CSCS International

What's a preferred supplier?

2011-07-07T14:52:59Z

Supply chain is a chain of suppliers. Regardless where you are in the supply chain, you'll have to interact with suppliers. The ability to identify and pick the right suppliers is crucial. This is the core skill set we evaluate candidates every time for positions in purchasing, sourcing, logistics and supply management.]]>

First, does this candidate have a systematic way in assessing suppliers and making sourcing decisions? If a candidate says yes and she uses a set of criteria such as quality, cost, delivery, technology and service, then the question becomes how do you apply them in the real cases? Many professionals often don't necessarily have a consistent way to apply them. For example, how to consistently measure cost competitiveness? What weight shall be applied to each factor when it comes to rating multiple suppliers? How to minimize the people factor in making sourcing decisions? Although supply management is often more an art than a science, it is very beneficial to have a systematic way to quantify various factors, and then bake your professional judgment into sourcing decisions, not the opposite. Very often, we found organizations do the opposite when it comes to China sourcing. Supply management has their desire in cost competitiveness, quality department cares mostly about quality and Engineering simply doesn't want to change a thing as any changes involve risks. While each function has their legitimate concerns and desires, without a systematic way to factor all these into quantitative analysis, China sourcing initiatives can easily become a political battlefield. Your China sourcing team shall be able to drive the quantitative analysis and lay a common foundation for organizational alignment before it becomes an opinionated debate.

Second, can a candidate link the performance to a supplier's fundamentals, which are its people, processes and systems? Any supplier performance metrics are results, not causes. If a candidate only sees the results, she is one degree away from the root causes and can be short sighted. What if you don't have much performance data to start with, a typical scenario for most China sourcing initiatives? A great professional can predict a supplier's performance based on how it treats its people, develops its processes and builds its systems. For example, is the supplier ISO certified? If yes, is it certified on paper only to impress its customers or does it truly embrace the ISO quality standards? It doesn't take much to verify for a seasoned professional when she gets into the shop; however, it indeed requires years of hands on experience in the field. Further, how does the supplier balance between relying on processes and people? We all know small suppliers are often people driven instead of process/ system driven; however, we don't want them to be person dependent, and we want our China sourcing team be able to identify that.

Throughout of years, we found candidates that worked predominantly for small companies tend to focus more on the performance itself, while big companies' employees more often try to get to the fundamental people, process and system issues. This is understandable as for small companies, employees often have to cover many functions and therefore can lack the in-depth knowledge about a particular function, while large employers can afford more specialization. For hiring managers, it depends on their business needs if they want to have a generalist or specialist for their China sourcing initiatives. For example, we have a $50M client and their need is very much a generalist to run everything in China for them from sourcing to logistics to supply planning; while a $3B client clearly wants a specialist to help improve the suppliers' people, processes and systems. For the $50M client, we don't refer a candidate who has spent all his life at IBM China and the only thing he did was running test equipment in an internal materials lab. For the $3B, it can be a disaster if they hire someone whose experience is primarily the one man show for a small company and knows everything for only a bit while is not an expert in any particular area.

The third thing we are looking for is how does the candidate communicate her decision making process. Communication skills are critical for any international procurement officers' success. For your China sourcing team, its task is not only find the right suppliers but also convince internal customers to make a change. It can be far more difficult to convince engineers than find the right supplier, for example. This requires not only fluent English but also logical thinking and many other soft skills. When hiring in China, a common mistake is to to attribute a candidate's inability in communicating to her lack of English proficiency. From our experience interviewing numerous candidates in China, if a candidate is not able to articulate in her broken English, very often she couldn't communicate well in Chinese either. Culture, language and personality all plays a role here. Lacking the communication skills, China sourcing team is often perceived as an execution arm and less effective in influencing positive changes. This can be detrimental and is one of the major reasons for the failure of China sourcing initiatives.

In our experience, it can take a long time to hire a professional in China. The supply chain profession is relatively new in China, and the language barrier further restricts MNCs' candidate base. As executive search consultants, we often hear cases that the positions have been open for months without being filled. We respect hiring managers' determination in hiring the right candidates, but also see business opportunities lost during the long process. The hiring can become more difficult as economy further picks up in China particularly for the high end positions.

