Just last week, a friend asked a question about the way I classify employees with respect to what they deliver to their organizations. So I decided to write a post about it. When thinking about the candidates organizations may be interested in hiring, I like to keep things simple and classify them into two categories. Experts or Performers. Yes I know what your immediate reaction will be Hassan, don’t make things so simple because they aren’t. Yes, I agree often they aren’t but trust me guys – at times they are that simple. I like to look at a potential hire with these two lenses because it makes my job easier and simplifies my hiring decision.

Believe it or not, I have been pretty darn good with this. Let’s see why I believe so. Experts are perfectionists. These are the folks with years and years (at times decades) of experience under their belt in the field of their specialty. They are mature in their thinking – too mature maybe for a customer-responsive, innovative and growth-savvy  organization.

Experts weigh in their knowledge and advice on important decisions. Theirs is the carefully chosen path. Risks mitigated – all corners covered. They take pride in their expertise and profession. Often like to work in organizations with established hierarchy and a set career path. Intuition is the element that’s long been suppressed – rationale is what they relish. Organizations with mature work processes find them to be a perfect fit. In my eyes, they are process-improving machines where problems are pushed in and a rational solution will come out the other end.

Performers are the ones who are never short on ideas. You often hear them ask the WHY question in the cafeteria. You might often find them jumping the gun on tough decisions but if encouraged, their idea train would take you places you h

adn’t dreamed of. They are usually the fresh perspective guys – irrespective of the longevity of their careers. They just have the attitude of ‘why not’ and ‘what else’. Often Performers are young blood – the fresh graduate, the newly transitioned into an industry or new to management. They may be short on sound and calculated advice at times, but never short on commitment or energy. Think of the pizza delivery guy who wants to work extra hours just before the Spring break – yes that’s them. If you lead them, you don’t need to bring a sense of urgency to every task – because they do it for you. They thrive when systems, processes and structures are still taking shape and evolving.

So who should you hire!

Market trends show that a particular type of organizations is hiring Performers and it has no co-relation to the size of the company or the state of its business growth. So what sets these organizations apart? Their attitude! Yes, I call it the Responsive Attitude. It is not the one with the reactive attitude, one that waits for the competition to beat them to the next product or market before they call in the emergency board meeting. It’s not even the one with the proactive attitude, one that would be trying out too many new things in search of the Killer App or next iPhone. These organizations are structured enough to have a strategic focus and flexible enough to revisit it from time to time – just the right balance. Having the Responsive Attitude means you are following up on your plans but you are constantly in touch with your customers in various markets to see what they are saying about you, your products, your delivery process and your customer service. These organizations are seeking Performers because they are ready to put out a product that is 80% ready TODAY then release the fully tested one NEXT WEEK. Performers help them make that decision. Experts would still be covering corners, mitigating risks while the competition would be working on their second Beta release. So review your clients and see which ones have the Responsive Attitude and then you would know what to do.

I don’t mean to claim that this is the Holy Grail of talent acquisition but this has been the result of our team’s research. I would be interested in your take on the subject.

Session 2

Sushant Rao - Director, Head of Asia, World Economic Forum, Switzerland

Presentation Title: “South Asian Economies and the Path of Growth, the Challenges and opportunities”

1.    WEF - More than just the Davos gathering - an initiative to bring together business leaders from all walks of life

2.    Also runs a WELCOME forum - a virtual gathering of more than 10,000 world leaders for collaborative dialogue and debate

3.    Global Competitive Report - Pakistan outlook

a.     Combination of hard data through IMF and WB and Leadership Opinion Surveys

b.    Competitiveness is defined as ‘productivity’

c.     Stages of development defined - progressive process

i.    Factor-driven

ii.    Efficiency-driven

iii.    Innovation-driven

d.    Report results: World overall

i.    US came out on top due to its large market - UK went down in the list this year

ii.    BRIC economies are doing better - China has broken into the top 30

e.     Report results: Pakistan

i.    Overall ranking of 101 out of 134

ii.    Important areas:

1.   Education

2.   Security environment

3.   Business friendly policies

4.    Financial Development Report - 2008 - also available on WEF website

a.    Pakistan performed remarkably well compared to other developing financial markets

b.   No 5 in overall Banking Efficiency Index

5.   World Trade Report

a.   Done in partnership with WTO

b.  Pakistan in top 25 in FDI and foreign labor - however, still work that needs to be in the perception among the international traders about the business environment and trade environment in Pakistan

6.   Last words

a.   Trade in Inter-South Asia is only @ 4% compared with ASEAN @ 45% - so this can be improved further

