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Mapping
Global Talent
Essays and Insights
Developed in co-operation with
Arctic C
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Greenland
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Canada
Mexico
The Bahamas
Cuba
Panama
El Salvador
Guatemala
Belize
Honduras
Nicaragua
Costa Rica
Jamaica
Haiti
Dominican Republic
Colombia
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Guyana
Ecuador
Puerto Rico
A T L A N
P A C I F I C
O C E A N
Caribbean Sea
Hudson Bay
Gulf of
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Baffin
Bay
Gulf of Mexico
Copyright © 2007 The Economist Intelligence Unit Ltd and Heidrick & Struggles
International Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction without permission is prohibited.
Trademarks and logos are copyrights of their respective owners.
Printed in the USA.
Printed on recycled paper made from 100% consumer waste.
Mapping Global Talent
Essays and Insights
contents
Executive summary, 2
Essays and Insights, 4
Leadership Consulting – How to attract, develop
and retain talent in a shifting global landscape, 4
Consumer – I shop therefore I am, 6
Professional services – Rising temperatures, 8
Technology – A future imperative, 10
Industrial – The tale of two worlds, 12
Life Sciences – A healthy future? 14
Financial Services – Accounting for talent, 16
Appendices, 18
Methodology, 19
Global Talent Index maps, 20
Global Talent Index weighting, 22
Overall GTI rankings, 23
Demographics, 24
Quality of compulsory education, 25
Quality of universities and business schools, 26
Quality of the environment to nurture talent, 27
Mobility and relative openness of the labor market, 28
Stock and flow of foreign direct investment, 29
Proclivity to attracting talent, 30
Further reading, 31
Economist Intelligence Unit, 32
Welcome to the Global Talent Index, a unique research study
designed to identify where talent is located in the world today
and where it will be located five years from now.
The wall map demonstrates talent’s distribution in 202, while this booklet of
short essays examines the challenges and opportunities opening up in different
industries. The theme that recurs repeatedly is that the successful organizations
of the future will be those able not just to attract the brightest global talent, but
nurture, develop and retain it by offering a compelling work environment and
sophisticated succession strategies.
I believe it will be the provision of a learning environment that will determine
the iconic market leading companies in years to come. We already know that
Generation Y – those born between 977 and 2005 – will have had an average of
fourteen jobs by the time they are 38. The next generation is more demanding,
fickle and sophisticated than any other. Sophisticated talent demands
sophisticated talent management.
I hope the Global Talent Index reveals a lot more about the future we face and
how we can best prepare for it. Ignorance is bliss? Not in the world of talent.
L Kevin Kelly
CEO, Heidrick & Struggles, September 2007
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
2
Executive summary
Talent is the new oil and just like
oil, demand far outstrips supply
In early 2007 Heidrick & Struggles, in partnership
with the Economist Intelligence Unit, undertook a
study to encapsulate the current state of global talent
and its future configuration around the planet. Which
countries have the strongest pipeline? Where will talent
thrive over the next five years? What will change? And
what impact should that have on how companies plan
strategically for the medium term?
The resulting research, incorporating the data analysis
of thirty countries, shows subtle shifts and changes
as it measures global talent in 2007 and anticipates
future realities in 202. Using a unique and proprietary
algorithm, the Heidrick & Struggles Global Talent
Index (GTI) uses quantitative and qualitative data to
measure the economic indicators, cultural contexts,
trends in education, foreign direct investment (FDI),
mortality, health and market fluidity that will impact
the ability of talent to thrive within these countries.
This combination of objective data and local
knowledge proved particularly helpful in enabling the
Economist Intelligence Unit to assess the more data-
poor economies: allowing us to tell a talent story that
would otherwise have remained hidden.
Money talks
The findings confirm a basic suspicion – talent follows
where money leads. As a consequence, perhaps
unsurprisingly, talent is most likely to be found in
developed, wealthy economies, led by the US (which
tops the table in 2007 and 202), followed by the UK
and Canada and the two smaller, but open economies of
Sweden and the Netherlands. The inclusion of Sweden
and the Netherlands, along with Australia, in the Top
0 talent rankings shows that this trend is consistent
even in countries where demographic factors are weak.
Specifically: it is not just the size of the potential talent
pool that matters, but how it is nurtured.
Political structure
influences talent growth
The results in the lower half of the rankings are more
ambiguous. Not all countries in the bottom ten
are equal: they range from Greece to Iran, through
Brazil and Saudi Arabia. In part this comes down to
the number of countries selected – analysis of thirty
economies cannot fully reflect the different levels of
development across the world. Nevertheless, certain
themes emerge, particularly from the bottom five.
A common trend is that several of the least promising
performers do not currently boast fully-functioning
democracies. This opens up an interesting avenue for
further research into the links between an open society
and the development of talent.
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 3
BRIC is IC
A key finding revealed by this research, and supported
by prior academic studies conducted by the Economist
Intelligence Unit, is that the often repeated, media
friendly ‘BRIC’ story – the inexorable rise of Brazil,
Russia, India and China – is more accurately expressed
as an ‘IC’ story.
India and China sit in the top ten (0th and 6th
respectively in 202) whereas Russia occupies 8th
place both now and in 202, and Brazil falls from 23rd
place now to 25th place in five years time. The fact that
Russia stays stable overall masks a gradual erosion in
the quality of its compulsory education system, which
has been steadily falling since the collapse of the Soviet
Union in 99. In spite of the increased investment in
higher education, weaknesses in primary and secondary
education provision are likely to have an adverse impact
on the country’s ability to develop its talent resources
over the longer term – a waste of Russia’s undoubted
natural potential. China and India do benefit from their
large populations but China also performs relatively
well in terms of its educational infrastructure and its
ability to attract foreign investment. Meanwhile India
out-performs China on several measures related to
the labor force – widespread knowledge of English
throughout the general population being an
obvious example.
Foreign direct investment
remains a key catalyst for
the development of talent
Malaysia exemplifies the power of foreign direct
investment (FDI) and achieves its 2th
place position
(in both 2007 and 202) largely because of the amount
of foreign investment flowing across its borders. FDI
is at a premium within the talent index since it is
normally accompanied by imports of technological
and managerial best practice. In addition, as foreign
companies become established they often seek to replace
expatriates with local employees, creating demand for
new jobs and new skills. Mexico is another example of
the potential power of FDI, rising two places (from 2st
place to 9th place) because of a strong rise in the stock
of FDI over the forecast period. Mexico’s proximity
to the US and its entry into the North American Free
Trade Organization (NAFTA) in 994 has given it the
edge over other Latin American countries (for example
Brazil), boosting annual FDI inflows to
around US$20bn.
Black and white and shades of grey
The GTI concentrates on seven focus areas (see
Methodology on page 9). The Index is a subtle tool,
but in certain cases the brushstrokes are too broad,
making changes in the rankings appear more dramatic
than they are. Two slightly weakening performers would
seem to be Germany and Australia, but their fall in the
rankings by one place (from 6th to 7th for Germany,
and 7th to 8th for Australia) is more the result of
China’s advance rather than any intrinsic deterioration
of their talent pools – indeed, Germany’s overall score
actually improves by one point in the five year period
analyzed by this study. This note of caution should
be borne in mind when examining any index as small
changes in score can combine to result in significant
alterations in rank. A case in point is Argentina, which
falls by four places on the back of a score that falls by
only two points.
Today’s leading pools of talent may not be
under pressure just yet but companies who
want to flourish in the future must adopt a
global view of recruitment. China and India
are emerging as significant players and cannot
be ignored. All over the world employees are
behaving as consumers, able to pick and choose
the companies they wish to work for: employers
must to do everything they can to cultivate
a powerful, persuasive reputation for talent
management if they are to safeguard their
long-term talent resources.
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
4
Leadership Consulting
How to attract,
develop and
retain talent in
a shifting global
landscape
The implications of the Global Talent Index
(GTI) for identifying, developing and retaining
the best executive talent are four-fold:
• The search map – the area in which talent
can be found – has changed.
• New global leaders must have very
specific competencies.
• Development opportunities need to be
much more targeted.
• Retention should start on the first day
of employment.
The search map
Our research shows a significant expansion in the area
of the search map. Most searches for large companies
are now global, targeting executives in Asia, Europe and
the US for key positions in international companies
all over the world. This new class of global executive
has common features: they have an MBA from a top
business school; they have several years of international
experience and are typically fluent in several languages.
My own research revealed that in 996, only 42% of
top CEOs in the United Kingdom had international
experience but by 2005, this figure had nearly
doubled with 79% of chief executives boasting
experience abroad.
Executives are also expected to have far more cross-
sector experience than before with a track record of
making lateral moves during their careers. In response
to the ‘War for Talent’, search firms are now tracking
international high-fliers proactively and for the long
term. For example, Heidrick & Struggles’ China
initiative specifically tracks Chinese nationals with
international backgrounds who want to return home.
Search firms need to continue to work much more
strategically with companies; the ad-hoc filling of empty
posts as they arise needs to be replaced by a holistic,
focused and flexible approach which incorporates
the assessment, development and training of existing
executives alongside the recruitment of new talent.
The new global leaders
The complexity, pace and global platform of today’s
business environment demands a special set of
characteristics. Apart from heightened requirements
in terms of background and experience, the leadership
criteria have changed dramatically over the last 0
years: there is now no substitute for global leadership
experience. However, when looking at the GTI and
the concentration of talent across the globe, one key
question emerges: how can we better assess the global
leadership capabilities of the various talent pools?
Dr Elisabeth Marx
Leadership Consulting
emarx@heidrick.com
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 5
From a search consultant’s point of view these are
the essential characteristics to look for in the new
global leader.
International literacy
• Operating in different geographic regions.
• Understanding the cultural differences of employees
and customers.
• Dealing with ambiguity – those executives who
demand an excessive amount of certainty and rigid
frameworks do not generally adapt well to the
complex cultural patterns of working in foreign
countries and with different sensibilities.
• Enjoying diversity in a psychological sense.
Managing paradoxes
• Taking a helicopter-view and think strategically
whilst keeping the focus on operational results.
• Switching easily between different modes: from
long-term thinking to short-term, and from cost-
saving to expansion and growth.
• The flexibility to handle these potential paradoxes is
the key characteristic of future top executives.
The ability to build successful teams
The emphasis on the CEO as the ‘hero’ is waning.
Business success at the top (and farther down the
organization) depends on the leader pulling effective
teams together. Our research shows that very few
companies have highly effective teams at the top and a
common complaint is that while there are individual
strengths, “the team is not working together”.
Companies are already beginning to address this issue,
and we are seeing much more active intervention at the
top level as CEOs engage external help in aligning the
team with business strategy.
The new development program
Large companies are increasingly creating their own
universities to train staff from around the world.
There has also been a rise in the provision of in-house
and bespoke programs from international business
schools. Samsung, for example, has created its own
talent pipeline by first recruiting people of different
nationalities from leading business schools and
universities around the world, and then putting them
through its in-house training and development center.
The coaching industry, a largely unregulated area,
is also exploding, answering a growing demand for
the development of ‘softer’ skills such as teaching,
negotiating and listening. In the future, to give
executives the support they require, we would expect
the provision of such skills to be provided by business
school programmes and follow-up coaching.
Retention and career
management of the best
The best are constantly offered jobs by your competitors
– how can you retain them over longer periods of
time? The answer is a better analysis and understanding
of their motivational make-up so that you can offer
productive career support and development.
Employer anxiety about top executives leaving can
prevent sensible career discussions from taking place.
Bosses often completely avoid the subject with their
employees, leaving the employee feeling under-valued
and unfulfilled, resulting in turnover at the most senior
level. Having an internal or external career development
function helps executives clarify what they want and
what they would like the next step of their career to be.
The company is then able to construct a scenario where
this can be achieved. The companies that will grow
in this new talent geography are those which coach,
motivate and develop their own talent in tandem with
an inclusive, global recruitment process.
“The answer is a better
analysis and understanding
of their motivational
make-up …”
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
6
Consumer
I shop
therefore I am
How do you cater to a fickle global
consumer who wants the latest and greatest
product for half the price? That is the
question troubling the consumer industry.
Higher levels of discretionary income
with the rise of the middle classes in India
and China, combined with ever more
sophisticated consumer tastes, have created
a world where the customer is king (but
always on the look out for a bigger, better
value crown!)
The growing spending power of the developing world
is startling. Today in China the middle class numbers
over 300 million people – that is the same figure as the
current population of the USA. Meanwhile, assuming
steady growth over two decades, India is poised to
overtake Germany as the world’s fifth-biggest consumer
market by 2025.
The developed world cannot match this aggressive
consumerism, but the next five years will see a rise in
tempo as key retail giants fight over a population that is
developing ever more precise ideas of what they want to
spend their money on. The pressures this consumerism
puts on product development, supply chain and price
has resulted in strong retail concentration
– for example, in the US, Home Depot and Sears
hold sway in the homeware arena, in the UK grocery
store Tesco is the leader, while Carrefour dominates in
France.
These giants expect the very latest in product
development, durability, design and price and
small scale suppliers – finding it hard to keep up
– are increasingly being incorporated into larger
conglomerates with only the Nestlés, the PepsiCos and
the Krafts able to square up to the big retail firms.
In talent terms this never-ending drive for innovation
will see an exponential increase in the value of R&D
expertise. The pipeline must be primed to produce a
constant stream of new products that will impress the
consumer. Throwing money at innovation isn’t the
solution – many large companies have been tripped up
by this in the past and have in turn been outsmarted
by smaller, more nimble competitors. Outsourcing will
become an important pressure valve, as some companies
are already finding to their advantage. At Procter &
Gamble, 35% of all its new products have elements that
originate from outside the company, up from about 5%
in 2000. They say this kind of collaboration has seen
R&D productivity increase by nearly 60%, while R&D
investment as a percentage of sales has fallen from 4.8%
in 2000 to 3.4% today.
Torrey Foster
Consumer practice
tfoster@heidrick.com
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 7
The case of Procter & Gamble highlights the fact that
survival in the consumer industry will come to rely
not just on investment of resources but also on good
management. Their R&D operation is working because
it is being well-directed with a clear strategy. This has
important implications for managerial talent in the
sector. Those individuals who will perform best in 202
and beyond will be those who are able to manage the
R&D function in a global context. These managers will
be skilled at forecasting customer and supplier behavior
and trends, and they will have an extremely detailed
understanding of supply chain vagaries and imperatives.
They will also need to be media-savvy. The single biggest
challenge in the consumer sector over the next five years
will be the increasing difficulty of communicating to
consumers and potential employees. An astonishing
range of media channels compete for the consumer’s
attention, and the industry’s dilemma will be how to
ensure their brand message – be it about online stores,
green policies or the latest new products, is actually
seen by their customers (before they see what the
competition has on offer).
So where will this talent be found? The educational
ranking of the Global Talent Index indicates that
unsurprisingly, over the next five years the US, Canada
and Europe will be the predominant suppliers of top
quality graduates. What is surprising and perhaps the
consequence of heightened visa restrictions is that
the United States registers a low score for mobility of
labor and relative openness of its labor market. This
measure records the language skills of the population,
the number of international students studying in the
country and the number of nationals studying in
foreign universities. The USA scores 9th place in 2007,
and falls to 0th place in 202, overtaken by India.
This is not the case in Canada, the UK or Germany,
which score st, 2nd and 3rd place respectively in this
particular ranking, both today and in 202. This would
suggest that, if it is to realize its full educational and
demographic potential, the US must encourage greater
immigration and emigration, helping future American
managers gain the international experience which will
allow them to compete in (and fully understand) the
global consumer market.
American companies in the consumer sector have not
traditionally had a reputation for nurturing their own
talent, innovation being the key concern. However,
there is evidence that the giants in the industry are
realizing the value of managing and developing the
talent they have – Wal-Mart for example, has ongoing
initiatives to develop its own talent, including a
leadership-in-training program and a leader-to-leader
project for managers, aiming to push decision-making
power down the management ladder. They have
also introduced a new pilot program through which
employees can alert the company of their talents and
ambitions and, once assessed, managers recommend
ways for them to pursue their skills, through
secondments, evening classes, language lessons etc.
This idea of temporary foreign work placements recalls
that key talent trend – to be fully successful in the
world of tomorrow, international experience will
be indispensable.
“to realize its full educational
and demographic potential the
US must encourage greater
immigration and emigration,
helping future American
managers gain the international
experience which will allow
them to compete in (and
fully understand) the global
consumer market”
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
8
Professional Services
Rising
temperatures
The professional services sector is
developing a split personality. On the one
hand, it is made up of internationally-
known US and European firms with
thousands of employees and years of
experience, ready to perform almost any
task for a corporate client. On the other, it
incorporates a myriad of young firms, from
call-centers in Croatia to large, fast-growing
Indian outfits, all of which are low-cost and,
in most cases, highly competitive in terms
of basic skills and business processes.
Historically, the two sides have co-existed fairly
peacefully: increasingly over the next five years, the
competition will start to heighten. With the outlook
for global economic growth slightly less buoyant, the
traditional professional services industry will find quick
wins harder to come by. Clients will increasingly pick
and choose services by price and value, as opposed to
reputation, depth of experience and international reach.
At the same time, the young offshoring companies
will continue to migrate into higher-end services,
encroaching on more of the core activities of their well-
established competitors.
