When Hiring HR Leaders in Asia, What Emphasis Should We Place on English Language Ability?
- Date:
- 21 August 2013
​1) So What’s the Problem?
“No-one at global headquarters realises that my I.Q. level drops 50 points whenever I speak English.”
I often use this memorable quote when speaking with Global HR Leaders about their HR Talent in Asia. It was said to me back in 2008, by a Japanese HR Leader, who was venting frustration about his lack of ability to articulate the issues that he was facing among the senior Management Team in Japan. There was a very specific goal that the company wanted to achieve, and there was a very specific legal requirement in Japan, which prevented them from doing it. But the Japanese HR Leader was finding it very difficult to explain the nuances behind both sides of the argument, which was leading to miscommunication and mistrust between business and HR counterparts in the U.S. and Japan.
This is not a unique problem to Japan; at The Chapman Consulting Group (ChapmanCG) we find that this kind of problem crops up time and again across all geographies in Asia. The main reason for this is the HR leader’s role itself. More so than with any other business or functional leader, it is up to the Human Resources team to properly form the communication ‘bridge’ between global, regional and local personnel. While companies can arguably still ‘just about survive’ without strong communication skills in the Finance, IT or Supply Chain departments, in the HR department it’s a deal-breaker. Since ChapmanCG work exclusively on executive search for the HR function, we consider ourselves experts in picking up these communication issues when assessing and selecting Human Resources talent across the region.
2) I don’t have this problem with HR leaders in Greece or Finland, so why should I expect it in Korea or Laos?
Growing up in Europe, living in the cosmopolitan city of London, and studying French and German to a senior level, when I was young I thought I had the world figured out when it came to communicating across language barriers. However, it took studying a module of Japanese Law at university to figure out that I was wrong. My lecturer said that he couldn’t explain one particular word in Japanese jurisprudence, because a simple translation didn’t exist. He would need to use the whole hour’s tutorial to explain the various cultural references underpinning its significance. So he moved on. But that’s where the seed of my own personal interest in Asia was first planted.
The truth is that the languages and cultures of Asia are very distinct from those of Europe, and indeed from each other. People who consider themselves experts in dealing with cultural and language barriers in other parts of the world can often land in trouble by being too complacent when working in Asia. The converse is also true; people on both sides of the continental barrier sometimes over-think the differences and treat each other as alien. Human nature, both at home and in the workplace, is a constant. It’s just the means and conventions of expression and interaction that differ from one place to the next. In a workplace setting, it’s the HR Director’s job to decipher which problems are down to cultural misunderstanding or language ineptitude, and which are down to general human error, low performance, or misjudgement.