About the Author
Bob Liu, C.P.M., CPIM, is Managing Director of CSCS International. He is stationed in Silicon Valley and travels frequently to Greater China to help clients build their local supply chain organizations. Bob got his MBA in supply chain management, and has been managing global supply chains for over 10 years in the U.S. and China. Click here to reach him.

IPO: The location factor

2010-08-12T18:52:03Z

Real estate is about location, location and location. Same applies to international procurement offices (IPOs): the location has a big impact on people, taxation and logistics infrastructure that are critical to your IPO's success.

]]> People

Companies pay a premium in many places for English speaking staff. This is particularly true when you get into second or third tier cities in China, for example, where English speaking talents are a scarcity. If you need a significant number of engineers, being close to a top university can be of great help. This can explain why Shanghai is the No. 1 pick for IPOs in China: It has abundant professionals and engineers; it has over 50 universities with tens of thousands of new graduates every year; and it is one of the cities in China with the highest English proficiency.

Taxation

Taxation can be significant to any IPOs. That's why Singapore is often the choice in Asia. Taxation is extremely complicated and even experienced taxation professionals have trouble to sort out. What an IPO needs to consider is not only the corporate tax, but also the personal income tax which can impact your ability in recruiting the right people. For example, for an annual income of $100K, a Hong Kong resident only needs to pay ~15% of tax but the a resident in mainland China would have to pay ~50%.

Infrastructure

Infrastructure can be a huge factor for your total landed cost. Transportation, shipping, warehousing, stability of power, Internet and phone system means a lot to your operations. This is mostly hidden cost that very few companies can accurately quantify ahead of time. Consider this: In China, logistics cost is 20% of GDP while this number is ~10% in the U.S. and Japan. This is mostly due to the insufficient infrastructure in China. Even in China, logistics cost can be significantly different from city to city, region to region. That's why MNCs usually pick coast cities as their IPO headquarters.

Sure there are a lot more to consider when selecting the right location for your IPO. Government reputation, political stability and local business culture. Singapore, Hong Kong and Shanghai are frequent picks for IPOs in Asia just because of their combined advantage in all these aspects.

IPO: It's about what people you hire

2010-06-27T06:09:06Z

According to Ariba, approximately 48% of the word's largest corporations have established international procurement offices (IPO). This figure is typically higher in industries with history of cost pressure, such as automobile, consumer goods and electronics. In the early days, many IPOs were set up to handle tactical things like purchasing order transactions. As supply base in low cost regions matures, more and more IPOs are commissioned with strategic tasks such as supplier identification, selection, audit and performance management. This requires a high level of expertise for the IPO staff. The people you hire for your IPO will make it or break it.

]]> So what issues should companies be aware when fist time staffing their IPOs?

Hire a change agent as IPO Head. A senior executive once said, his IPO delivered nothing but tons of presentations. From presentation to product, it requires a change agent to make it happen. Many companies set up IPOs in order to shift its supply base to low cost regions. This by any criteria is a huge change. How do you convince Engineering to qualify new suppliers which they have never heard about? How would you assure Manufacturing that their production lines won't be negatively impacted with a supply chain now 5,000 miles longer? How do you get sufficient resource from Finance and Tax to set up the correct transactions across borders? This will require the IPO head to be a change agent when you set up the organization.

Keep in mind this change agent is most time located remotely in a different country and a different time zone. This makes change management at headquarters even more challenging. He or she must be passionate about his or her mission and able to initiate positive changes throughout the organization. Very often, IPO heads get frustrated after months of presentations: They've got very favorable pricing, low cost region suppliers are very capable in all aspects, but at the end of the day, there is no business. How do they overcome the roadblocks and maintain the morale of their team as well as suppliers? This indeed requires leadership attributes that people typically don't associate with IPO positions.

Build a balanced team to support IPO mission. In the early days, IPOs were mostly tasked with tactical transactions such as PO management. As supply base shifts to low cost regions, IPOs are taking over more strategic responsibilities which used to reside in headquarters. For example, IBM basically moved its procurement headquarters to China and its CPO John Paterson stays there all year long. Dell virtually did the same with a huge IPO in Singapore - ask their CPO Kevin Brown how much time he stays in Singapore office every year. The era for an IPO with all buyers and commercial people is far gone. You need a balanced team for your extended supply management arm.