As a result, offshoring – “hiring” another company’s
talent to cut costs – is expected to show compound
annual growth rates of more than 5%. By contrast the
traditional professional services sector, will grow at
around half that rate.
Given this, both sides of the sector will need to make
the procurement of talent a top priority in the next five
years. Both will depend on similar methods for finding
their new hires – vigorous recruiting at the university
level and strong networking skills for identifying
managers from other professions who might be
persuaded to change careers. Both sides of the business
will also need to develop strong internal recruiters who
know how to promote the firm and who are adept
at building networks of qualified candidates in the
communities where their companies operate.
The first stop will be universities. Both at home and
abroad, the reputation and quality of a country’s
universities will be a key measurement for recruiters.
The Global Talent Index’s ranking of the quality of
universities and business schools – which assesses the
number of universities ranked globally among the top
five-hundred, the number of business schools ranking
in the world’s top one-hundred and the spending per
student on higher education as a percentage of GDP
per capita – shows a number of important developments
in this regard.
In 202, for example, the GTI score shows that the
top five countries measured by the quality of their
Krishnan Rajagopalan
Business & Professional Services practice
krajagopalan@heidrick.com
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 9
universities and business schools will be unchanged
from 2007 with the US, the UK, Sweden, South Korea
and Australia scoring 78, 44, 38, 37, and 36 in 202
respectively (out of a possible 00 points). However,
there will be significant movement below these top-
ranked countries, with Germany, France, Russia, Japan
and Poland all moving up two places to 6th, 7th, th
2th and 6th respectively (out of the ranking of thirty
countries). Russia’s advance stands in stark contrast to
the lower quality of its compulsory education, where it
ranks 22nd in the 202 ranking, down two places from
20th in 2007. The two measurements underline Russia’s
growing commitment to higher education, with junior
and high-school facilities receiving a lower priority.
Given the advances of both Germany and France,
Canada and Saudi Arabia will both drop two places
to 8th and 9th on the 202 ranking of the quality of
universities and business schools. Lower down the
ranking, China will hold steady at 2st place with India
moving up one level to 25th; these figures are naturally
distorted due to the size of the population and the
method of assessment, which is spread per capita. While
both of these countries will continue to support high-
quality higher education over the next five years and
will have tremendous talent pools, the sheer number
of their populations pulls down their ranking in the
expenditure per student measurement.
As the developing world continues to pile into the
offshoring business, the range of industries “hiring”
capital will continue to grow over the next five years.
Even the most conservative, security-conscious sectors
will be seeking to reduce costs by moving their more
routine businesses to offshore facilities. In the legal
profession, for example, more highly skilled work
such as litigation research, traditionally carried out by
paralegals in-house, and intellectual property work
involving patent research, analysis, and drafting
of patent applications, is expected to move to
offshoring facilities.
Given the continued need for versatile, talented staff for
both sides of the professional services sector – offshore
and onshore – firms will need to do the following:
Think globally regarding talent
pools and talent competition
They will need to source globally for roles that they
have previously looked to fill locally and they will need
to keep in mind that the talent competition is leveling
out with the traditional competitor and the offshore
company looking for exactly the same talent but with a
different value proposition.
Think creatively on channels
for talent acquisition
One of the key resources in the years ahead will be
the industry’s own employees. In particular, employee
referral programs will become more popular. These
generally offer cash rewards and prizes to employees for
successfully referred candidates. For KPMG, nearly 39%
of the firm’s experienced hires came through employee
referrals. For smaller firms the percentage will be less
but just as valuable, particularly considering the low
cost of acquiring talent in this manner.
Innovate the HR function
With talent in short supply, organizations should elevate
HR to the highest levels, acknowledging that talent is
the only competitive advantage. Leading companies
need to customize their HR processes to align with
business objectives and create a results-oriented,
performance culture. Be ready – the global talent war in
professional services is just beginning to heat up.
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
10
Technology
A future
imperative
After years of hype, the technological future
is almost here. The networked home, the
truly portable office, easy-to-use video
conferencing and collaborative, online
project management all promise to become
realities over the next five years. This will
have one effect – the search for talent in
the IT and telecoms sectors will intensify as
corporate and consumer spending outpaces
global economic growth.
Even the most traditional non-technical companies
will need to upgrade to Web 2.0 online environments
and the latest hi-tech equipment in order to maintain
productivity and competitiveness. At the same time,
consumers will continue to demand the latest electronic
gadgets complete with internet access, such as designer
smartphones, portable gaming consoles, and networked
appliances for the home.
In the telecoms sector, sales of the ubiquitous mobile
phone will continue to grow, even as world penetration
levels rise to over 50%. In addition to buoyant sales
in emerging markets, demand will be sustained by
upgrades to web-enabled handsets, which will be used
to pay for purchases, to check e-mails, download music,
watch TV and make and receive texts and calls. Fixed-
line telecom companies will need to meet the challenge
of web-based telephony and converged networks,
providing their customers with much more than plain
vanilla voice services.
Given these trends, a flexible, collaborative, global
workforce will be a top priority for virtually all
multinationals in the IT and telecoms sectors. In order
to retain top-flight people around the world, companies
are already developing techniques for plugging their
people into closed system internal corporate recruiting
networks using the latest technology. For example,
IBM now manages its workforce globally using a
system called Professional Marketplace, which provides
rapid online access to the HR profiles of over 70,000
employees. These profiles are updated regularly in
order to reflect work experiences and skills. Using this
system, managers can quickly identify suitably-skilled
employees from around the world to meet the needs of
each project. Microsoft uses something similar, called
distributed engineering, where engineers around the
world can collaborate online.
With the best IT and telecom companies experiencing
turnover rates as high as 5%, retaining talent will
become an even greater concern in the years ahead.
As a result, non-compensation based benefits – such
as childcare and flexible working hours – will rise in
importance. SAS Institute, the world’s largest privately
held software and related services provider, has a 4%
Daniel Cheng
Technology practice
dcheng@heidrick.com
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 11
employee turnover, which it attributes in part to its on-
site day care center. The company also has around five
employees who focus full-time on helping employees
deal with the needs of their ageing parents.
The Global Talent Index reveals that the tech sector
will continue to recruit primarily from the US over the
next several years as it retains its dominance in terms
of the quality of universities and business schools –
the key factor in developing new talent in these fields.
The US will be followed by the UK and Sweden in
Europe. Saudi Arabia will hold a similar position in
the Middle East.
The countries to watch in terms of an improving
overall quality for nurturing talent are Australia and
South Korea, as well as China, which will leap eight
places to rank 4th by 202. A declining country in this
category is Russia, which is predicted to sink from 6th
place to th over the next five years primarily due to
the gradual erosion of its education system since the
collapse of the Soviet Union in 99. This trend will not
be countered significantly by the rising investment the
Russian government is putting into higher education as
it will take more than five years for these improvements
to have a significant effect on the Russian ability to
nurture talent.
The ten countries with the greatest proclivity for
attracting talent (assessing the technical skills of the
work force, personal disposable income, employment
growth and GDP data) will remain largely unchanged
over the next five years, with North America and
Europe retaining their overall dominance. France
will take over the number two spot currently held by
Sweden, which will slip to 7th place. This leap can be
attributed in part to Nicolas Sarkozy’s new government
and his modernising of France’s traditional working
practice restrictions.
On demographics, China and India rank first and
second place respectively. We can predict that these
two countries will yield an increasing number of
talented graduates in the hi-tech sector given their
strong tradition of engineering and science at the
university level. This, plus the increased presence of
foreign multinationals in China, has helped boost the
country up the overall ranking from 8th place in 2007
to 6th place in 202. India holds firm at 0th overall,
aided by its gradual improvement in the quality of its
environment to nurture talent, the mobility of its labor
and relative openness of its labor market.
“Even the most
traditional non-
technical companies
will need to upgrade
to Web 2.0 online
environments
and the latest hi-
tech equipment in
order to maintain
productivity and
competitiveness.”
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
12
Industrial
The tale of
two worlds
Top-flight graduates will be harder to lure
into the industrial manufacturing sector
over the next five years. Recruiters who
understand this fact will be at an advantage.
The reasons are simple – the global manufacturing
sector will grow at a relatively slow pace over the next
few years, led by strength in emerging markets. Global
passenger car sales, for example, will rise by an average
of only 3.5% per year until 202 and the increase will
be driven by demand in China and India. Sales in the
developed world will remain disappointing; with the US
market set to stagnate and those in western Europe and
Japan expected to grow by a modest 2 to 4%.
The energy sector will exhibit similarly low-key
growth with global energy demand per head expected
to average 2.4% per year over the next few years.
Slower demand will be the result of high prices and
an increased move toward energy conservation in the
developed world. There will be a similar story in other
major industrial sectors.
Given this trend, traditional manufacturing industries
and energy companies will need to tackle their less
than sparkling growth profile head on and wring as
much talent as possible out of emerging markets. One
tactic will be the establishment of local training units
in the fast growing markets. In China, for example, the
logistics firm DHL has already set up its own
Logistics Management University, which teaches
new recruits everything from courier business to
supply chain management.
The downside, however, will be losing staff almost as
quickly as they are trained. “Multinational operations
in China must contend with a 20 to 30% annual
staff turnover rate and recruit ,000 plus employees
annually,” says Indranil Sen, a Vice President for
strategic intelligence at DHL. “With two years’
experience in logistics, many employees will job-hop
and start work for another firm, the incentive being a
50% pay increase.”
In the developed world, manufacturing companies
can retain trained staff if they are willing to give
international opportunities to their top performers. And
this trend will be seen all the way up the management
structure. In a recent survey of US and European CEOs
by the Economist Intelligence Unit, 60% of respondents
said their senior management teams will become more
international over the next three years. Opportunities
for senior management in the emerging markets look
set to grow – Chinese automakers, for example, will be
keen to hire Western managers over the next five years
as they begin to expand into foreign markets.
Dale Visokey
Industry practice
dvisokey@heidrick.com
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 13
In the US and European aerospace and defense
industries, the major talent challenge over the next five
years will be a greying workforce. According to the
Aerospace Industries Association, the average aerospace/
defense engineer in the US is currently nearly sixty
years old. By 2008, approximately 27% of employed
engineers will be eligible for retirement, and during the
next decade, the number of employees with science and
engineering degrees reaching traditional retirement
age will triple.
In the developing world, the exact opposite is true, with
science and engineering degrees becoming increasingly
popular as a means to move up the income ladder.
However, visa restrictions in the US and Europe,
limiting the immigration of foreign professionals, will
remain tough. As a result, the growing ranks of Asian
graduates will be increasingly absorbed on their home
ground by native firms and the US and European
companies locating new manufacturing facilities in
these faster growing emerging economies.
Given this imbalance, the aerospace and engineering
industries will need to make a big effort to attract
and retain new graduates, through the establishment
of programs that support research, pre-graduation
internships, and mentoring activities once a new recruit
signs on. Retention will be a major problem; in the
aerospace industry, the attrition rate in the one to six
year range will be approximately two times greater than
in the overall new graduate population.
The manufacturing sector also demands blue-collar
talent – those steady workers who contribute to the
success of a business through a commitment to quality
and productivity. Several fast growing developing
markets – China in particular – will be an increasingly
attractive source of these skills. The Global Talent
Index’s ‘flow of foreign direct investment’ (FDI)
measurement reveals that some other countries are likely
to become more important in this regard. South Africa
will rise seven places to rank fifth on the FDI ranking
by 202, a movement that reflects the country’s growing
role as a supplier of goods and services to the rest of the
African continent as well as overseas. Other countries
which will rise up the FDI ranking include Mexico (up
five places to th) Egypt, Ukraine, and France.
“In a recent survey of US and European CEOs by the
Economist Intelligence Unit, 60% of respondents said
their senior management teams will become more
international over the next three years.”
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
14
Life Sciences
A healthy
future?
The life sciences sector, in many ways, is
a victim of its own success. The medical
and public health advances of the last
several decades have translated into
healthier people, longer lifespans, reduced
infant mortality and an expanding global
population. It seems demand for healthcare
services and products can only continue to
increase globally.
The prevalence of ‘lifestyle’ diseases – such as obesity
and alcoholism – are already causing increased alarm
in the developed world, leading to a greater focus on
disease prevention and education in those economies.
Meanwhile concern over infectious diseases, particularly
Avian Flu and HIV/AIDS, will facilitate greater
government cooperation with industry in both the
emerging markets and the developed world, increasing
the demand for multi-lingual healthcare policy experts
with a global perspective in both the public and
private sector.
The global pharmaceutical business will see continued
growth, but at a slower rate, as more low-cost generics
become available, government pricing pressures
continue, and truly innovative drugs come to market
at a slower pace. This steady growth will be sustained
by increasing knowledge about DNA and molecular
science, which promise more personalized drugs able
to target niche markets with greater efficacy. This
should deliver greater pricing power to the industry
but may require the sale of larger numbers of lower
revenue drugs rather than reliance upon the traditional
blockbuster model of selling a few key drugs to large
segments of the global population.
Whether due to costs, restructuring, mergers, a
reluctance to hire from outside the industry, the rapid
growth of emerging markets or a combination of all
five, the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries
have historically failed to invest sufficient resources in
building their internal teams. The biotech companies
have tended to rely on a pretty hand-to-mouth existence
while the more established firms in pharma have often
operated as exclusive US/European clubs, increasingly
leaning on staffing organizations to fill their talent
gaps in the short term, rather than applying long-term
succession planning. As the influence of China and
India continue to rise over the next five years this trend
cannot continue; already there is growing evidence of
the gradual move to outsourcing selected functions, an
option the industry had previously been slow to accept.
When assessing a move to outsourcing, biotech
companies will need to ensure they are able to access
similar talent pools and resources to those they have
in their current locations. Existing biotech clusters
Jeff W Dodson
Life Sciences practice
jdodson@heidrick.com
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 15
have the competitive advantage of being located close
to many highly respected universities – for example
the cluster in Northern California which has twelve
major research universities and laboratories in the
region helping to drive innovation. The proliferation
of collaborative working and knowledge sharing tools
and technologies should help break down geographic
barriers over the next five years, allowing for an
increasing level of outsourcing to countries in Asia and
Eastern Europe.
In cases where medicines need to be developed for
large regional markets, it will make sense for companies
to locate their facilities closer to the population in
question, where the demand is higher and where these
companies can access the local skilled talent pool.
Multinationals in this sector will invest in global regions
where there is a high supply of technical and scientific
professionals, such as China, India and Brazil, which
rank st, 2nd and 5th, respectively, in the demographics
category of the Global Talent Index both in 2007 and
202. To build the scale of talent needed in markets
like China and India to better serve large local markets,
pharmaceutical multinationals will need to play an
active role in recruiting and developing people at junior,
middle and senior levels in their organizations.
Globally, the life sciences sector will need to keep
working hard to attract the most skilled and committed
scientists and researchers, in addition to top-quality
senior general management executives capable of
leading and driving change across complex global
organizations. This will necessitate a global talent
search; for graduate level personnel this search will
be centered mainly on the top universities. For more
experienced individuals the hunt will be among the
world’s fast-growing biotech firms and university labs.
As with other high-growth sectors, not just the
recruitment but the retention of talent will be a major
headache for the life sciences sector over the next
five years. To address this problem, pharmaceutical
companies will need to start looking at recruiting
outside of their traditional hiring range. For example,
companies will need to be more involved at high
school and college level to generate interest and educate
students on the skills needed for the industry. In
addition, these companies will need to begin targeting
the 60+ market, which is looking increasingly likely to
seek supplemental income after retirement age and may
continue to work in the field through reduced work
programs.
The Global Talent Index’s measurement of the quality
of the environment to nurture talent – which puts
a strong weighting on the percentage of university
students in the sciences, numbers of R&D researchers
and meritocratic remuneration – reflects one of the
biggest changes ahead for talent trends in the life science
sector over the next five years. China, which advances
two places on the overall Global Talent Index for 202,
jumps eight places to 4th in this category between
2007 and 202, its biggest advance among all seven
measurements used to make up the GTI. The increase
reflects the Chinese government’s determination to
improve the quality of life for its population and
develop the life sciences sector into one of its global
competencies.
Another strong performer in this category is South
Korea, which advances four places to 0th place in the
rank in its ability to nurture talent. Unsurprisingly, the
US ranks top in this category, given its long history
of innovation in the sector, followed closely by the
Netherlands, Canada, Japan and Australia.
Developing an awareness of these emerging trends and
making the recruitment, development and retention of
top talent a strategic imperative is critically important
for every life sciences company competing in the
global market. Equally important is the establishment
of strong partnerships with world class agencies
capable of recruiting the best talent in key functions
in all established and emerging regions. The most
proactive industry players have already made significant
investments in talent, and these are the companies that
are best positioned for the future.
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
16
Financial Services
Accounting
for talent
Over the past two decades young graduates
have been attracted to the challenge and
wealth creation opportunities that have
resulted from an evolving global financial
services sector. The US has been a dominant
source of talent, but several factors have
resulted in an increasing demand for fresh
skill sets and talent from different countries.
These factors include the continued growth
of European markets, a rise in opportunities
across Asia and other emerging markets,
and the growth of a new group of top
financial service firms not domiciled in
the US.