Zafar Siddiqui, President CNBC Pakistan, Chairman CNBC Arabiya, Africa

Presentation Article: Media in the Emerging Markets

1.    Referred to climate change - “another flood here, time to build an arc”

a.     Discussed some facts from a recently published article

2.    Emerging Markets

a.     Powerhouses that have adopted open market policies

b.    Market Trends in Emerging Markets

i.    Liberalization - decline in support for public media - private media ownership

ii.    Increasing trend of sponsor-centric content development as opposed to content being developed in the interest of the public

iii.   The New Media Vs The Traditional Media

1.    USNews has abandoned print in favor of web publishing

2.    Blogging increasing faster than ever

3.    Many firsts of the New Media in the recent US elections

iv.    The Digital Divide

1.    This could lead to the exclusion of millions in the world, especially Africa

3.    Media in Emerging Markets

a.    With the economic downturn in the West, the international media giants will look toward the emerging markets

b.    Free and independent media are necessary for effective functioning of democratic situations

c.     Informed decision a must for the democratic process to continue which can be facilitated through a responsible and free press and media

Rishi S. Jaitly - Senior Policy Analyst, Google Inc.

Presentation Article: The Internet in 2008: Democratizing Democracy and Globalizing Globalization

1.    Google’s Mission:  A Knowledge Society

2.    The Old World - 20^th century consumed content - saw content presented by the few

3.    The New World - participation by many, empowering people to speak to the world at large

4.    AdWords - a tool to raise awareness but also raise funds

5.    Learning from the recent US elections

a.     Expand electorates through web tools and social media

b.    Build a brand - through text by creating a context - the ‘change’ brand of Obama

c.     Live debates - a way to hold your elected officials in check and ask them tough questions breaking through the established media

d.    Pushing democracy to its limit - democracy on steroids

e.     Sign up to sitemap.com to get included to Google and other search engines

6.    Globalizing globalization

a.     Internet by definition is ‘global’ and by getting your products or services online, you are participating in a global market

Session 1

Points from Syed Farrukh Abbas, CEO, Pakistan Operations - Abraaj Capital

Presentation Title: “Entrepreneurship: Leveraging Business Opportunities in the Region

1. Mr Farrukh Abbas disagreed with me professionally.  He claimed this region to be the most promising in the world in the next 20 years.
2. Showed a chart that shows the global distribution of GDP from 0 AD to 2008 AD.  The chart was developed by Sir Paul Judge - a board member of Abraaj Capital.
3. Fast growing GDP in the MENASA region compared to other regions.
   1. “what can we buy cheap when people are running” - an investor’s view from Middile Eastern region
4. Abraaj is looking into ‘food and agriculture’ investment in Pakistan in the next few months
5. Mr Farrukh shared the overview of Abraaj Capital
   1. 50% of average gross IIR in the last five years
   2. 150+ employees
   3. Has worked with regional companies, companies with competitive advantage, platform consolidation and public-private partnership
6. He concluded by reiterating that MENASA is the region to invest in and that true entrepreneurship means not being the boss and answering to customers and growing employees.

Mr Hilmy Cader, Global CEO MTI Consulting, Bahrain

Presentation Title: Strategies and Managing in Turbulent Times

1. The crisis has hit the world. Pakistan also has an economic crisis on top of the world economic crisis.  His presentation will touch upon the following three subjects:
2. Bull Market Syndromes
   1. This is what companies do when the going is good - expanding recklessly, investing in areas and making acquisitions
   2. Companies build models which are on very high fixed cost base - an airline has Seat Capacity Breakeven of 87%
   3. Companies disguise unprofitable brands and variants - Unilever had 1600 brands but 90% came from only 400 - e.g. 36 variants of Crest in the US
   4. Also, unprofitable staff - they don’t do a Personal P&L, i.e. who is contributing what
   5. Company structures are considered very fixed  - e.g. Agri business in Philippines created an additional layer for sales staff just to promote two good sales persons
   6. Himalayan Layers - tall vertical structure with multiple layers
   7. Activity-based job filling - You appoint people based on activity instead of a strategic value addition by each position
   8. ‘White Collar Crime’ - management wastes a lot of time and it goes unaccounted for
   9. Case Study done in Paksitan -
3. Strategic Response Alternatives
   1. Two options to respond to a crisis
      1. ‘Chop and Cripple Mode’ - Cost-cut mindset with focus on cost upside
      2. Trim & Fit Drivers - Go to back to fundamentals with prudent thinking and focus on revenue upside
4. Trim and Fit Drivers
   1. Knowledge sharing by MTI based on their work with some regional companies
      1. Change starts at the top - CEO and Chairman must be there at the Trim and Fit meetings
      2. Accept reality and communicate the truth with staff with tact
      3. The change process should be an inclusive process
      4. Laser Beam Bottom-line Focus - look at the currency - that is the language of crisis
      5. Good time to Consolidate and Acquire - small companies are suffering and if you have cash, go shopping - also a good time to build a brand
      6. Take the Fat off the Process and NOT the People
5. Last word - “Tighten your belt or lose the pants”