Here is the typical expertise that needs to be present at such an IPO: category, purchasing, engineering, logistics and materials management. You don't have to have 5 people to cover these 5 areas if business volume is not substantial; however, a one man show is deemed to be not enough. Insufficiently resourced IPOs will operate like an isolated small island in the Pacific Ocean, and are deemed to fail in accomplishing their strategic missions.

Offer competitive pay to local team. The No. 1 driver for establishing IPOs has been cost reductions. However, don't expect to save much on labor cost from your IPO staff. Companies frequently find out they even have to pay more to hire a commodity manager or supplier engineer in low cost regions than they would have to in their home country. Why? It is simply dictated by limited supply of such talent: There are not sufficient "trilingual" professionals out there. A "trilingual" speaks fluent English, a local language and the language of a profession. These are rare commodities in low cost countries. Unless you are big names like IBM who can attract talent through brand recognition, be prepared to offer very competitive pay.

Take China as an example. A senior VP of a premier institution in the U.S. once said, the days for hiring a sales manager in China with $18,000 a year are far gone. Same applies to supply management professionals. Salaries have been growing at close to double digit year over year in China. High turnover of local team has been a challenge for essentially any MNCs in China. With the economy booming and many China based companies trying to establish their footprint globaly, the competition for bilingual talents is fierce. MNCs are no longer competing among themselves but with domestic major companies as well for experienced bilinguals. They will have to offer not only competitive pay but also a career path for their IPO staff, or else they will find themselves training camp for their peer companies.

Having said all the above, how would you make sure you are doing the right things when staffing your first IPO? Companies often find executive search firms with local expertise of great help if their internal HR doesn't possess such expertise. They can start with filling the IPO head position, and then build a team around this position. Experienced IPO heads typically understand the needs of their staff very well, and companies will rely less on executive search partners when their IPO heads are in place.

About the Author

Bob Liu, C.P.M., CPIM, is Managing Director of CSCS International. He is stationed in Silicon Valley and travels frequently to Greater China to help clients build their local supply chain organizations. Bob got his MBA in supply chain management, and has been managing global supply chains for over 10 years in the U.S. and China. He can be reached at bob.liu#ChinaSCservices.com (substitute # with @).

Connections with high influence

2010-06-08T04:59:07Z

Experienced bilingual professionals are rare commodities in China. It is simple: There are simply not many out there. For the same reason, they are typically not on the job market. If you want to build a strong local team, how would you get them? And even if you hire a headhunter to cold call them, how would the headhunter get their attention as they get such calls almost every week promising them better opportunities?]]>

For example, we contacted 10 such connections 2 months ago when searching a GM/VP level supply chain executive, and were able to get a short list of candidates in just 2 weeks. Among such candidates are mostly former VPs or directors from Fortune 500 companies. They are all bilingual, grew up in Greater China and spent over 15 years working at MNCs. Then we spent another 2 weeks arranging interviews with our client, and the client was ready to make an offer at the end of interviews.

Any head hunters know the importance of such highly influential professionals and call them for referrals. How would you make sure they take your request seriously and help? It depends on the relationships which takes time to build. For us at CSCS International, it was around 10 years of effort. As a bilingual professional, I leveraged my strength to help the professional organizations succeed. For example, I have bridged the communications between ISM and its counterpart China Logistics and Purchasing Federation (CFLP), and met with their officers numerous times. We have also been helping ISM localize its CPSM certification program in China, which further improves CSCS' relationship with both ISM and their partner CFLP. Whenever CFLP compiles its chronicles on purchasing and supply management, I usually contribute a well written case study or article. When they need speakers at their conferences, I go and speak. And when their officers visit the U.S., I am their translator. So when I give their president a call and ask if he knows a senior executive to fill a VP position for Low Cost Region Sourcing, the possibility is high that he will point me to a right person.

Again, it takes time. Anybody with a telephone can start a head hunting business, but very few have invested as much as we have, and have the network we have. That's why we are the best in getting the right bilingual professional to run MNCs' China related supply chains.