In the future, a number of market risks will rebalance
the opportunities that have existed in this sector. Slower
global economic growth and rising interest rates, credit
defaults and issues stemming from a lack of market
liquidity – following the sub-prime mortgage collapse
– will, in the short-term lead firms to reevaluate their
portfolios, product mix and pace of expansion. A
slowdown in the global property market, particularly
in developed economies, will put financial pressure
on banks that have enjoyed strong returns from real
estate lending. As the economy slows and the debt
markets become less attractive, M&A activities, led
in part by private equity funds, will lessen, causing
investment banks to rethink their ongoing growth plans
in investment banking and capital markets. The sharp
rise in debt associated with leveraged buyouts by private
equity firms will increasingly become a source of risk
to lenders.
To combat this, many banks will continue to diversify
their businesses, strengthen reserves and improve the
quality of loan recipients. A high premium will be
placed on new product development, emerging markets,
and increasingly sophisticated risk management and
transfer techniques. The appetite will be for multi-
lingual candidates with international experience who
possess a strong combination of technical experience
and education.
The Global Talent Index (GTI) shows that the historic
dominance of US talent will continue but also reveals
the rise of several European countries as European
financial services firms emerge as dominant global
players. Over the next five years, it is predicted that
France will leap three places to rank 2nd behind the
US in the proclivity to attracting talent measurement
– this vital indicator assesses the technical skills of the
workforce, personal disposable income, employment
growth and GDP data. Canada, Germany, Australia
and the UK follow in 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th places,
respectively. Japan will also gain competitive advantage,
Valerie Germain
Financial Services practice
vgermain@heidrick.com
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 17
jumping from 4th to th place in its proclivity to
attract talent over the next five years.
There will also be significant demand for talent
originating in the high growth areas of Asia and the
other emerging markets. The demand for this talent
may outpace the supply. Despite the vast numbers of
graduates entering the workforce every year in these
countries, a relatively low proportion will have the skills
required by global financial service firms. Those that do
will be highly sought after and firms will need to offer
top compensation and career growth opportunities to
attract and secure their loyalty.
Interestingly, India, which earns its overall 0th place
ranking in the GTI primarily because of the talent pool
created by its huge population, will jump four places,
from 7th to 3th, in its proclivity to attract talent in
202. This is the country’s single biggest improvement
among all seven indices, reflecting a continued emphasis
on technical training at the secondary and tertiary levels
of education as well as a rapidly expanding middle-class.
The orientation of graduates is far more sophisticated
today because of their access to information from the
internet. ‘Generation Y’, those born between 977 and
2005, have grown up with computers, show no fear of
technology, take risks and are media-savvy and brand
conscious. They are an online generation whose new
social spheres are networking sites such as MySpace and
FaceBook. Within a few years, job podcasts by even the
most conservative of companies will become a reality.
The firms that understand this and position themselves
accordingly will reap the benefits.
One of the ongoing challenges in financial services
has been the thoughtfulness with which firms have
approached succession planning. This has been true
in some parts of the sector more than others but, as
the sources of talent change it will be increasingly
incumbent on all firms to mature the processes around
the development and retention of their next generation
of leadership talent.
‘Generation Y’, those born between 1977 and 2005, have grown
up with computers, show no fear of technology, take risks
and are media-savvy and brand conscious. They are an online
generation whose new social spheres are networking sites such
as MySpace and FaceBook. Within a few years, job podcasts by
even the most conservative of companies will become a reality.
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
18
Russia
Finland
Spain
Sweden
Norway
Germany
France
Portugal
Romania
Turkey
Denmark
Poland
Belarus
Ukraine
Greece
Cyprus
Neth.
Ireland
Lithuania
Latvia
Estonia
Greenland
Iceland
Ethiopia
Eritrea
Sudan
Egypt
Niger
Mauritania
Mali
Nigeria
Somalia
Libya
Chad
Algeria
Tunisia
Morocco
Benin
Ghana
Cote
D'Ivoire
Liberia
Sierra Leone
Guinea
Burkina Faso
Gambia
Western Sahara
Senegal
Guinea Bissau
Canary Islands
Jordan
Israel
Lebanon
Azerbaijan
Georgia
Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Kuwait
U. A. E.
Yemen
Syria
Iraq
Iran
Oman
Saudi Arabia
Afghanistan
Pakistan
Chin
Kazakhstan
Turkmenistan
Uzbekistan N
Mongolia
United Kingdom
Italy
e Verde Islands
Azores Islands
Austria Hungary
Bulgaria
Czech Rep.
Slovakia
Bel.
Albania
Mold.
Bosnia
& Herz.
Croatia
Slovenia
Switz.
Mac.
Qatar
Mont.
Serbia
Arctic Circle
e
r
Equator
Equat
N T I C
I N D I A
O C E A
Norwegian
Sea
Greenland
Sea
North
Sea
Mediterranean Sea
Baltic
Sea
Black Sea
Aral Sea
Arabian Sea
Barents Sea
Kara
Sea
R
e
d
S
e
a
Caspian
Sea
Appendices
Appendix A Methodology, 19
Appendix B Global Talent Index maps, 20
Appendix C Global Talent Index weighting, 22
Appendix D Overall GTI ranking, 23
Appendix E Demographics, 24
Appendix F Quality of compulsory education, 25
Appendix G Quality of universities and business schools, 26
Appendix H Quality of the environment to nurture talent, 27
Appendix I Mobility and relative openness of the labor market, 28
Appendix J Stock and flow of foreign direct investment, 29
Appendix K Proclivity to attracting talent, 30
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 19
Appendix A
Methodology
The Global Talent Index is the result of a
collaboration between Heidrick & Struggles
and the Economist Intelligence Unit; the
vision of the former was matched by the
research expertise of the latter. The Index
measures not only a country’s natural
potential for producing talent in socio-
demographic terms, but also the conditions
necessary to realize this potential. A country
may exhibit heady population growth but
without a supporting infrastructure and the
right cultural contexts, the talent margin
will not be able to fully develop.
To reflect this multi-layered analysis seven major
areas were determined to be of importance:
• demographics
• quality of compulsory education systems
• quality of universities and business schools
• quality of the environment to nurture talent
• mobility and relative openness of the labour market
• trends in foreign direct investment
• proclivity to attracting talent
Applying their respective areas of expertise in talent
assessment and data gathering, the project team from
both organizations drew up a list of variables with
which to measure the seven areas of interest. These
variables combine quantitative measures drawn from
a variety of local and international data sources,
with qualitative assessments from the Economist
Intelligence Unit’s network of country analysts and local
contributors. Forecasts were based on the Economist
Intelligence Unit’s macroeconomic model and country
analysts’ projections for qualitative variables. Some
variables, particularly for education, had to be assumed
to remain equal in five years, owing to the lack of
time on which to base projections. The data was then
normalized in order to obtain scores from  to 00
(where higher scores meant better performances on the
talent measures).
Finally, the project team set the weights of the different
variables in the overall Index by assigning scores from
 to 5 for each variable (where  = less important and
5 = of critical importance).
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
20
Appendix B
Global Talent Index maps
the world at 202
Arctic Circle
Tropic of Cancer
Tropic of Cancer
Tropic of Capricorn
Equator
Equator
Tropic of Capricorn
Antarctic Circle
Spain
Norway
Portugal
Ireland
Greenland
Iceland
United States
Canada
Mexico
The Bahamas
Cuba
Panama
El Salvador
Guatemala
Belize
Honduras
Nicaragua
Costa Rica
Jamaica
Haiti
Dominican Republic
Argentina
Bolivia
Colombia
Venezuela
Peru
Brazil
French Guiana
Suriname
Guyana
Chile
Ecuador
Paraguay
Uruguay
Mauritania
Mali
Algeria
Morocco
Ivory
Coast
Liberia
Sierra Leone
Guinea
Gambia
Western Sahara
Senegal
Guinea Bissau
United Kingdom
Canary Islands
CapeVerde Islands
Azores Islands
France
Russia
Puerto Rico
A T L A N T I C
P A C I F I C
A R C T I C
O C E A N
O C E A N
O C E A N
Beaufort
Sea
Caribbean Sea
Hudson Bay
Gulf of
Alaska
Baffin
Bay
Gulf of Mexico
Norwegian
Sea
2012
rank
country
rank
change
GTI
2012
GTI
2007
1 United States 0 53 52
2 United Kingdom + 2 48 46
3 Canada - 1 47 47
4 Netherlands - 1 46 46
5 Sweden 0 45 45
6 China + 2 44 42
Global Talent Index
ranking in 202
The map uses color to represent thirty countries’ overall talent
ranking at 202, indicating at a glance how countries score at
nurturing talent, from red-hot beds to blue cooler climates.
Global Talent Index scores in 2012 – numbers represent how countries score at nurturing talent
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 21
Togo
Russia
Finland
Spain
Sweden
Norway
Germany
France
Portugal
Romania
Turkey
Denmark
Poland
Belarus
Ukraine
Greece
Cyprus
Neth.
Ireland
Lithuania
Latvia
Estonia
Greenland
Iceland
United States
Canada
Brazil
Kenya
Ethiopia
Eritrea
Sudan
Egypt
Niger
Mauritania
Mali
Nigeria
Somalia
Namibia
Libya
Chad
South Africa
Tanzania
Dem. Rep.
Of Congo
Angola
Algeria
Madagascar
Mozambique
Botswana
Zambia
Gabon
Central African Republic
Tunisia
Morocco
Uganda
Burundi
Rwanda
Benin
Ghana
Cote
D'Ivoire
Liberia
Sierra Leone
Guinea
Burkina Faso
Gambia
Cameroon
SaoTome & Principe
Zimbabwe
Congo
Equatorial Guinea
Western Sahara
Senegal
Guinea Bissau
Canary Islands
Jordan
Israel
Lebanon
Azerbaijan
Georgia
Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Kuwait
U. A. E.
Yemen
Syria
Iraq
Iran
Oman
Saudi Arabia
Afghanistan
Pakistan India
China
Kazakhstan
Turkmenistan
Uzbekistan
Myanmar
Nepal
Sri Lanka
Mongolia
United Kingdom
Italy
Cape Verde Islands
Azores Islands
Puerto Rico
Venezuela
Guyana
Suriname
French Guyana
Austria Hungary
Bulgaria
Czech Rep.
Slovakia
Bel.
Albania
Mold.
Bosnia
& Herz.
Croatia
Slovenia
Switz.
Mac.
Qatar
Mont.
Serbia
Arctic Circle
T
r
o
p
i
c
o
f
C
a
n
c
e
r
Equator
Equator
Tropic of Capricorn
A T L A N T I C
I N D I A N
O C E A N
O C E A N
A R C T I C
O C E A N
Chukchi
Sea
Beaufort Sea
Hudson
Bay Baffin
Bay
Norwegian
Sea
Greenland
Sea
North
Sea
Mediterranean Sea
Baltic
Sea
Black Sea
Aral Sea
Arabian Sea
Bay
of
Bengal
Sea of
Okhotsk
Barents Sea
Kara
Sea
Leptev
Sea
R
e
d
S
e
a
Caspian
Sea
Russia
India
China
Burma
Thailand
Cambodia
Nepal
Bhutan
Vietnam
Sri Lanka
Laos
Bangladesh
Malaysia
Papua New Guinea
East Timor
Brunei
Sing.
Philippines
Malaysia
I n d o n e s i a
Japan
Mongolia
South Korea
North Korea
Australia
New Zealand
New Caledonia
Fiji
Antarctica
Vanuatu
Solomon Islands
Madagascar
Tropic of Cancer
Tropic of Capricorn
Equator
Tropic of Capricorn
Antarctic Circle
P A C I F I C
I N D I A N O C E A N
O C E A N
Bay
of
Bengal
South
China
Sea
Sea of Japan
East China
Sea
Yellow
Sea
Sea of
Okhotsk
Tasman Sea
Great
Australian
Bight
Ross Sea
2012
rank
country
rank
change
GTI
2012
GTI
2007
7 Germany - 1 44 43
8 Australia - 1 43 43
9 France 0 43 41
10 India 0 41 39
11 Spain 0 37 37
12 Malaysia 0 37 37
2012
rank
country
rank
change
GTI
2012
GTI
2007
13 South Korea + 2 37 34
14 Japan + 2 36 34
15 Poland - 2 35 35
16 Italy - 2 34 34
17 Ukraine + 2 34 33
18 Russia 0 34 33
2012
rank
country
rank
change
GTI
2012
GTI
2007
19 Mexico + 2 33 31
20 Greece 0 32 32
21 Argentina - 4 32 34
22 Thailand 0 30 31
23 South Africa + 1 30 29
24 Egypt + 1 29 29
2012
rank
country
rank
change
GTI
2012
GTI
2007
25 Brazil - 2 29 30
26 Turkey 0 29 27
27 Saudi Arabia + 1 26 23
28 Nigeria - 1 23 25
29 Indonesia 0 22 23
30 Iran 0 21 21
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
22
indicator weight: 1 to 5
Demographics
Population aged 20-59 5 
CAGR Population aged 20-59 (%) 0
Quality of compulsory education sectors
Duration of compulsory education 4 
Starting age of compulsory education 1 
Current education spending (% of GDP) 2 
Current education spending per pupil
as a % of GDP per capita
4 
Primary school enrollment ratio (%) 2 
Secondary school enrollment ratio (%) 4 
Mean years of schooling 4 
Adult literacy rate (% of pop over 15) 5 
Pupil/Teacher ratio, primary 2 
Pupil/Teacher ratio, lower secondary 2 
Pupil/Teacher ratio, upper secondary 2 
Quality of universities and business schools
Gross enrollment ratio ISCED 5 & 6 Total 4 
Number of business schools
ranked in world’s top 100
2 
Number of universities ranked
in world’s top 500
3 
Expenditure per student for higher
education (as % of GDP per capita)
3 
Quality of the environment to nurture talent
Share of the population aged 25-64
with tertiary level education
3 
Percentage of higher education graduates
in the Social Sciences, Business and Law
2 
Percentage of tertiary graduates
in the Sciences
4 
Researchers in R&D (per m pop) 4 
Technicians in R&D (per m pop) 1 
indicator weight: 1 to 5
R&D as % of GDP 5 
Cost of living 3 
Degree of restrictiveness of labor laws 4 
Wage regulation 1 
Quality of workforce 4 
Local managers 4 
Protection of intellectual property rights 1 
Protection of private property 3 
Meritocratic remuneration 4 
Mobility and relative openness of the labor market
Number of students studying overseas 2 
Number of overseas students studying in
country as a % of tertiary enrollment
4 
Language skills of the labor force 5 
Hiring of foreign nationals 4 
Openness of trade (exports + imports
% of GDP)
3 
Stock and flow of foreign direct investment
Average flow of FDI in previous five years
(% of GDP)
0
Average stock of FDI in previous five years
(% of GDP)
2 
Proclivity to attracting talent
Technical skills of the workforce 4 
Personal disposable income per capita
(US$ bn)
4 
Employment growth 3 
GDP per capita 0
GDP per capita (PPP) 4 
Nominal USD GDP 3 
PPP GDP 3 
Real GDP growth (%) 3 
Appendix C
Global Talent
Index weighting
Seven major areas were determined to be of importance
in researching and analysing the factors that determine
a country’s potential for producing talent. These are
listed here in the tables on the right. As the final step
in the data analysis, the project team from Heidrick &
Struggles and The Economist Intelligence Unit applied
their judgement to set the weights of the different
variables in the overall ranking by assigning scores from
 to 5 for each variable (where  = unimportant and 5
= critical importance). For example, in assessing the
quality of compulsory education, the starting age of a
country’s compulsory education was judged to be much
less significant than its adult literacy rate which were
weighted  and 5 respectively. This process ensures that
the final scores include a degree of insight from the
project team based on its specialist knowledge of
the subject.
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 23
Appendix D
Overall GTI
rankings
The two tables on the right show the ranking that each
of the thirty countries achieved in the study in 2007 and
the projection forward five years to 202. The arrows
between the columns show movement in rank over the
five-year period. Red arrows show warming talent, blue
shows where talent is cooling and green indicates where
no change has occurred.
2007
rank country GTI score
1 US 52
2 Canada 47
3 Netherlands 46
4 UK 46
5 Sweden 45
6 Germany 43
7 Australia 43
8 China 42
9 France 41
10 India 39
11 Spain 37
12 Malaysia 37
13 Poland 35
14 Italy 34
15 South Korea 34
16 Japan 34
17 Argentina 34
18 Russia 33
19 Ukraine 33
20 Greece 32
21 Mexico 31
22 Thailand 31
23 Brazil 30
24 South Africa 29
25 Egypt 29
26 Turkey 27
27 Nigeria 25
28 Saudi Arabia 23
29 Indonesia 23
30 Iran 21
2012
rank country GTI score
1 US 53
2 UK 48
3 Canada 47
4 Netherlands 46
5 Sweden 45
6 China 44
7 Germany 44
8 Australia 43
9 France 43
10 India 41
11 Spain 37
12 Malaysia 37
13 South Korea 37
14 Japan 36
15 Poland 35
16 Italy 34
17 Ukraine 34
18 Russia 34
19 Mexico 33
20 Greece 32
21 Argentina 32
22 Thailand 30
23 South Africa 30
24 Egypt 29
25 Brazil 29
26 Turkey 29
27 Saudi Arabia 26
28 Nigeria 23
29 Indonesia 22
30 Iran 21
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
24
Appendix E
Demographics
In assessing the demographic factors that affect
talent, the team analysed how many people of
working age, 20-59 years old, there were in each
of the thirty countries.
