter-Cultural Intelligence is growing rapidly across the world.
Marco Blankenburgh, International Director, http://www.knowledgeworkx.com
January 4, 2008 at 7:13 am
Thanks for the feedback. I completely agree with you. Intercultural skills have become more and more important in the last decades and its importance will growth in the future. I hope that at least an organization recognizes the need to address the matter of intercultural competences. Some months ago I entered an international project and I recognized a large number of differences (e.g. the way trust is created, conversation styles, and supervising issues) that make or break a business. Hence organizations have to focus on this issue.
January 7, 2008 at 4:43 am
I have been following your blog for some time and have enjoyed the information and perspectives offered. Large MNC’s have long recognized the importance of “cultural sensitivity” – this seemed to be the buzz word back in the 80’s when the “Pacific Rim” was the portal of opportunity for many businesses. The McKinsey report reaffirms that cultural (social, economic and political) differences still weigh heavily in effective communications and successful deal making.
While it is easier to discern differences in “customs”, it is often more difficult to understand and accept the deeper biases that people have of each other – the majority of which escape cursory reviews and are often perplexing when uncovered.
While “event-specific” deals certainly occur if the basic cost metrics are met, “generational business” over long periods of time demand much give and take – and a great reliance on the depth and quality of friendship among/between company heads and their successors. There is a chemistry in every transaction (contemplated and real), and it appears that the most successful ventures have just the right compounds for crystalization and sustained growth . Every geo-political unit has its own nuances and lexicon for this hard-to-define element.
The Chinese have a term, that roughly translated means “the ability for two people to communicate verbally while simultaneously connecting viscerally.”
Thank you for your important contributions.
Kim Chin, Managing Member, The McChin Group LLC, http://www.mcchin.biz
January 7, 2008 at 8:12 am
Thanks for your comment and feedback. I think that both the understanding and the true acceptance of the bias (of one’s oponent) is the fundament to establish trust between two people. I really like your statement / term “the ability for two people to communicate verbally while simultaneously connecting viscerallyâ€. My personal observation is that – after a certain period of time – you get an impression whether the other person is accepting your cultural background and your personality; which should open the door the establish sympathy (and then trust). If the other person stays “on the surface” it is unlikely to connect viscerally.