Multinational people managers

The human resources department is not usually thought of as the go-to place for building an international career. However, it could become so.
Take Dutch national Rob Luijten, executive vice-president, human resources, at Tate & Lyle, a London-based global food producer. “For me personally,” he says, “what matters is not where a business is based, but whether HR is a really important part of its strategic agenda.”

In the mid-noughties Mr Luijten ran the Asia-Pacific HR team of GE Plastics, from Shanghai. As to where he might be found in years to come, he says, the field is wide open – although he admits to a “soft spot” for Asia.


HR careers that play out on several continents may not be the norm, but they are becoming increasingly common. A decade ago, western corporations saw their Asian and Latin American operations as low-cost production bases and sent out expatriates to oversee them.


Now many of those companies are leading the charge to invent products and services for emerging-market consumers, which puts their ability to attract and nurture local talent under the spotlight. “Today there is more encouragement for local as well as global innovation,” says Michael Dickmann, professor of international human resource management at Cranfield School of Management.


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