2007
rank country score
1 China 100
2 India 73
3 US 21
4 Indonesia 17
5 Brazil 13
6 Russia 10
7 Japan 8
8 Nigeria 7
9 Mexico 7
10 Germany 5
11 Turkey 5
12 Iran 5
13 Egypt 4
14 Thailand 4
15 UK 4
16 France 4
17 Italy 4
18 South Korea 3
19 Ukraine 3
20 Spain 3
21 Poland 2
22 South Africa 2
23 Argentina 2
24 Canada 2
25 Malaysia 1
26 Saudi Arabia 1
27 Australia 1
28 Netherlands 1
29 Greece 0
30 Sweden 0
2012
rank country score
1 China 100
2 India 76
3 US 20
4 Indonesia 17
5 Brazil 14
6 Russia 10
7 Nigeria 8
8 Japan 7
9 Mexico 7
10 Germany 5
11 Turkey 5
12 Iran 5
13 Egypt 5
14 Thailand 4
15 UK 4
16 France 3
17 Italy 3
18 South Korea 3
19 Ukraine 3
20 Spain 3
21 Poland 2
22 Argentina 2
23 South Africa 2
24 Canada 2
25 Malaysia 1
26 Saudi Arabia 1
27 Australia 1
28 Netherlands 1
29 Greece 0
30 Sweden 0
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 25
Appendix F
Quality of
compulsory
education
In assessing the quality of compulsory education,
the team looked at eleven variables which impact the
effectiveness of schooling as follows:
• duration of compulsory education
• starting age of compulsory education
• current education spending (% of GDP)
• current education spending per pupil as
a % of GDP per capita
• primary school enrolment ratio (%)
• secondary school enrolment ratio (%)
• mean years of schooling
• adult literacy rate (% of pop over 5)
• pupil/teacher ratio, primary
• pupil/teacher ratio, lower secondary
• pupil/teacher ratio, upper secondary
2007
rank country score
1 UK 74
2 Canada 73
3 Germany 72
4 Sweden 71
5 France 70
6 Netherlands 70
7 Australia 70
8 US 70
9 Spain 66
10 Japan 66
11 South Korea 66
12 Italy 64
13 Poland 64
14 Ukraine 63
15 Argentina 62
16 South Africa 59
17 Malaysia 59
18 Mexico 58
19 Thailand 57
20 Russia 56
21 Greece 55
22 Turkey 51
23 Brazil 50
24 India 44
25 Iran 42
26 China 41
27 Egypt 39
28 Indonesia 37
29 Nigeria 35
30 Saudi Arabia 33
2012
rank country score
1 UK 75
2 France 72
3 Netherlands 71
4 Canada 71
5 Germany 71
6 US 70
7 Sweden 69
8 Australia 68
9 Japan 66
10 South Korea 66
11 Spain 66
12 Ukraine 65
13 Italy 64
14 Poland 63
15 Argentina 60
16 Mexico 58
17 Thailand 58
18 South Africa 57
19 Greece 57
20 Malaysia 57
21 Turkey 54
22 Russia 53
23 Brazil 48
24 China 46
25 India 42
26 Iran 40
27 Egypt 39
28 Indonesia 38
29 Saudi Arabia 35
30 Nigeria 30
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
26
Appendix G
Quality of
universities and
business schools
The following variables were used as a measure of
both the reputation and resources of the business
schools and universities in each country as well as
their enrolment records:
• gross enrollment ratio ISCED 5 & 6 total
• number of business schools ranked in
world’s top 00
• number of universities ranked in world’s top 500
• expenditure per student for higher education
(as % of GDP per capita)
2007
rank country score
1 US 76
2 UK 43
3 Sweden 37
4 South Korea 35
5 Australia 35
6 Canada 33
7 Saudi Arabia 33
8 Germany 32
9 France 32
10 Netherlands 30
11 Greece 30
12 Spain 29
13 Russia 28
14 Japan 28
15 Egypt 28
16 Ukraine 26
17 Italy 26
18 Poland 25
19 Malaysia 22
20 Argentina 21
21 China 19
22 Thailand 16
23 Turkey 14
24 Mexico 12
25 Brazil 12
26 India 11
27 South Africa 9
28 Iran 8
29 Nigeria 6
30 Indonesia 5
2012
rank country score
1 US 78
2 UK 44
3 Sweden 38
4 South Korea 37
5 Australia 36
6 Germany 34
7 France 34
8 Canada 33
9 Saudi Arabia 33
10 Greece 30
11 Russia 30
12 Japan 30
13 Spain 30
14 Egypt 28
15 Ukraine 27
16 Poland 27
17 Italy 27
18 Netherlands 25
19 Malaysia 23
20 Argentina 22
21 China 20
22 Thailand 17
23 Mexico 15
24 Turkey 15
25 India 12
26 Brazil 10
27 South Africa 10
28 Iran 9
29 Nigeria 7
30 Indonesia 6
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 27
Appendix H
Quality of the
environment to
nurture talent
Assessing the quality of the environment involved
analysis of the following factors:
• share of the population aged 25-84 with
higher education
• percentage of higher education graduates in
the Social Sciences, Business and Law
• percentage of tertiary graduates in the Sciences
• researchers in R&D (per m pop)
• technicians in R&D (per m pop)
• R&D as % of GDP
• cost of living
• degree of restrictiveness of labor laws
• wage regulation
• quality of work force
• local managers
• protection of intellectual property rights
• protection of private property
• meritocratic remuneration
2007
rank country score
1 US 64
2 Netherlands 60
3 Canada 57
4 Japan 56
5 Sweden 53
6 Russia 52
7 Australia 52
8 Germany 52
9 France 49
10 UK 49
11 India 48
12 Spain 48
13 Ukraine 47
14 South Korea 46
15 Malaysia 45
16 Argentina 44
17 Mexico 44
18 Brazil 43
19 Italy 43
20 Poland 41
21 Thailand 41
22 China 41
23 Greece 41
24 South Africa 39
25 Iran 38
26 Nigeria 35
27 Egypt 35
28 Indonesia 35
29 Turkey 33
30 Saudi Arabia 28
2012
rank country score
1 US 64
2 Netherlands 60
3 Canada 58
4 Japan 56
5 Australia 55
6 Sweden 53
7 Germany 53
8 UK 53
9 France 52
10 South Korea 51
11 Russia 50
12 Spain 49
13 India 48
14 China 47
15 Mexico 46
16 Malaysia 43
17 Ukraine 43
18 Poland 43
19 Brazil 41
20 Greece 41
21 Italy 41
22 South Africa 39
23 Argentina 39
24 Thailand 39
25 Iran 36
26 Egypt 35
27 Turkey 34
28 Indonesia 32
29 Saudi Arabia 32
30 Nigeria 29
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
28
Appendix I
Mobility and
relative openness
of the labor
market
The variables used to measure the mobility and relative
openness of the labor market focus not only on the
number of people studying outside of their home
country and their language skills, but also on a country’s
tendency to hire foreign nationals to add diversity to its
workforce. These characteristics along with openness to
other cultures are crucial to creating and maintaining
talent flow:
• number of students studying overseas
• number of overseas students studying in country as a
% of enrollment in higher education
• language skills of the labor force
• hiring of foreign nationals
• openness of trade (exports + imports % of GDP)
2007
rank country score
1 Canada 73
2 UK 62
3 Germany 59
4 Netherlands 58
5 Australia 58
6 Sweden 54
7 Malaysia 52
8 France 51
9 US 49
10 India 47
11 China 46
12 South Africa 43
13 Thailand 41
14 Greece 41
15 Poland 41
16 Nigeria 40
17 Turkey 40
18 Italy 39
19 Spain 38
20 Argentina 38
21 Mexico 38
22 Ukraine 38
23 Brazil 37
24 Egypt 36
25 Russia 34
26 South Korea 34
27 Indonesia 30
28 Japan 30
29 Saudi Arabia 27
30 Iran 20
2012
rank country score
1 Canada 74
2 UK 64
3 Germany 61
4 Netherlands 60
5 Australia 59
6 Sweden 57
7 Malaysia 56
8 France 53
9 India 53
10 US 51
11 China 48
12 South Africa 46
13 Poland 43
14 Greece 42
15 Ukraine 42
16 Mexico 41
17 Italy 41
18 Turkey 40
19 South Korea 40
20 Spain 40
21 Russia 40
22 Argentina 39
23 Brazil 39
24 Egypt 39
25 Nigeria 37
26 Thailand 36
27 Japan 35
28 Saudi Arabia 32
29 Indonesia 29
30 Iran 20
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 29
Appendix J
Stock and flow
of foreign direct
investment
To determine the scores for this pillar of the research,
the project team looked at the average stock and at the
average flow of foreign direct investment (FDI) for
each country in the previous five years as a percentage
of GDP. However, it only used the figures for each
country’s average stock of FDI when calculating
this index.
2007
rank country score
1 Netherlands 100
2 Malaysia 73
3 Sweden 69
4 UK 50
5 Nigeria 47
6 Spain 45
7 Argentina 42
8 Australia 42
9 Canada 41
10 Thailand 40
11 Egypt 39
12 South Africa 39
13 Poland 38
14 France 36
15 China 36
16 Mexico 35
17 Germany 30
18 Brazil 29
19 Ukraine 23
20 US 15
21 Italy 14
22 Turkey 13
23 Saudi Arabia 12
24 South Korea 12
25 Greece 10
26 Russia 10
27 India 7
28 Indonesia 5
29 Iran 0
30 Japan 0
2012
rank country GTI score
1 Netherlands 100
2 Sweden 71
3 UK 56
4 Malaysia 53
5 South Africa 47
6 Canada 45
7 Egypt 42
8 France 41
9 Australia 40
10 Spain 38
11 Mexico 37
12 Poland 37
13 Thailand 31
14 Nigeria 30
15 Argentina 30
16 Ukraine 28
17 Germany 28
18 Brazil 26
19 China 25
20 Turkey 22
21 US 18
22 Italy 16
23 Russia 13
24 Indonesia 9
25 South Korea 9
26 India 9
27 Greece 8
28 Saudi Arabia 8
29 Japan 0
30 Iran 0
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
30
Appendix K
Proclivity to
attracting talent
Perhaps the most difficult area to define because of
its cultural nuance, is a country’s proclivity to attract
talent. In other words, why would anyone want to work
there? In assessing this final pillar of the research, the
project team looked at the following variables:
• technical skills of the workforce
• personal disposable income per capita (US$ bn)
• employment growth
• GDP per capita (PPP)
• nominal USD GDP
• PPP GDP
• real GDP growth (%)
2007
rank country score
1 US 39
2 Sweden 37
3 Canada 36
4 Germany 35
5 France 35
6 Australia 34
7 UK 33
8 Spain 31
9 Netherlands 31
10 Italy 30
11 Poland 29
12 Greece 26
13 Argentina 25
14 Japan 25
15 South Korea 23
16 Malaysia 23
17 India 23
18 Egypt 23
19 Russia 20
20 Mexico 20
21 Brazil 19
22 Iran 19
23 Saudi Arabia 19
24 Turkey 17
25 Nigeria 16
26 China 16
27 Ukraine 15
28 Indonesia 15
29 Thailand 14
30 South Africa 11
2012
rank country score
1 US 41
2 France 35
3 Canada 35
4 Germany 34
5 Australia 33
6 UK 33
7 Sweden 32
8 Spain 31
9 Italy 30
10 Netherlands 29
11 Japan 28
12 Malaysia 27
13 India 27
14 South Korea 27
15 Greece 26
16 Poland 24
17 Argentina 24
18 Mexico 24
19 Russia 23
20 Saudi Arabia 22
21 Turkey 22
22 Egypt 22
23 Ukraine 21
24 Brazil 20
25 Thailand 18
26 China 18
27 Iran 17
28 Nigeria 17
29 Indonesia 14
30 South Africa 11
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 31
Further reading
available on www.heidrick.com
‘The Leadership Team: Complementary Strengths or Conflicting Agendas’, Stephen A Miles and Michael D
Watkins, Harvard Business Review, April 2007
‘Roller Coaster Leadership’, Kevin Kelly, Business Strategy Review, Spring 2007
Getting Results in China: How China’s Tech Executives are Molding a New Generation of Leaders, (A joint research
project between Heidrick & Struggles and The Stanford Project on Regions of Innovation and Entrepreneurship)
Route to the Top, Dr Elisabeth Marx, Heidrick & Struggles, 2006
Executive Leadership in China, (A joint study between Heidrick & Struggles and the Economist Intelligence Unit)
Benchmarking Corporate Governance in China, (A joint research project carried out by Heidrick & Struggles and the
School of Management, Fudan University)
Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights
32
The Economist Intelligence Unit is the
world’s foremost provider of country,
industry and management analysis.
Founded in 946 when a director of
intelligence was appointed to serve The
Economist, the Economist Intelligence Unit
is now a leading research and advisory firm
with more than forty offices worldwide.
For nearly sixty years, the Economist Intelligence Unit
has delivered vital business intelligence to influential
decision-makers around the world. Its extensive
international reach and unfettered independence
makes it the most trusted and valuable resource
for international companies, financial institutions,
universities and government agencies.
The mission of the Economist Intelligence Unit is
to provide executives with authoritative analysis and
forecasts to make informed global decisions. It offers
three kinds of business intelligence: country analysis
on more than 200 markets, industry trends in eight
key sectors and latest management strategies and
best practices.
The nature of the operation and client base of the
Economist Intelligence Unit demands a global presence.
The head office is in London with major regional
centres in Hong Kong, Vienna and New York.
www.eiu.com
Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 33
China
Burma
Thailand
Cambodia
Nepal
Bhutan
Vietnam
Laos
Bangladesh
Malaysia
Papua New Guinea
East Timor
Brunei
Sing.
Philippines
Malaysia
I n d o n e s i a
Japan
Australia
New Caledonia
Fiji
Vanuatu
Solomon Islands
Tropic of Cancer
Tropic of Cap
Equator
Tropic of Capricorn
P A C I F I C
N O C
Bay
of
Bengal
South
China
Sea
East China
Sea
Yellow
Sea
Great
Australian
Bight
Amsterdam +31 (0)20 462 77 77
Atlanta +1 404 577 2410
Auckland +64 (0)9 3066630
Barcelona +34 (0)93 225 7300
Beijing +86 (0)10 65988288
Boston +1 617 737 6300
Brussels +32 (0)2 5420750
Buenos Aires +54 (0)11 43209950
Chicago +1 312 496 1000
Chongqing +86 (0)23 63001588
Cleveland +1 216 241 7410
Copenhagen +45 33 377 600
Dallas +1 214 706 7700
Denver +1 720 932 3839
Dusseldorf +49 (0)211 82820
El Segundo +1 310 321 3220
Encino +1 818 905 6010
Frankfurt +49 (0)69 697 0020
Hamburg +49 (0)40 3405770
Helsinki +358 9 2511250
Hong Kong +852 21039300
Houston +1 713 237 9000
Istanbul +90 (0)212 3510904
Johannesburg +27 (0)11 6856910
Lisbon +351 21 3514530
London +44 (0)20 7075 4000
Los Angeles +1 213 625 8811
Madrid +34 (0)91 391 5256
Melbourne +61 (0)3 90123000
Menlo Park +1 650 234 1500
Mexico City +52 (01)55 91380370
Miami +1 305 262 2606
Milan +39 02 762521
Minneapolis +1 612 215 6913
Moscow +7 495 225 9367
Mumbai +91 (0)22 66663021
Munich: Keplerstrasse +49 (0)89 998110
Munich: Sophienstrasse +49 (0)89 255477
New Delhi +91 (0)11 26451010
New York, Park Avenue +1 212 867 9876
New York, Wall Street +1 212 699 3000
Paris +33 (0)1 4434 1700
Philadelphia +1 215 988 1000
Rome +39 06 8537 5801
San Francisco +1 415 981 2854
Santiago +56 (0)2 2033660
Sao Paulo +55 11 550 44000
Seoul +82 (0)2 34306000
Shanghai +86 (0)21 61361988
Singapore +65 63325001
Stamford +1 203 252 2900
Stockholm +46 (0)8 4067100
Sydney +61 (0)2 8205 2000
Taipei +886 (0)2 27576123
Tokyo +81 (0)3 55106800
Toronto +1 416 361 4700
Tysons Corner +1 703 848 2500
Vienna +43 (0)1 53310070
Warsaw +48 (0)22 5849898
Washington DC +1 202 331 4900
Zurich +41 (0)44 4881313
Heidrick & Struggles
our global capability
Connecting leaders around the globe is
what Heidrick & Struggles does best.
For over fifty years we have been building
deep relationships with the world’s
most talented individuals on behalf of
the world’s most successful companies.
