China - land of the crazy company expansion plans

When people ask how many people there are in my firm, and I respond '700 in China', they usually balk.  This apparently is a lot of people.  Maybe they've never heard of Capgemini, that's entirely possible.  But when you look at our short term growth targets, 700 is just scratching the surface.

 

In the below article, Indian Outsourcing company Tata plans to grow from 400 to 4000 staff in China over the next few years.  This is typical of ambitious growth plans by professional service firms.  They know there's a huge future market out there, and want to grow to fill that void.  Capgemini plan to grow from our current 700 to 4000 by 2008 (which will include 1500 in Business and Technology Consulting, the rest being Outsourcing).

 

Scary business eh?  Especially when you think that we are a good part of the way into 2006 already.  And getting to 4000 isn't just recruiting another 3500 people, you've got China's high levels of staff turnover to account for too.  Not just because staff are fickle, but also because of the fierce growth targets - poaching is ripe.  We've just poached a good 15-20 senior managers from Bearingpoint China.  I can't imagine they'll be too happy with that.

 

Hence many say that HR is the biggest corporate issue in China.  Recruitment, retention, training etc.  But for professional service firms probably the bigger problem is winning sales.  Unlike small companies where 3 clients are plenty for the company to thrive for a couple of years, you can never have enough clients.  How will we win client after client after client?  On what basis will we win them?  Cost?  Quality?  Reputation?

 

Growth at these rates?  Unrealistic?  One hell of a journey?  Lots of pressure?  How can you run a consultancy business to global standards when 80% of your company joined in the last 1 or 2 years?  What will be the corporate culture?  How will you control standards and methods?  Especially when you are talking about a distributed organisation, where the staff are spread around the country at client sites. 

 

Lastly in particular, how will you best leverage your international brand, capability and experience within the China market?  Use of seconded expatriates?  Ad hoc assignment of experts by project?  Are successful overseas practices and solutions applicable to China's market?  Should you rely on expatriate senior management, or upon the best you can find locally?  How will you manage this language and culture mix within senior management?

 

Now That's exciting. At the rock face, it's really tiring, frustrating, unrewarding and hard work, but at the macro scale, it's exciting.

 

TCS to focus on China
Staff Correspondent
156 words
21 April 2006
The Hindu
16
English
(c) 2006 Kasturi & Sons Ltd

 

To increase staff strength in China to 4,000 in 3-4 years

 

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), as a part of its global strategy, will focus on China and increase the employee's strength from 400 to 4,000 in the next three to four years. The company's joint venture with the Chinese government-owned National Development Reform Commission (NDRC) along with Microsoft will start operation from May.

 

Addressing a press conference here on Thursday, S. Ramadorai, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of TCS, said the existing operation of 400-people global development centre (GDC) would be folded up in the next 12 months and employees would be moved to the joint venture company. The joint venture would function as a single entity in China. The new venture would cater to China and multinational companies operating there, as well as the region, including Korea and Japan.