This CFO believes Australian businesses care too much about local experience.
After working overseas for the past 14 years, it was only when I was looking at moving back to Australia that I realised how many businesses here don’t value global experience.
In both the cities where I worked, London and Dubai, it was normal for my colleagues to be people from different countries, some barely off their flights from South Africa, Canada or Australia. This is because, unlike a lot of Australian organisations, international cities recognise that skills translate from country to country.
A puzzling trend
During my final years overseas, when I was considering a return to Australia, I would meet with recruitment agencies to get a feel for the job market here. They often gave me the advice that my lack of Australian experience was a problem (I had only worked in my field for three years in Australia before I headed overseas).
I was told their clients (potential Australian employers) always preferred people who had recent Australian experience.
I was shocked by this attitude. Isn’t considerable international expertise of great value to Australian companies? A candidate such as myself could potentially introduce the best international practices, and also open doors to the contacts I had made whilst working overseas. If it was simply an issue of a visa or sponsorship, I could understand their reluctance.
A couple of former colleagues who also moved to Australia after some time abroad have similar stories, even though both of them had developed excellent skills and deep knowledge in some of the world’s biggest and fastest growing markets.
It remains a total puzzle to me why cities like London and New York are open to hiring the best talent that is presented to them – no matter where it is from – yet Australia seems to be very insular.
Australia’s local bias
I appreciate that in certain fields having extensive Australian experience would make sense. However, this cannot be said for the broader job categories. Whilst there might be some specifics to be brushed up on, employers should realise that certain skills translate globally.
Technological advances over the past 10 to 15 years have demonstrated how businesses everywhere are now operating in a global environment. Whether you run a local café or an ASX listed company, the world is at your fingertips.
I truly believe Australian companies need to take heed of international viewpoints, and make sure they’re not overvaluing Australian-only experience.
Kal Desai is a Chartered Accountant and currently works as CFO of Australian manufacturer Beak Engineering.
Great article Kal. Volumes can be written on this topic.
Local companies, hiring managers, recruiters et al are doing themselves a huge disservice by ignoring international expertise.
Such experience is beneficial to not only the local workforce capability, but can also positively impact business results.
The challenge is to adopt a more broad minded approach to identifying and recruiting the right talent and skills.
The question is, is the ‘hiring community’ as a whole ready to embrace this? HR leaders have a critical role to drive a new value proposition.
I completely agree with you Kal. I studied a HR degree in Australia and worked here for a few years prior to moving to London for several years. I worked for some amazing companies in the UK and got a lot of international HR experience but coming back to Perth was a nightmare for my career. All my overseas experience including working on the London Olympics was dismissed as I didn’t have any relevant ‘local’ experience and my salary dropped significantly. What the recruiters and companies don’t realise is that UK is miles ahead in HR practices (and some other… Read more »
Reading this article and the responses I’m feeling quite pleased with myself. I have long felt that I was missing out on good candidates by going through agencies and my preference is to recruit directly. I hired a new trainer a few weeks ago who had the same story – worked for 12 years in London and Dubai and for 6 months couldn’t get work in Australia because of a lack of local experience. I snapped him up and it was one of the best recruitment decisions I have ever made. He has achieved more in the past 3 weeks… Read more »
I’d add an under-appreciation of transferable skills and experience too. I felt completely shut out of the labour market when I returned from Korea after 3.5 years. I was told by a recruiter (the only one that would even meet me) that my international experience counted for nothing and my local degrees were no longer relevant (I’d graduated just before moving to Korea). I couldn’t even get an entry-level job in Perth during the boom when people were crying out for more skilled labour. That was not great for the ego.
Thank You I’m from Las Vegas originally and had worked there for 14 years in the retail, f&b, management in the Mega resorts. I relocated in 2009 to South Africa, I quickly got a job with with a major property management company with a portfolio of 46 properties and moved to the clients HQ as a facilities manager. I got here to Perth and not so much as an email. In turn I got my MCOM thinking an Australian Uni would look good and validate my experience, I was wrong , as I write this reply; I am a part… Read more »