Through the strategic acquisition,
development and retention of talent
we help our clients – from the most
established market giants to the
newest market disruptors – build
winning leadership teams.
www.heidrick.com
For general enquiries about the Heidrick & Struggles
Global Talent Index or to order more copies of the wall map
and booklet please email talentmap@heidrick.com
For press inquiries please contact Narda Shirley at
narda@gongcommunications.com

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Mapping Global Talent

  • 1. Arc tic Circle Tropic of Cancer Trop ic of Cancer Tropic of Capricorn Equ ator Equator Tropic of Capr icorn Antarctic Circle Spain Norway Portugal Ireland Greenland Iceland United States Canada Mexico The Bahamas Cuba Panama El Salvador Guatemala Belize Honduras Nicaragua Costa Rica Jamaica Haiti Dominican Republic Argentina Bolivia Colombia Venezuela Peru Brazil French Guiana Suriname Guyana Chile Ecuador Paraguay Uruguay Mauritania Mali Algeria Morocco Ivory Coast Liberia Sierra Leone Guinea Gambia Western Sahara Senegal Guinea Bissau United Kingdom Canary Islands CapeVerde Islands Azores Islands France Russia Puerto Rico A T L A N T I C P A C I F I C A R C T I C O C E A N O C E A N O C E A N Beaufort Sea Caribbean Sea Hudson Bay Gulf of Alaska Baffin Bay Gulf of Mexico Norwegian Sea Togo Russia Finland Spain Sweden Norway Germany France Portugal Romania Turkey Denmark Poland Belarus Ukraine Greece Cyprus Neth. Ireland Lithuania Latvia Estonia Greenland Iceland United States Canada Brazil Kenya Ethiopia Eritrea Sudan Egypt Niger Mauritania Mali Nigeria Somalia Namibia Libya Chad South Africa Tanzania Dem. Rep. Of Congo Angola Algeria Madagascar Mozambique Botswana Zambia Gabon Central African Republic Tunisia Morocco Uganda Burundi Rwanda Benin Ghana Cote D'Ivoire Liberia Sierra Leone Guinea Burkina Faso Gambia Cameroon SaoTome & Principe Zimbabwe Congo Equatorial Guinea Western Sahara Senegal Guinea Bissau Canary Islands Jordan Israel Lebanon Azerbaijan Georgia Kyrgyzstan Tajikistan Kuwait U. A. E. Yemen Syria Iraq Iran Oman Saudi Arabia Afghanistan Pakistan India China Kazakhstan Turkmenistan Uzbekistan Myanmar Nepal Sri Lanka Mongolia United Kingdom Italy Cape Verde Islands Azores Islands Puerto Rico Venezuela Guyana Suriname French Guyana Austria Hungary Bulgaria Czech Rep. Slovakia Bel. Albania Mold. Bosnia & Herz. Croatia Slovenia Switz. Mac. Qatar Mont. Serbia Arctic Circle Tr op ic of Ca nc er Eq ua tor Eq ua to r Tropic of Capricorn A T L A N T I C I N D I A N O C E A N O C E A N A R C T I C O C E A N Chukchi Sea Beaufort Sea Hudson Bay Baffin Bay Norwegian Sea Greenland Sea North Sea Mediterranean Sea Baltic Sea Black Sea Aral Sea Arabian Sea Bay of Bengal Sea of Okhotsk Barents Sea Kara Sea Leptev Sea Re d Se a Caspian Sea Russia India China Burma Thailand Cambodia Nepal Bhutan Vietnam Sri Lanka Laos Bangladesh Malaysia Papua New Guinea East Timor Brunei Sing. Philippines Malaysia I n d o n e s i a Japan Mongolia South Korea North Korea Australia N New Cal Antarctica Solo Madagascar Tropic of Cancer Equator Tropic of Capricorn Antarctic Circle P A C I F I C I N D I A N O C E A N Bay of Bengal South China Sea Sea of Japan East China Sea Yellow Sea Sea of Okhotsk Tasman Sea Great Australian Bight Ross Sea Mapping Global Talent Essays and Insights Developed in co-operation with
  • 2. Arctic C Tropic of Cancer Equator Greenland United States Canada Mexico The Bahamas Cuba Panama El Salvador Guatemala Belize Honduras Nicaragua Costa Rica Jamaica Haiti Dominican Republic Colombia Venezuela Su Guyana Ecuador Puerto Rico A T L A N P A C I F I C O C E A N Caribbean Sea Hudson Bay Gulf of Alaska Baffin Bay Gulf of Mexico Copyright © 2007 The Economist Intelligence Unit Ltd and Heidrick & Struggles International Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction without permission is prohibited. Trademarks and logos are copyrights of their respective owners. Printed in the USA. Printed on recycled paper made from 100% consumer waste.
  • 3. Mapping Global Talent Essays and Insights contents Executive summary, 2 Essays and Insights, 4 Leadership Consulting – How to attract, develop and retain talent in a shifting global landscape, 4 Consumer – I shop therefore I am, 6 Professional services – Rising temperatures, 8 Technology – A future imperative, 10 Industrial – The tale of two worlds, 12 Life Sciences – A healthy future? 14 Financial Services – Accounting for talent, 16 Appendices, 18 Methodology, 19 Global Talent Index maps, 20 Global Talent Index weighting, 22 Overall GTI rankings, 23 Demographics, 24 Quality of compulsory education, 25 Quality of universities and business schools, 26 Quality of the environment to nurture talent, 27 Mobility and relative openness of the labor market, 28 Stock and flow of foreign direct investment, 29 Proclivity to attracting talent, 30 Further reading, 31 Economist Intelligence Unit, 32 Welcome to the Global Talent Index, a unique research study designed to identify where talent is located in the world today and where it will be located five years from now. The wall map demonstrates talent’s distribution in 202, while this booklet of short essays examines the challenges and opportunities opening up in different industries. The theme that recurs repeatedly is that the successful organizations of the future will be those able not just to attract the brightest global talent, but nurture, develop and retain it by offering a compelling work environment and sophisticated succession strategies. I believe it will be the provision of a learning environment that will determine the iconic market leading companies in years to come. We already know that Generation Y – those born between 977 and 2005 – will have had an average of fourteen jobs by the time they are 38. The next generation is more demanding, fickle and sophisticated than any other. Sophisticated talent demands sophisticated talent management. I hope the Global Talent Index reveals a lot more about the future we face and how we can best prepare for it. Ignorance is bliss? Not in the world of talent. L Kevin Kelly CEO, Heidrick & Struggles, September 2007
  • 4. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 2 Executive summary Talent is the new oil and just like oil, demand far outstrips supply In early 2007 Heidrick & Struggles, in partnership with the Economist Intelligence Unit, undertook a study to encapsulate the current state of global talent and its future configuration around the planet. Which countries have the strongest pipeline? Where will talent thrive over the next five years? What will change? And what impact should that have on how companies plan strategically for the medium term? The resulting research, incorporating the data analysis of thirty countries, shows subtle shifts and changes as it measures global talent in 2007 and anticipates future realities in 202. Using a unique and proprietary algorithm, the Heidrick & Struggles Global Talent Index (GTI) uses quantitative and qualitative data to measure the economic indicators, cultural contexts, trends in education, foreign direct investment (FDI), mortality, health and market fluidity that will impact the ability of talent to thrive within these countries. This combination of objective data and local knowledge proved particularly helpful in enabling the Economist Intelligence Unit to assess the more data- poor economies: allowing us to tell a talent story that would otherwise have remained hidden. Money talks The findings confirm a basic suspicion – talent follows where money leads. As a consequence, perhaps unsurprisingly, talent is most likely to be found in developed, wealthy economies, led by the US (which tops the table in 2007 and 202), followed by the UK and Canada and the two smaller, but open economies of Sweden and the Netherlands. The inclusion of Sweden and the Netherlands, along with Australia, in the Top 0 talent rankings shows that this trend is consistent even in countries where demographic factors are weak. Specifically: it is not just the size of the potential talent pool that matters, but how it is nurtured. Political structure influences talent growth The results in the lower half of the rankings are more ambiguous. Not all countries in the bottom ten are equal: they range from Greece to Iran, through Brazil and Saudi Arabia. In part this comes down to the number of countries selected – analysis of thirty economies cannot fully reflect the different levels of development across the world. Nevertheless, certain themes emerge, particularly from the bottom five. A common trend is that several of the least promising performers do not currently boast fully-functioning democracies. This opens up an interesting avenue for further research into the links between an open society and the development of talent.
  • 5. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 3 BRIC is IC A key finding revealed by this research, and supported by prior academic studies conducted by the Economist Intelligence Unit, is that the often repeated, media friendly ‘BRIC’ story – the inexorable rise of Brazil, Russia, India and China – is more accurately expressed as an ‘IC’ story. India and China sit in the top ten (0th and 6th respectively in 202) whereas Russia occupies 8th place both now and in 202, and Brazil falls from 23rd place now to 25th place in five years time. The fact that Russia stays stable overall masks a gradual erosion in the quality of its compulsory education system, which has been steadily falling since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 99. In spite of the increased investment in higher education, weaknesses in primary and secondary education provision are likely to have an adverse impact on the country’s ability to develop its talent resources over the longer term – a waste of Russia’s undoubted natural potential. China and India do benefit from their large populations but China also performs relatively well in terms of its educational infrastructure and its ability to attract foreign investment. Meanwhile India out-performs China on several measures related to the labor force – widespread knowledge of English throughout the general population being an obvious example. Foreign direct investment remains a key catalyst for the development of talent Malaysia exemplifies the power of foreign direct investment (FDI) and achieves its 2th place position (in both 2007 and 202) largely because of the amount of foreign investment flowing across its borders. FDI is at a premium within the talent index since it is normally accompanied by imports of technological and managerial best practice. In addition, as foreign companies become established they often seek to replace expatriates with local employees, creating demand for new jobs and new skills. Mexico is another example of the potential power of FDI, rising two places (from 2st place to 9th place) because of a strong rise in the stock of FDI over the forecast period. Mexico’s proximity to the US and its entry into the North American Free Trade Organization (NAFTA) in 994 has given it the edge over other Latin American countries (for example Brazil), boosting annual FDI inflows to around US$20bn. Black and white and shades of grey The GTI concentrates on seven focus areas (see Methodology on page 9). The Index is a subtle tool, but in certain cases the brushstrokes are too broad, making changes in the rankings appear more dramatic than they are. Two slightly weakening performers would seem to be Germany and Australia, but their fall in the rankings by one place (from 6th to 7th for Germany, and 7th to 8th for Australia) is more the result of China’s advance rather than any intrinsic deterioration of their talent pools – indeed, Germany’s overall score actually improves by one point in the five year period analyzed by this study. This note of caution should be borne in mind when examining any index as small changes in score can combine to result in significant alterations in rank. A case in point is Argentina, which falls by four places on the back of a score that falls by only two points. Today’s leading pools of talent may not be under pressure just yet but companies who want to flourish in the future must adopt a global view of recruitment. China and India are emerging as significant players and cannot be ignored. All over the world employees are behaving as consumers, able to pick and choose the companies they wish to work for: employers must to do everything they can to cultivate a powerful, persuasive reputation for talent management if they are to safeguard their long-term talent resources.
  • 6. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 4 Leadership Consulting How to attract, develop and retain talent in a shifting global landscape The implications of the Global Talent Index (GTI) for identifying, developing and retaining the best executive talent are four-fold: • The search map – the area in which talent can be found – has changed. • New global leaders must have very specific competencies. • Development opportunities need to be much more targeted. • Retention should start on the first day of employment. The search map Our research shows a significant expansion in the area of the search map. Most searches for large companies are now global, targeting executives in Asia, Europe and the US for key positions in international companies all over the world. This new class of global executive has common features: they have an MBA from a top business school; they have several years of international experience and are typically fluent in several languages. My own research revealed that in 996, only 42% of top CEOs in the United Kingdom had international experience but by 2005, this figure had nearly doubled with 79% of chief executives boasting experience abroad. Executives are also expected to have far more cross- sector experience than before with a track record of making lateral moves during their careers. In response to the ‘War for Talent’, search firms are now tracking international high-fliers proactively and for the long term. For example, Heidrick & Struggles’ China initiative specifically tracks Chinese nationals with international backgrounds who want to return home. Search firms need to continue to work much more strategically with companies; the ad-hoc filling of empty posts as they arise needs to be replaced by a holistic, focused and flexible approach which incorporates the assessment, development and training of existing executives alongside the recruitment of new talent. The new global leaders The complexity, pace and global platform of today’s business environment demands a special set of characteristics. Apart from heightened requirements in terms of background and experience, the leadership criteria have changed dramatically over the last 0 years: there is now no substitute for global leadership experience. However, when looking at the GTI and the concentration of talent across the globe, one key question emerges: how can we better assess the global leadership capabilities of the various talent pools? Dr Elisabeth Marx Leadership Consulting emarx@heidrick.com
  • 7. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 5 From a search consultant’s point of view these are the essential characteristics to look for in the new global leader. International literacy • Operating in different geographic regions. • Understanding the cultural differences of employees and customers. • Dealing with ambiguity – those executives who demand an excessive amount of certainty and rigid frameworks do not generally adapt well to the complex cultural patterns of working in foreign countries and with different sensibilities. • Enjoying diversity in a psychological sense. Managing paradoxes • Taking a helicopter-view and think strategically whilst keeping the focus on operational results. • Switching easily between different modes: from long-term thinking to short-term, and from cost- saving to expansion and growth. • The flexibility to handle these potential paradoxes is the key characteristic of future top executives. The ability to build successful teams The emphasis on the CEO as the ‘hero’ is waning. Business success at the top (and farther down the organization) depends on the leader pulling effective teams together. Our research shows that very few companies have highly effective teams at the top and a common complaint is that while there are individual strengths, “the team is not working together”. Companies are already beginning to address this issue, and we are seeing much more active intervention at the top level as CEOs engage external help in aligning the team with business strategy. The new development program Large companies are increasingly creating their own universities to train staff from around the world. There has also been a rise in the provision of in-house and bespoke programs from international business schools. Samsung, for example, has created its own talent pipeline by first recruiting people of different nationalities from leading business schools and universities around the world, and then putting them through its in-house training and development center. The coaching industry, a largely unregulated area, is also exploding, answering a growing demand for the development of ‘softer’ skills such as teaching, negotiating and listening. In the future, to give executives the support they require, we would expect the provision of such skills to be provided by business school programmes and follow-up coaching. Retention and career management of the best The best are constantly offered jobs by your competitors – how can you retain them over longer periods of time? The answer is a better analysis and understanding of their motivational make-up so that you can offer productive career support and development. Employer anxiety about top executives leaving can prevent sensible career discussions from taking place. Bosses often completely avoid the subject with their employees, leaving the employee feeling under-valued and unfulfilled, resulting in turnover at the most senior level. Having an internal or external career development function helps executives clarify what they want and what they would like the next step of their career to be. The company is then able to construct a scenario where this can be achieved. The companies that will grow in this new talent geography are those which coach, motivate and develop their own talent in tandem with an inclusive, global recruitment process. “The answer is a better analysis and understanding of their motivational make-up …”
  • 8. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 6 Consumer I shop therefore I am How do you cater to a fickle global consumer who wants the latest and greatest product for half the price? That is the question troubling the consumer industry. Higher levels of discretionary income with the rise of the middle classes in India and China, combined with ever more sophisticated consumer tastes, have created a world where the customer is king (but always on the look out for a bigger, better value crown!) The growing spending power of the developing world is startling. Today in China the middle class numbers over 300 million people – that is the same figure as the current population of the USA. Meanwhile, assuming steady growth over two decades, India is poised to overtake Germany as the world’s fifth-biggest consumer market by 2025. The developed world cannot match this aggressive consumerism, but the next five years will see a rise in tempo as key retail giants fight over a population that is developing ever more precise ideas of what they want to spend their money on. The pressures this consumerism puts on product development, supply chain and price has resulted in strong retail concentration – for example, in the US, Home Depot and Sears hold sway in the homeware arena, in the UK grocery store Tesco is the leader, while Carrefour dominates in France. These giants expect the very latest in product development, durability, design and price and small scale suppliers – finding it hard to keep up – are increasingly being incorporated into larger conglomerates with only the Nestlés, the PepsiCos and the Krafts able to square up to the big retail firms. In talent terms this never-ending drive for innovation will see an exponential increase in the value of R&D expertise. The pipeline must be primed to produce a constant stream of new products that will impress the consumer. Throwing money at innovation isn’t the solution – many large companies have been tripped up by this in the past and have in turn been outsmarted by smaller, more nimble competitors. Outsourcing will become an important pressure valve, as some companies are already finding to their advantage. At Procter & Gamble, 35% of all its new products have elements that originate from outside the company, up from about 5% in 2000. They say this kind of collaboration has seen R&D productivity increase by nearly 60%, while R&D investment as a percentage of sales has fallen from 4.8% in 2000 to 3.4% today. Torrey Foster Consumer practice tfoster@heidrick.com
  • 9. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 7 The case of Procter & Gamble highlights the fact that survival in the consumer industry will come to rely not just on investment of resources but also on good management. Their R&D operation is working because it is being well-directed with a clear strategy. This has important implications for managerial talent in the sector. Those individuals who will perform best in 202 and beyond will be those who are able to manage the R&D function in a global context. These managers will be skilled at forecasting customer and supplier behavior and trends, and they will have an extremely detailed understanding of supply chain vagaries and imperatives. They will also need to be media-savvy. The single biggest challenge in the consumer sector over the next five years will be the increasing difficulty of communicating to consumers and potential employees. An astonishing range of media channels compete for the consumer’s attention, and the industry’s dilemma will be how to ensure their brand message – be it about online stores, green policies or the latest new products, is actually seen by their customers (before they see what the competition has on offer). So where will this talent be found? The educational ranking of the Global Talent Index indicates that unsurprisingly, over the next five years the US, Canada and Europe will be the predominant suppliers of top quality graduates. What is surprising and perhaps the consequence of heightened visa restrictions is that the United States registers a low score for mobility of labor and relative openness of its labor market. This measure records the language skills of the population, the number of international students studying in the country and the number of nationals studying in foreign universities. The USA scores 9th place in 2007, and falls to 0th place in 202, overtaken by India. This is not the case in Canada, the UK or Germany, which score st, 2nd and 3rd place respectively in this particular ranking, both today and in 202. This would suggest that, if it is to realize its full educational and demographic potential, the US must encourage greater immigration and emigration, helping future American managers gain the international experience which will allow them to compete in (and fully understand) the global consumer market. American companies in the consumer sector have not traditionally had a reputation for nurturing their own talent, innovation being the key concern. However, there is evidence that the giants in the industry are realizing the value of managing and developing the talent they have – Wal-Mart for example, has ongoing initiatives to develop its own talent, including a leadership-in-training program and a leader-to-leader project for managers, aiming to push decision-making power down the management ladder. They have also introduced a new pilot program through which employees can alert the company of their talents and ambitions and, once assessed, managers recommend ways for them to pursue their skills, through secondments, evening classes, language lessons etc. This idea of temporary foreign work placements recalls that key talent trend – to be fully successful in the world of tomorrow, international experience will be indispensable. “to realize its full educational and demographic potential the US must encourage greater immigration and emigration, helping future American managers gain the international experience which will allow them to compete in (and fully understand) the global consumer market”
  • 10. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 8 Professional Services Rising temperatures The professional services sector is developing a split personality. On the one hand, it is made up of internationally- known US and European firms with thousands of employees and years of experience, ready to perform almost any task for a corporate client. On the other, it incorporates a myriad of young firms, from call-centers in Croatia to large, fast-growing Indian outfits, all of which are low-cost and, in most cases, highly competitive in terms of basic skills and business processes. Historically, the two sides have co-existed fairly peacefully: increasingly over the next five years, the competition will start to heighten. With the outlook for global economic growth slightly less buoyant, the traditional professional services industry will find quick wins harder to come by. Clients will increasingly pick and choose services by price and value, as opposed to reputation, depth of experience and international reach. At the same time, the young offshoring companies will continue to migrate into higher-end services, encroaching on more of the core activities of their well- established competitors. As a result, offshoring – “hiring” another company’s talent to cut costs – is expected to show compound annual growth rates of more than 5%. By contrast the traditional professional services sector, will grow at around half that rate. Given this, both sides of the sector will need to make the procurement of talent a top priority in the next five years. Both will depend on similar methods for finding their new hires – vigorous recruiting at the university level and strong networking skills for identifying managers from other professions who might be persuaded to change careers. Both sides of the business will also need to develop strong internal recruiters who know how to promote the firm and who are adept at building networks of qualified candidates in the communities where their companies operate. The first stop will be universities. Both at home and abroad, the reputation and quality of a country’s universities will be a key measurement for recruiters. The Global Talent Index’s ranking of the quality of universities and business schools – which assesses the number of universities ranked globally among the top five-hundred, the number of business schools ranking in the world’s top one-hundred and the spending per student on higher education as a percentage of GDP per capita – shows a number of important developments in this regard. In 202, for example, the GTI score shows that the top five countries measured by the quality of their Krishnan Rajagopalan Business & Professional Services practice krajagopalan@heidrick.com
  • 11. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 9 universities and business schools will be unchanged from 2007 with the US, the UK, Sweden, South Korea and Australia scoring 78, 44, 38, 37, and 36 in 202 respectively (out of a possible 00 points). However, there will be significant movement below these top- ranked countries, with Germany, France, Russia, Japan and Poland all moving up two places to 6th, 7th, th 2th and 6th respectively (out of the ranking of thirty countries). Russia’s advance stands in stark contrast to the lower quality of its compulsory education, where it ranks 22nd in the 202 ranking, down two places from 20th in 2007. The two measurements underline Russia’s growing commitment to higher education, with junior and high-school facilities receiving a lower priority. Given the advances of both Germany and France, Canada and Saudi Arabia will both drop two places to 8th and 9th on the 202 ranking of the quality of universities and business schools. Lower down the ranking, China will hold steady at 2st place with India moving up one level to 25th; these figures are naturally distorted due to the size of the population and the method of assessment, which is spread per capita. While both of these countries will continue to support high- quality higher education over the next five years and will have tremendous talent pools, the sheer number of their populations pulls down their ranking in the expenditure per student measurement. As the developing world continues to pile into the offshoring business, the range of industries “hiring” capital will continue to grow over the next five years. Even the most conservative, security-conscious sectors will be seeking to reduce costs by moving their more routine businesses to offshore facilities. In the legal profession, for example, more highly skilled work such as litigation research, traditionally carried out by paralegals in-house, and intellectual property work involving patent research, analysis, and drafting of patent applications, is expected to move to offshoring facilities. Given the continued need for versatile, talented staff for both sides of the professional services sector – offshore and onshore – firms will need to do the following: Think globally regarding talent pools and talent competition They will need to source globally for roles that they have previously looked to fill locally and they will need to keep in mind that the talent competition is leveling out with the traditional competitor and the offshore company looking for exactly the same talent but with a different value proposition. Think creatively on channels for talent acquisition One of the key resources in the years ahead will be the industry’s own employees. In particular, employee referral programs will become more popular. These generally offer cash rewards and prizes to employees for successfully referred candidates. For KPMG, nearly 39% of the firm’s experienced hires came through employee referrals. For smaller firms the percentage will be less but just as valuable, particularly considering the low cost of acquiring talent in this manner. Innovate the HR function With talent in short supply, organizations should elevate HR to the highest levels, acknowledging that talent is the only competitive advantage. Leading companies need to customize their HR processes to align with business objectives and create a results-oriented, performance culture. Be ready – the global talent war in professional services is just beginning to heat up.
  • 12. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 10 Technology A future imperative After years of hype, the technological future is almost here. The networked home, the truly portable office, easy-to-use video conferencing and collaborative, online project management all promise to become realities over the next five years. This will have one effect – the search for talent in the IT and telecoms sectors will intensify as corporate and consumer spending outpaces global economic growth. Even the most traditional non-technical companies will need to upgrade to Web 2.0 online environments and the latest hi-tech equipment in order to maintain productivity and competitiveness. At the same time, consumers will continue to demand the latest electronic gadgets complete with internet access, such as designer smartphones, portable gaming consoles, and networked appliances for the home. In the telecoms sector, sales of the ubiquitous mobile phone will continue to grow, even as world penetration levels rise to over 50%. In addition to buoyant sales in emerging markets, demand will be sustained by upgrades to web-enabled handsets, which will be used to pay for purchases, to check e-mails, download music, watch TV and make and receive texts and calls. Fixed- line telecom companies will need to meet the challenge of web-based telephony and converged networks, providing their customers with much more than plain vanilla voice services. Given these trends, a flexible, collaborative, global workforce will be a top priority for virtually all multinationals in the IT and telecoms sectors. In order to retain top-flight people around the world, companies are already developing techniques for plugging their people into closed system internal corporate recruiting networks using the latest technology. For example, IBM now manages its workforce globally using a system called Professional Marketplace, which provides rapid online access to the HR profiles of over 70,000 employees. These profiles are updated regularly in order to reflect work experiences and skills. Using this system, managers can quickly identify suitably-skilled employees from around the world to meet the needs of each project. Microsoft uses something similar, called distributed engineering, where engineers around the world can collaborate online. With the best IT and telecom companies experiencing turnover rates as high as 5%, retaining talent will become an even greater concern in the years ahead. As a result, non-compensation based benefits – such as childcare and flexible working hours – will rise in importance. SAS Institute, the world’s largest privately held software and related services provider, has a 4% Daniel Cheng Technology practice dcheng@heidrick.com
  • 13. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 11 employee turnover, which it attributes in part to its on- site day care center. The company also has around five employees who focus full-time on helping employees deal with the needs of their ageing parents. The Global Talent Index reveals that the tech sector will continue to recruit primarily from the US over the next several years as it retains its dominance in terms of the quality of universities and business schools – the key factor in developing new talent in these fields. The US will be followed by the UK and Sweden in Europe. Saudi Arabia will hold a similar position in the Middle East. The countries to watch in terms of an improving overall quality for nurturing talent are Australia and South Korea, as well as China, which will leap eight places to rank 4th by 202. A declining country in this category is Russia, which is predicted to sink from 6th place to th over the next five years primarily due to the gradual erosion of its education system since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 99. This trend will not be countered significantly by the rising investment the Russian government is putting into higher education as it will take more than five years for these improvements to have a significant effect on the Russian ability to nurture talent. The ten countries with the greatest proclivity for attracting talent (assessing the technical skills of the work force, personal disposable income, employment growth and GDP data) will remain largely unchanged over the next five years, with North America and Europe retaining their overall dominance. France will take over the number two spot currently held by Sweden, which will slip to 7th place. This leap can be attributed in part to Nicolas Sarkozy’s new government and his modernising of France’s traditional working practice restrictions. On demographics, China and India rank first and second place respectively. We can predict that these two countries will yield an increasing number of talented graduates in the hi-tech sector given their strong tradition of engineering and science at the university level. This, plus the increased presence of foreign multinationals in China, has helped boost the country up the overall ranking from 8th place in 2007 to 6th place in 202. India holds firm at 0th overall, aided by its gradual improvement in the quality of its environment to nurture talent, the mobility of its labor and relative openness of its labor market. “Even the most traditional non- technical companies will need to upgrade to Web 2.0 online environments and the latest hi- tech equipment in order to maintain productivity and competitiveness.”
  • 14. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 12 Industrial The tale of two worlds Top-flight graduates will be harder to lure into the industrial manufacturing sector over the next five years. Recruiters who understand this fact will be at an advantage. The reasons are simple – the global manufacturing sector will grow at a relatively slow pace over the next few years, led by strength in emerging markets. Global passenger car sales, for example, will rise by an average of only 3.5% per year until 202 and the increase will be driven by demand in China and India. Sales in the developed world will remain disappointing; with the US market set to stagnate and those in western Europe and Japan expected to grow by a modest 2 to 4%. The energy sector will exhibit similarly low-key growth with global energy demand per head expected to average 2.4% per year over the next few years. Slower demand will be the result of high prices and an increased move toward energy conservation in the developed world. There will be a similar story in other major industrial sectors. Given this trend, traditional manufacturing industries and energy companies will need to tackle their less than sparkling growth profile head on and wring as much talent as possible out of emerging markets. One tactic will be the establishment of local training units in the fast growing markets. In China, for example, the logistics firm DHL has already set up its own Logistics Management University, which teaches new recruits everything from courier business to supply chain management. The downside, however, will be losing staff almost as quickly as they are trained. “Multinational operations in China must contend with a 20 to 30% annual staff turnover rate and recruit ,000 plus employees annually,” says Indranil Sen, a Vice President for strategic intelligence at DHL. “With two years’ experience in logistics, many employees will job-hop and start work for another firm, the incentive being a 50% pay increase.” In the developed world, manufacturing companies can retain trained staff if they are willing to give international opportunities to their top performers. And this trend will be seen all the way up the management structure. In a recent survey of US and European CEOs by the Economist Intelligence Unit, 60% of respondents said their senior management teams will become more international over the next three years. Opportunities for senior management in the emerging markets look set to grow – Chinese automakers, for example, will be keen to hire Western managers over the next five years as they begin to expand into foreign markets. Dale Visokey Industry practice dvisokey@heidrick.com
  • 15. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 13 In the US and European aerospace and defense industries, the major talent challenge over the next five years will be a greying workforce. According to the Aerospace Industries Association, the average aerospace/ defense engineer in the US is currently nearly sixty years old. By 2008, approximately 27% of employed engineers will be eligible for retirement, and during the next decade, the number of employees with science and engineering degrees reaching traditional retirement age will triple. In the developing world, the exact opposite is true, with science and engineering degrees becoming increasingly popular as a means to move up the income ladder. However, visa restrictions in the US and Europe, limiting the immigration of foreign professionals, will remain tough. As a result, the growing ranks of Asian graduates will be increasingly absorbed on their home ground by native firms and the US and European companies locating new manufacturing facilities in these faster growing emerging economies. Given this imbalance, the aerospace and engineering industries will need to make a big effort to attract and retain new graduates, through the establishment of programs that support research, pre-graduation internships, and mentoring activities once a new recruit signs on. Retention will be a major problem; in the aerospace industry, the attrition rate in the one to six year range will be approximately two times greater than in the overall new graduate population. The manufacturing sector also demands blue-collar talent – those steady workers who contribute to the success of a business through a commitment to quality and productivity. Several fast growing developing markets – China in particular – will be an increasingly attractive source of these skills. The Global Talent Index’s ‘flow of foreign direct investment’ (FDI) measurement reveals that some other countries are likely to become more important in this regard. South Africa will rise seven places to rank fifth on the FDI ranking by 202, a movement that reflects the country’s growing role as a supplier of goods and services to the rest of the African continent as well as overseas. Other countries which will rise up the FDI ranking include Mexico (up five places to th) Egypt, Ukraine, and France. “In a recent survey of US and European CEOs by the Economist Intelligence Unit, 60% of respondents said their senior management teams will become more international over the next three years.”
  • 16. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 14 Life Sciences A healthy future? The life sciences sector, in many ways, is a victim of its own success. The medical and public health advances of the last several decades have translated into healthier people, longer lifespans, reduced infant mortality and an expanding global population. It seems demand for healthcare services and products can only continue to increase globally. The prevalence of ‘lifestyle’ diseases – such as obesity and alcoholism – are already causing increased alarm in the developed world, leading to a greater focus on disease prevention and education in those economies. Meanwhile concern over infectious diseases, particularly Avian Flu and HIV/AIDS, will facilitate greater government cooperation with industry in both the emerging markets and the developed world, increasing the demand for multi-lingual healthcare policy experts with a global perspective in both the public and private sector. The global pharmaceutical business will see continued growth, but at a slower rate, as more low-cost generics become available, government pricing pressures continue, and truly innovative drugs come to market at a slower pace. This steady growth will be sustained by increasing knowledge about DNA and molecular science, which promise more personalized drugs able to target niche markets with greater efficacy. This should deliver greater pricing power to the industry but may require the sale of larger numbers of lower revenue drugs rather than reliance upon the traditional blockbuster model of selling a few key drugs to large segments of the global population. Whether due to costs, restructuring, mergers, a reluctance to hire from outside the industry, the rapid growth of emerging markets or a combination of all five, the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries have historically failed to invest sufficient resources in building their internal teams. The biotech companies have tended to rely on a pretty hand-to-mouth existence while the more established firms in pharma have often operated as exclusive US/European clubs, increasingly leaning on staffing organizations to fill their talent gaps in the short term, rather than applying long-term succession planning. As the influence of China and India continue to rise over the next five years this trend cannot continue; already there is growing evidence of the gradual move to outsourcing selected functions, an option the industry had previously been slow to accept. When assessing a move to outsourcing, biotech companies will need to ensure they are able to access similar talent pools and resources to those they have in their current locations. Existing biotech clusters Jeff W Dodson Life Sciences practice jdodson@heidrick.com
  • 17. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 15 have the competitive advantage of being located close to many highly respected universities – for example the cluster in Northern California which has twelve major research universities and laboratories in the region helping to drive innovation. The proliferation of collaborative working and knowledge sharing tools and technologies should help break down geographic barriers over the next five years, allowing for an increasing level of outsourcing to countries in Asia and Eastern Europe. In cases where medicines need to be developed for large regional markets, it will make sense for companies to locate their facilities closer to the population in question, where the demand is higher and where these companies can access the local skilled talent pool. Multinationals in this sector will invest in global regions where there is a high supply of technical and scientific professionals, such as China, India and Brazil, which rank st, 2nd and 5th, respectively, in the demographics category of the Global Talent Index both in 2007 and 202. To build the scale of talent needed in markets like China and India to better serve large local markets, pharmaceutical multinationals will need to play an active role in recruiting and developing people at junior, middle and senior levels in their organizations. Globally, the life sciences sector will need to keep working hard to attract the most skilled and committed scientists and researchers, in addition to top-quality senior general management executives capable of leading and driving change across complex global organizations. This will necessitate a global talent search; for graduate level personnel this search will be centered mainly on the top universities. For more experienced individuals the hunt will be among the world’s fast-growing biotech firms and university labs. As with other high-growth sectors, not just the recruitment but the retention of talent will be a major headache for the life sciences sector over the next five years. To address this problem, pharmaceutical companies will need to start looking at recruiting outside of their traditional hiring range. For example, companies will need to be more involved at high school and college level to generate interest and educate students on the skills needed for the industry. In addition, these companies will need to begin targeting the 60+ market, which is looking increasingly likely to seek supplemental income after retirement age and may continue to work in the field through reduced work programs. The Global Talent Index’s measurement of the quality of the environment to nurture talent – which puts a strong weighting on the percentage of university students in the sciences, numbers of R&D researchers and meritocratic remuneration – reflects one of the biggest changes ahead for talent trends in the life science sector over the next five years. China, which advances two places on the overall Global Talent Index for 202, jumps eight places to 4th in this category between 2007 and 202, its biggest advance among all seven measurements used to make up the GTI. The increase reflects the Chinese government’s determination to improve the quality of life for its population and develop the life sciences sector into one of its global competencies. Another strong performer in this category is South Korea, which advances four places to 0th place in the rank in its ability to nurture talent. Unsurprisingly, the US ranks top in this category, given its long history of innovation in the sector, followed closely by the Netherlands, Canada, Japan and Australia. Developing an awareness of these emerging trends and making the recruitment, development and retention of top talent a strategic imperative is critically important for every life sciences company competing in the global market. Equally important is the establishment of strong partnerships with world class agencies capable of recruiting the best talent in key functions in all established and emerging regions. The most proactive industry players have already made significant investments in talent, and these are the companies that are best positioned for the future.
  • 18. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 16 Financial Services Accounting for talent Over the past two decades young graduates have been attracted to the challenge and wealth creation opportunities that have resulted from an evolving global financial services sector. The US has been a dominant source of talent, but several factors have resulted in an increasing demand for fresh skill sets and talent from different countries. These factors include the continued growth of European markets, a rise in opportunities across Asia and other emerging markets, and the growth of a new group of top financial service firms not domiciled in the US. In the future, a number of market risks will rebalance the opportunities that have existed in this sector. Slower global economic growth and rising interest rates, credit defaults and issues stemming from a lack of market liquidity – following the sub-prime mortgage collapse – will, in the short-term lead firms to reevaluate their portfolios, product mix and pace of expansion. A slowdown in the global property market, particularly in developed economies, will put financial pressure on banks that have enjoyed strong returns from real estate lending. As the economy slows and the debt markets become less attractive, M&A activities, led in part by private equity funds, will lessen, causing investment banks to rethink their ongoing growth plans in investment banking and capital markets. The sharp rise in debt associated with leveraged buyouts by private equity firms will increasingly become a source of risk to lenders. To combat this, many banks will continue to diversify their businesses, strengthen reserves and improve the quality of loan recipients. A high premium will be placed on new product development, emerging markets, and increasingly sophisticated risk management and transfer techniques. The appetite will be for multi- lingual candidates with international experience who possess a strong combination of technical experience and education. The Global Talent Index (GTI) shows that the historic dominance of US talent will continue but also reveals the rise of several European countries as European financial services firms emerge as dominant global players. Over the next five years, it is predicted that France will leap three places to rank 2nd behind the US in the proclivity to attracting talent measurement – this vital indicator assesses the technical skills of the workforce, personal disposable income, employment growth and GDP data. Canada, Germany, Australia and the UK follow in 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th places, respectively. Japan will also gain competitive advantage, Valerie Germain Financial Services practice vgermain@heidrick.com
  • 19. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 17 jumping from 4th to th place in its proclivity to attract talent over the next five years. There will also be significant demand for talent originating in the high growth areas of Asia and the other emerging markets. The demand for this talent may outpace the supply. Despite the vast numbers of graduates entering the workforce every year in these countries, a relatively low proportion will have the skills required by global financial service firms. Those that do will be highly sought after and firms will need to offer top compensation and career growth opportunities to attract and secure their loyalty. Interestingly, India, which earns its overall 0th place ranking in the GTI primarily because of the talent pool created by its huge population, will jump four places, from 7th to 3th, in its proclivity to attract talent in 202. This is the country’s single biggest improvement among all seven indices, reflecting a continued emphasis on technical training at the secondary and tertiary levels of education as well as a rapidly expanding middle-class. The orientation of graduates is far more sophisticated today because of their access to information from the internet. ‘Generation Y’, those born between 977 and 2005, have grown up with computers, show no fear of technology, take risks and are media-savvy and brand conscious. They are an online generation whose new social spheres are networking sites such as MySpace and FaceBook. Within a few years, job podcasts by even the most conservative of companies will become a reality. The firms that understand this and position themselves accordingly will reap the benefits. One of the ongoing challenges in financial services has been the thoughtfulness with which firms have approached succession planning. This has been true in some parts of the sector more than others but, as the sources of talent change it will be increasingly incumbent on all firms to mature the processes around the development and retention of their next generation of leadership talent. ‘Generation Y’, those born between 1977 and 2005, have grown up with computers, show no fear of technology, take risks and are media-savvy and brand conscious. They are an online generation whose new social spheres are networking sites such as MySpace and FaceBook. Within a few years, job podcasts by even the most conservative of companies will become a reality.
  • 20. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 18 Russia Finland Spain Sweden Norway Germany France Portugal Romania Turkey Denmark Poland Belarus Ukraine Greece Cyprus Neth. Ireland Lithuania Latvia Estonia Greenland Iceland Ethiopia Eritrea Sudan Egypt Niger Mauritania Mali Nigeria Somalia Libya Chad Algeria Tunisia Morocco Benin Ghana Cote D'Ivoire Liberia Sierra Leone Guinea Burkina Faso Gambia Western Sahara Senegal Guinea Bissau Canary Islands Jordan Israel Lebanon Azerbaijan Georgia Kyrgyzstan Tajikistan Kuwait U. A. E. Yemen Syria Iraq Iran Oman Saudi Arabia Afghanistan Pakistan Chin Kazakhstan Turkmenistan Uzbekistan N Mongolia United Kingdom Italy e Verde Islands Azores Islands Austria Hungary Bulgaria Czech Rep. Slovakia Bel. Albania Mold. Bosnia & Herz. Croatia Slovenia Switz. Mac. Qatar Mont. Serbia Arctic Circle e r Equator Equat N T I C I N D I A O C E A Norwegian Sea Greenland Sea North Sea Mediterranean Sea Baltic Sea Black Sea Aral Sea Arabian Sea Barents Sea Kara Sea R e d S e a Caspian Sea Appendices Appendix A Methodology, 19 Appendix B Global Talent Index maps, 20 Appendix C Global Talent Index weighting, 22 Appendix D Overall GTI ranking, 23 Appendix E Demographics, 24 Appendix F Quality of compulsory education, 25 Appendix G Quality of universities and business schools, 26 Appendix H Quality of the environment to nurture talent, 27 Appendix I Mobility and relative openness of the labor market, 28 Appendix J Stock and flow of foreign direct investment, 29 Appendix K Proclivity to attracting talent, 30
  • 21. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 19 Appendix A Methodology The Global Talent Index is the result of a collaboration between Heidrick & Struggles and the Economist Intelligence Unit; the vision of the former was matched by the research expertise of the latter. The Index measures not only a country’s natural potential for producing talent in socio- demographic terms, but also the conditions necessary to realize this potential. A country may exhibit heady population growth but without a supporting infrastructure and the right cultural contexts, the talent margin will not be able to fully develop. To reflect this multi-layered analysis seven major areas were determined to be of importance: • demographics • quality of compulsory education systems • quality of universities and business schools • quality of the environment to nurture talent • mobility and relative openness of the labour market • trends in foreign direct investment • proclivity to attracting talent Applying their respective areas of expertise in talent assessment and data gathering, the project team from both organizations drew up a list of variables with which to measure the seven areas of interest. These variables combine quantitative measures drawn from a variety of local and international data sources, with qualitative assessments from the Economist Intelligence Unit’s network of country analysts and local contributors. Forecasts were based on the Economist Intelligence Unit’s macroeconomic model and country analysts’ projections for qualitative variables. Some variables, particularly for education, had to be assumed to remain equal in five years, owing to the lack of time on which to base projections. The data was then normalized in order to obtain scores from  to 00 (where higher scores meant better performances on the talent measures). Finally, the project team set the weights of the different variables in the overall Index by assigning scores from  to 5 for each variable (where  = less important and 5 = of critical importance).
  • 22. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 20 Appendix B Global Talent Index maps the world at 202 Arctic Circle Tropic of Cancer Tropic of Cancer Tropic of Capricorn Equator Equator Tropic of Capricorn Antarctic Circle Spain Norway Portugal Ireland Greenland Iceland United States Canada Mexico The Bahamas Cuba Panama El Salvador Guatemala Belize Honduras Nicaragua Costa Rica Jamaica Haiti Dominican Republic Argentina Bolivia Colombia Venezuela Peru Brazil French Guiana Suriname Guyana Chile Ecuador Paraguay Uruguay Mauritania Mali Algeria Morocco Ivory Coast Liberia Sierra Leone Guinea Gambia Western Sahara Senegal Guinea Bissau United Kingdom Canary Islands CapeVerde Islands Azores Islands France Russia Puerto Rico A T L A N T I C P A C I F I C A R C T I C O C E A N O C E A N O C E A N Beaufort Sea Caribbean Sea Hudson Bay Gulf of Alaska Baffin Bay Gulf of Mexico Norwegian Sea 2012 rank country rank change GTI 2012 GTI 2007 1 United States 0 53 52 2 United Kingdom + 2 48 46 3 Canada - 1 47 47 4 Netherlands - 1 46 46 5 Sweden 0 45 45 6 China + 2 44 42 Global Talent Index ranking in 202 The map uses color to represent thirty countries’ overall talent ranking at 202, indicating at a glance how countries score at nurturing talent, from red-hot beds to blue cooler climates. Global Talent Index scores in 2012 – numbers represent how countries score at nurturing talent
  • 23. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 21 Togo Russia Finland Spain Sweden Norway Germany France Portugal Romania Turkey Denmark Poland Belarus Ukraine Greece Cyprus Neth. Ireland Lithuania Latvia Estonia Greenland Iceland United States Canada Brazil Kenya Ethiopia Eritrea Sudan Egypt Niger Mauritania Mali Nigeria Somalia Namibia Libya Chad South Africa Tanzania Dem. Rep. Of Congo Angola Algeria Madagascar Mozambique Botswana Zambia Gabon Central African Republic Tunisia Morocco Uganda Burundi Rwanda Benin Ghana Cote D'Ivoire Liberia Sierra Leone Guinea Burkina Faso Gambia Cameroon SaoTome & Principe Zimbabwe Congo Equatorial Guinea Western Sahara Senegal Guinea Bissau Canary Islands Jordan Israel Lebanon Azerbaijan Georgia Kyrgyzstan Tajikistan Kuwait U. A. E. Yemen Syria Iraq Iran Oman Saudi Arabia Afghanistan Pakistan India China Kazakhstan Turkmenistan Uzbekistan Myanmar Nepal Sri Lanka Mongolia United Kingdom Italy Cape Verde Islands Azores Islands Puerto Rico Venezuela Guyana Suriname French Guyana Austria Hungary Bulgaria Czech Rep. Slovakia Bel. Albania Mold. Bosnia & Herz. Croatia Slovenia Switz. Mac. Qatar Mont. Serbia Arctic Circle T r o p i c o f C a n c e r Equator Equator Tropic of Capricorn A T L A N T I C I N D I A N O C E A N O C E A N A R C T I C O C E A N Chukchi Sea Beaufort Sea Hudson Bay Baffin Bay Norwegian Sea Greenland Sea North Sea Mediterranean Sea Baltic Sea Black Sea Aral Sea Arabian Sea Bay of Bengal Sea of Okhotsk Barents Sea Kara Sea Leptev Sea R e d S e a Caspian Sea Russia India China Burma Thailand Cambodia Nepal Bhutan Vietnam Sri Lanka Laos Bangladesh Malaysia Papua New Guinea East Timor Brunei Sing. Philippines Malaysia I n d o n e s i a Japan Mongolia South Korea North Korea Australia New Zealand New Caledonia Fiji Antarctica Vanuatu Solomon Islands Madagascar Tropic of Cancer Tropic of Capricorn Equator Tropic of Capricorn Antarctic Circle P A C I F I C I N D I A N O C E A N O C E A N Bay of Bengal South China Sea Sea of Japan East China Sea Yellow Sea Sea of Okhotsk Tasman Sea Great Australian Bight Ross Sea 2012 rank country rank change GTI 2012 GTI 2007 7 Germany - 1 44 43 8 Australia - 1 43 43 9 France 0 43 41 10 India 0 41 39 11 Spain 0 37 37 12 Malaysia 0 37 37 2012 rank country rank change GTI 2012 GTI 2007 13 South Korea + 2 37 34 14 Japan + 2 36 34 15 Poland - 2 35 35 16 Italy - 2 34 34 17 Ukraine + 2 34 33 18 Russia 0 34 33 2012 rank country rank change GTI 2012 GTI 2007 19 Mexico + 2 33 31 20 Greece 0 32 32 21 Argentina - 4 32 34 22 Thailand 0 30 31 23 South Africa + 1 30 29 24 Egypt + 1 29 29 2012 rank country rank change GTI 2012 GTI 2007 25 Brazil - 2 29 30 26 Turkey 0 29 27 27 Saudi Arabia + 1 26 23 28 Nigeria - 1 23 25 29 Indonesia 0 22 23 30 Iran 0 21 21
  • 24. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 22 indicator weight: 1 to 5 Demographics Population aged 20-59 5  CAGR Population aged 20-59 (%) 0 Quality of compulsory education sectors Duration of compulsory education 4  Starting age of compulsory education 1  Current education spending (% of GDP) 2  Current education spending per pupil as a % of GDP per capita 4  Primary school enrollment ratio (%) 2  Secondary school enrollment ratio (%) 4  Mean years of schooling 4  Adult literacy rate (% of pop over 15) 5  Pupil/Teacher ratio, primary 2  Pupil/Teacher ratio, lower secondary 2  Pupil/Teacher ratio, upper secondary 2  Quality of universities and business schools Gross enrollment ratio ISCED 5 & 6 Total 4  Number of business schools ranked in world’s top 100 2  Number of universities ranked in world’s top 500 3  Expenditure per student for higher education (as % of GDP per capita) 3  Quality of the environment to nurture talent Share of the population aged 25-64 with tertiary level education 3  Percentage of higher education graduates in the Social Sciences, Business and Law 2  Percentage of tertiary graduates in the Sciences 4  Researchers in R&D (per m pop) 4  Technicians in R&D (per m pop) 1  indicator weight: 1 to 5 R&D as % of GDP 5  Cost of living 3  Degree of restrictiveness of labor laws 4  Wage regulation 1  Quality of workforce 4  Local managers 4  Protection of intellectual property rights 1  Protection of private property 3  Meritocratic remuneration 4  Mobility and relative openness of the labor market Number of students studying overseas 2  Number of overseas students studying in country as a % of tertiary enrollment 4  Language skills of the labor force 5  Hiring of foreign nationals 4  Openness of trade (exports + imports % of GDP) 3  Stock and flow of foreign direct investment Average flow of FDI in previous five years (% of GDP) 0 Average stock of FDI in previous five years (% of GDP) 2  Proclivity to attracting talent Technical skills of the workforce 4  Personal disposable income per capita (US$ bn) 4  Employment growth 3  GDP per capita 0 GDP per capita (PPP) 4  Nominal USD GDP 3  PPP GDP 3  Real GDP growth (%) 3  Appendix C Global Talent Index weighting Seven major areas were determined to be of importance in researching and analysing the factors that determine a country’s potential for producing talent. These are listed here in the tables on the right. As the final step in the data analysis, the project team from Heidrick & Struggles and The Economist Intelligence Unit applied their judgement to set the weights of the different variables in the overall ranking by assigning scores from  to 5 for each variable (where  = unimportant and 5 = critical importance). For example, in assessing the quality of compulsory education, the starting age of a country’s compulsory education was judged to be much less significant than its adult literacy rate which were weighted  and 5 respectively. This process ensures that the final scores include a degree of insight from the project team based on its specialist knowledge of the subject.
  • 25. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 23 Appendix D Overall GTI rankings The two tables on the right show the ranking that each of the thirty countries achieved in the study in 2007 and the projection forward five years to 202. The arrows between the columns show movement in rank over the five-year period. Red arrows show warming talent, blue shows where talent is cooling and green indicates where no change has occurred. 2007 rank country GTI score 1 US 52 2 Canada 47 3 Netherlands 46 4 UK 46 5 Sweden 45 6 Germany 43 7 Australia 43 8 China 42 9 France 41 10 India 39 11 Spain 37 12 Malaysia 37 13 Poland 35 14 Italy 34 15 South Korea 34 16 Japan 34 17 Argentina 34 18 Russia 33 19 Ukraine 33 20 Greece 32 21 Mexico 31 22 Thailand 31 23 Brazil 30 24 South Africa 29 25 Egypt 29 26 Turkey 27 27 Nigeria 25 28 Saudi Arabia 23 29 Indonesia 23 30 Iran 21 2012 rank country GTI score 1 US 53 2 UK 48 3 Canada 47 4 Netherlands 46 5 Sweden 45 6 China 44 7 Germany 44 8 Australia 43 9 France 43 10 India 41 11 Spain 37 12 Malaysia 37 13 South Korea 37 14 Japan 36 15 Poland 35 16 Italy 34 17 Ukraine 34 18 Russia 34 19 Mexico 33 20 Greece 32 21 Argentina 32 22 Thailand 30 23 South Africa 30 24 Egypt 29 25 Brazil 29 26 Turkey 29 27 Saudi Arabia 26 28 Nigeria 23 29 Indonesia 22 30 Iran 21
  • 26. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 24 Appendix E Demographics In assessing the demographic factors that affect talent, the team analysed how many people of working age, 20-59 years old, there were in each of the thirty countries. 2007 rank country score 1 China 100 2 India 73 3 US 21 4 Indonesia 17 5 Brazil 13 6 Russia 10 7 Japan 8 8 Nigeria 7 9 Mexico 7 10 Germany 5 11 Turkey 5 12 Iran 5 13 Egypt 4 14 Thailand 4 15 UK 4 16 France 4 17 Italy 4 18 South Korea 3 19 Ukraine 3 20 Spain 3 21 Poland 2 22 South Africa 2 23 Argentina 2 24 Canada 2 25 Malaysia 1 26 Saudi Arabia 1 27 Australia 1 28 Netherlands 1 29 Greece 0 30 Sweden 0 2012 rank country score 1 China 100 2 India 76 3 US 20 4 Indonesia 17 5 Brazil 14 6 Russia 10 7 Nigeria 8 8 Japan 7 9 Mexico 7 10 Germany 5 11 Turkey 5 12 Iran 5 13 Egypt 5 14 Thailand 4 15 UK 4 16 France 3 17 Italy 3 18 South Korea 3 19 Ukraine 3 20 Spain 3 21 Poland 2 22 Argentina 2 23 South Africa 2 24 Canada 2 25 Malaysia 1 26 Saudi Arabia 1 27 Australia 1 28 Netherlands 1 29 Greece 0 30 Sweden 0
  • 27. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 25 Appendix F Quality of compulsory education In assessing the quality of compulsory education, the team looked at eleven variables which impact the effectiveness of schooling as follows: • duration of compulsory education • starting age of compulsory education • current education spending (% of GDP) • current education spending per pupil as a % of GDP per capita • primary school enrolment ratio (%) • secondary school enrolment ratio (%) • mean years of schooling • adult literacy rate (% of pop over 5) • pupil/teacher ratio, primary • pupil/teacher ratio, lower secondary • pupil/teacher ratio, upper secondary 2007 rank country score 1 UK 74 2 Canada 73 3 Germany 72 4 Sweden 71 5 France 70 6 Netherlands 70 7 Australia 70 8 US 70 9 Spain 66 10 Japan 66 11 South Korea 66 12 Italy 64 13 Poland 64 14 Ukraine 63 15 Argentina 62 16 South Africa 59 17 Malaysia 59 18 Mexico 58 19 Thailand 57 20 Russia 56 21 Greece 55 22 Turkey 51 23 Brazil 50 24 India 44 25 Iran 42 26 China 41 27 Egypt 39 28 Indonesia 37 29 Nigeria 35 30 Saudi Arabia 33 2012 rank country score 1 UK 75 2 France 72 3 Netherlands 71 4 Canada 71 5 Germany 71 6 US 70 7 Sweden 69 8 Australia 68 9 Japan 66 10 South Korea 66 11 Spain 66 12 Ukraine 65 13 Italy 64 14 Poland 63 15 Argentina 60 16 Mexico 58 17 Thailand 58 18 South Africa 57 19 Greece 57 20 Malaysia 57 21 Turkey 54 22 Russia 53 23 Brazil 48 24 China 46 25 India 42 26 Iran 40 27 Egypt 39 28 Indonesia 38 29 Saudi Arabia 35 30 Nigeria 30
  • 28. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 26 Appendix G Quality of universities and business schools The following variables were used as a measure of both the reputation and resources of the business schools and universities in each country as well as their enrolment records: • gross enrollment ratio ISCED 5 & 6 total • number of business schools ranked in world’s top 00 • number of universities ranked in world’s top 500 • expenditure per student for higher education (as % of GDP per capita) 2007 rank country score 1 US 76 2 UK 43 3 Sweden 37 4 South Korea 35 5 Australia 35 6 Canada 33 7 Saudi Arabia 33 8 Germany 32 9 France 32 10 Netherlands 30 11 Greece 30 12 Spain 29 13 Russia 28 14 Japan 28 15 Egypt 28 16 Ukraine 26 17 Italy 26 18 Poland 25 19 Malaysia 22 20 Argentina 21 21 China 19 22 Thailand 16 23 Turkey 14 24 Mexico 12 25 Brazil 12 26 India 11 27 South Africa 9 28 Iran 8 29 Nigeria 6 30 Indonesia 5 2012 rank country score 1 US 78 2 UK 44 3 Sweden 38 4 South Korea 37 5 Australia 36 6 Germany 34 7 France 34 8 Canada 33 9 Saudi Arabia 33 10 Greece 30 11 Russia 30 12 Japan 30 13 Spain 30 14 Egypt 28 15 Ukraine 27 16 Poland 27 17 Italy 27 18 Netherlands 25 19 Malaysia 23 20 Argentina 22 21 China 20 22 Thailand 17 23 Mexico 15 24 Turkey 15 25 India 12 26 Brazil 10 27 South Africa 10 28 Iran 9 29 Nigeria 7 30 Indonesia 6
  • 29. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 27 Appendix H Quality of the environment to nurture talent Assessing the quality of the environment involved analysis of the following factors: • share of the population aged 25-84 with higher education • percentage of higher education graduates in the Social Sciences, Business and Law • percentage of tertiary graduates in the Sciences • researchers in R&D (per m pop) • technicians in R&D (per m pop) • R&D as % of GDP • cost of living • degree of restrictiveness of labor laws • wage regulation • quality of work force • local managers • protection of intellectual property rights • protection of private property • meritocratic remuneration 2007 rank country score 1 US 64 2 Netherlands 60 3 Canada 57 4 Japan 56 5 Sweden 53 6 Russia 52 7 Australia 52 8 Germany 52 9 France 49 10 UK 49 11 India 48 12 Spain 48 13 Ukraine 47 14 South Korea 46 15 Malaysia 45 16 Argentina 44 17 Mexico 44 18 Brazil 43 19 Italy 43 20 Poland 41 21 Thailand 41 22 China 41 23 Greece 41 24 South Africa 39 25 Iran 38 26 Nigeria 35 27 Egypt 35 28 Indonesia 35 29 Turkey 33 30 Saudi Arabia 28 2012 rank country score 1 US 64 2 Netherlands 60 3 Canada 58 4 Japan 56 5 Australia 55 6 Sweden 53 7 Germany 53 8 UK 53 9 France 52 10 South Korea 51 11 Russia 50 12 Spain 49 13 India 48 14 China 47 15 Mexico 46 16 Malaysia 43 17 Ukraine 43 18 Poland 43 19 Brazil 41 20 Greece 41 21 Italy 41 22 South Africa 39 23 Argentina 39 24 Thailand 39 25 Iran 36 26 Egypt 35 27 Turkey 34 28 Indonesia 32 29 Saudi Arabia 32 30 Nigeria 29
  • 30. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 28 Appendix I Mobility and relative openness of the labor market The variables used to measure the mobility and relative openness of the labor market focus not only on the number of people studying outside of their home country and their language skills, but also on a country’s tendency to hire foreign nationals to add diversity to its workforce. These characteristics along with openness to other cultures are crucial to creating and maintaining talent flow: • number of students studying overseas • number of overseas students studying in country as a % of enrollment in higher education • language skills of the labor force • hiring of foreign nationals • openness of trade (exports + imports % of GDP) 2007 rank country score 1 Canada 73 2 UK 62 3 Germany 59 4 Netherlands 58 5 Australia 58 6 Sweden 54 7 Malaysia 52 8 France 51 9 US 49 10 India 47 11 China 46 12 South Africa 43 13 Thailand 41 14 Greece 41 15 Poland 41 16 Nigeria 40 17 Turkey 40 18 Italy 39 19 Spain 38 20 Argentina 38 21 Mexico 38 22 Ukraine 38 23 Brazil 37 24 Egypt 36 25 Russia 34 26 South Korea 34 27 Indonesia 30 28 Japan 30 29 Saudi Arabia 27 30 Iran 20 2012 rank country score 1 Canada 74 2 UK 64 3 Germany 61 4 Netherlands 60 5 Australia 59 6 Sweden 57 7 Malaysia 56 8 France 53 9 India 53 10 US 51 11 China 48 12 South Africa 46 13 Poland 43 14 Greece 42 15 Ukraine 42 16 Mexico 41 17 Italy 41 18 Turkey 40 19 South Korea 40 20 Spain 40 21 Russia 40 22 Argentina 39 23 Brazil 39 24 Egypt 39 25 Nigeria 37 26 Thailand 36 27 Japan 35 28 Saudi Arabia 32 29 Indonesia 29 30 Iran 20
  • 31. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 29 Appendix J Stock and flow of foreign direct investment To determine the scores for this pillar of the research, the project team looked at the average stock and at the average flow of foreign direct investment (FDI) for each country in the previous five years as a percentage of GDP. However, it only used the figures for each country’s average stock of FDI when calculating this index. 2007 rank country score 1 Netherlands 100 2 Malaysia 73 3 Sweden 69 4 UK 50 5 Nigeria 47 6 Spain 45 7 Argentina 42 8 Australia 42 9 Canada 41 10 Thailand 40 11 Egypt 39 12 South Africa 39 13 Poland 38 14 France 36 15 China 36 16 Mexico 35 17 Germany 30 18 Brazil 29 19 Ukraine 23 20 US 15 21 Italy 14 22 Turkey 13 23 Saudi Arabia 12 24 South Korea 12 25 Greece 10 26 Russia 10 27 India 7 28 Indonesia 5 29 Iran 0 30 Japan 0 2012 rank country GTI score 1 Netherlands 100 2 Sweden 71 3 UK 56 4 Malaysia 53 5 South Africa 47 6 Canada 45 7 Egypt 42 8 France 41 9 Australia 40 10 Spain 38 11 Mexico 37 12 Poland 37 13 Thailand 31 14 Nigeria 30 15 Argentina 30 16 Ukraine 28 17 Germany 28 18 Brazil 26 19 China 25 20 Turkey 22 21 US 18 22 Italy 16 23 Russia 13 24 Indonesia 9 25 South Korea 9 26 India 9 27 Greece 8 28 Saudi Arabia 8 29 Japan 0 30 Iran 0
  • 32. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 30 Appendix K Proclivity to attracting talent Perhaps the most difficult area to define because of its cultural nuance, is a country’s proclivity to attract talent. In other words, why would anyone want to work there? In assessing this final pillar of the research, the project team looked at the following variables: • technical skills of the workforce • personal disposable income per capita (US$ bn) • employment growth • GDP per capita (PPP) • nominal USD GDP • PPP GDP • real GDP growth (%) 2007 rank country score 1 US 39 2 Sweden 37 3 Canada 36 4 Germany 35 5 France 35 6 Australia 34 7 UK 33 8 Spain 31 9 Netherlands 31 10 Italy 30 11 Poland 29 12 Greece 26 13 Argentina 25 14 Japan 25 15 South Korea 23 16 Malaysia 23 17 India 23 18 Egypt 23 19 Russia 20 20 Mexico 20 21 Brazil 19 22 Iran 19 23 Saudi Arabia 19 24 Turkey 17 25 Nigeria 16 26 China 16 27 Ukraine 15 28 Indonesia 15 29 Thailand 14 30 South Africa 11 2012 rank country score 1 US 41 2 France 35 3 Canada 35 4 Germany 34 5 Australia 33 6 UK 33 7 Sweden 32 8 Spain 31 9 Italy 30 10 Netherlands 29 11 Japan 28 12 Malaysia 27 13 India 27 14 South Korea 27 15 Greece 26 16 Poland 24 17 Argentina 24 18 Mexico 24 19 Russia 23 20 Saudi Arabia 22 21 Turkey 22 22 Egypt 22 23 Ukraine 21 24 Brazil 20 25 Thailand 18 26 China 18 27 Iran 17 28 Nigeria 17 29 Indonesia 14 30 South Africa 11
  • 33. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 31 Further reading available on www.heidrick.com ‘The Leadership Team: Complementary Strengths or Conflicting Agendas’, Stephen A Miles and Michael D Watkins, Harvard Business Review, April 2007 ‘Roller Coaster Leadership’, Kevin Kelly, Business Strategy Review, Spring 2007 Getting Results in China: How China’s Tech Executives are Molding a New Generation of Leaders, (A joint research project between Heidrick & Struggles and The Stanford Project on Regions of Innovation and Entrepreneurship) Route to the Top, Dr Elisabeth Marx, Heidrick & Struggles, 2006 Executive Leadership in China, (A joint study between Heidrick & Struggles and the Economist Intelligence Unit) Benchmarking Corporate Governance in China, (A joint research project carried out by Heidrick & Struggles and the School of Management, Fudan University)
  • 34. Heidrick & Struggles Mapping Global Talent: Essays and Insights 32 The Economist Intelligence Unit is the world’s foremost provider of country, industry and management analysis. Founded in 946 when a director of intelligence was appointed to serve The Economist, the Economist Intelligence Unit is now a leading research and advisory firm with more than forty offices worldwide. For nearly sixty years, the Economist Intelligence Unit has delivered vital business intelligence to influential decision-makers around the world. Its extensive international reach and unfettered independence makes it the most trusted and valuable resource for international companies, financial institutions, universities and government agencies. The mission of the Economist Intelligence Unit is to provide executives with authoritative analysis and forecasts to make informed global decisions. It offers three kinds of business intelligence: country analysis on more than 200 markets, industry trends in eight key sectors and latest management strategies and best practices. The nature of the operation and client base of the Economist Intelligence Unit demands a global presence. The head office is in London with major regional centres in Hong Kong, Vienna and New York. www.eiu.com
  • 35. Global Talent Index, developed in co-operation with the Economist Intelligence Unit 33 China Burma Thailand Cambodia Nepal Bhutan Vietnam Laos Bangladesh Malaysia Papua New Guinea East Timor Brunei Sing. Philippines Malaysia I n d o n e s i a Japan Australia New Caledonia Fiji Vanuatu Solomon Islands Tropic of Cancer Tropic of Cap Equator Tropic of Capricorn P A C I F I C N O C Bay of Bengal South China Sea East China Sea Yellow Sea Great Australian Bight
  • 36. Amsterdam +31 (0)20 462 77 77 Atlanta +1 404 577 2410 Auckland +64 (0)9 3066630 Barcelona +34 (0)93 225 7300 Beijing +86 (0)10 65988288 Boston +1 617 737 6300 Brussels +32 (0)2 5420750 Buenos Aires +54 (0)11 43209950 Chicago +1 312 496 1000 Chongqing +86 (0)23 63001588 Cleveland +1 216 241 7410 Copenhagen +45 33 377 600 Dallas +1 214 706 7700 Denver +1 720 932 3839 Dusseldorf +49 (0)211 82820 El Segundo +1 310 321 3220 Encino +1 818 905 6010 Frankfurt +49 (0)69 697 0020 Hamburg +49 (0)40 3405770 Helsinki +358 9 2511250 Hong Kong +852 21039300 Houston +1 713 237 9000 Istanbul +90 (0)212 3510904 Johannesburg +27 (0)11 6856910 Lisbon +351 21 3514530 London +44 (0)20 7075 4000 Los Angeles +1 213 625 8811 Madrid +34 (0)91 391 5256 Melbourne +61 (0)3 90123000 Menlo Park +1 650 234 1500 Mexico City +52 (01)55 91380370 Miami +1 305 262 2606 Milan +39 02 762521 Minneapolis +1 612 215 6913 Moscow +7 495 225 9367 Mumbai +91 (0)22 66663021 Munich: Keplerstrasse +49 (0)89 998110 Munich: Sophienstrasse +49 (0)89 255477 New Delhi +91 (0)11 26451010 New York, Park Avenue +1 212 867 9876 New York, Wall Street +1 212 699 3000 Paris +33 (0)1 4434 1700 Philadelphia +1 215 988 1000 Rome +39 06 8537 5801 San Francisco +1 415 981 2854 Santiago +56 (0)2 2033660 Sao Paulo +55 11 550 44000 Seoul +82 (0)2 34306000 Shanghai +86 (0)21 61361988 Singapore +65 63325001 Stamford +1 203 252 2900 Stockholm +46 (0)8 4067100 Sydney +61 (0)2 8205 2000 Taipei +886 (0)2 27576123 Tokyo +81 (0)3 55106800 Toronto +1 416 361 4700 Tysons Corner +1 703 848 2500 Vienna +43 (0)1 53310070 Warsaw +48 (0)22 5849898 Washington DC +1 202 331 4900 Zurich +41 (0)44 4881313 Heidrick & Struggles our global capability Connecting leaders around the globe is what Heidrick & Struggles does best. For over fifty years we have been building deep relationships with the world’s most talented individuals on behalf of the world’s most successful companies. Through the strategic acquisition, development and retention of talent we help our clients – from the most established market giants to the newest market disruptors – build winning leadership teams. www.heidrick.com For general enquiries about the Heidrick & Struggles Global Talent Index or to order more copies of the wall map and booklet please email talentmap@heidrick.com For press inquiries please contact Narda Shirley at narda@gongcommunications.com