It is all about communication

2009-11-02T15:10:50Z

Now you have a purchasing office in China but the spend with low cost region suppliers doesn't pace your expectations. Your China team was able to get very favorable quotations, but no business materializes. Why?

That's why you want to hire a trilingual who communicates well in Chinese, English and the language of supply chain management. Ideally this candidate should have worked a few years in a Western country, and is familiar with how business is conducted in Western culture. Such ideal candidates are a rare commodity and highly sought after in China. The recent economic crisis balanced the demand and supply a little; however, the balance won't last long as global economy recovers. More and more trillinguals moved back to China. For example, CSCS was talking with such a candidate. He got his MBA from a top supply chain program in the U.S., worked for Whirlpool and Tyco for multiple years and moved back China recently. It is very rare to have the unique background like his in both high volume (Whirlpool) and high mix (Tyco) industries. Sure he didn't stay in the job market for long before landing a job in Shanghai.

Communication is not only about language. It is more about understanding how things get done and addressing issues that way. For example, we are all human beings and human beings do business with human beings they know and trust. Engineers are no different. Ray Xu, MBA in supply chain and a typical trilingual who moved from the U.S. to Shanghai recently, shared his experience. When he was developing low cost region suppliers for a Fortune 500 company in the U.S., he often invited his engineers to China to meet with suppliers face to face. They solved issues during work day, had dinner together and sang Karaoke after hours. Such team building activities shortened the distance between suppliers and engineers, and improved engineers' confidence tremendously. In engineers' mind, the suppliers are no longer just suppliers who deliver goods; they are the same human beings just as engineers are. Gradually, engineers' concern went away and China suppliers got designed into products.

]]>

The Costly Local Hires

2009-10-05T14:50:31Z

Our clients often ask, how much does it cost to hire a supply chain manager, logistics manager or purchasing manager in China? The answer, as expected, is it all depends.

For example, a local company can pay $1,000 a month or less to hire a purchasing manager with over 8 years purchasing experience. This person would be able to read some English, for example, simple specifications and drawings, and communicate in broken English through emails. However, if you want to get someone who can participate or lead conference calls with headquarters in English, develop the supply base strategy in China and manage the complete China supply chain, you may have to pay $10,000 a month or even more.

]]> So Rule No. 1: Don't rely on local salary statistics when budgeting your China hiring plans. Those statistics numbers are leaned towards local hires working for local companies. They apply to 99.999% of the work force but not the 0.0001% that you, as a MNC, plan to hire. Your target candidates are so called "trilinguals"who speak English, Chinese and the language of a profession. These trilinguals are a rare commodity and therefore cost you more.

Rule No. 2: Location, location, location. In cities like Shanghai, living cost is very high and exceeds many places in the U.S. For example, a decent appartment can easily cost over $300,000. If you move to a satellite city around Shanghai, such as Kunshan, Taicang and Wuxi, all within 100 miles to Shanghai, housing is much more affordable and so is the labor. These cities may sound unfamiliar but are now the true manufacturing base in China. So if your company plans to set up a manufacturing facility or distribution center in China, it will very likely end up with such a seemingly small city. In fact, these cities are not as small as they sound. For example, Wuxi has over 4.3M residents back to 2006, pretty close to the population of Phoenix, AZ. One more thing to note, even in these satellite cities, compensations for high level executives are very competitive. For example, we were recruiting a procurement director for a European company to centralize its purchasing at multiple plants in Taicang. The compensation package is around $150,000 a year. Note this is a place where a typical worker makes around $3,000 a year.

Rule No. 3: Don't allow cost to be the determining factor in your hiring decisions. In today's China, no matter what package you offer, you can always find someone willing to do the job for 25% less. The question is do you trust the quality? For high caliber candidates in China, it is not surprising you may have to pay far more than the prevailiing salary in the U.S. Why? These trilinguals are a scarcity in China. Let's make an analogy. For a great single family house, you can easily have to pay over $1M in Silicon Valley; however, if you want to buy a same quality house in Shanghai, you may have to pay $5M simply because there are not many out there. Employers have to realize that it is not competitive pay to competitive candidates that costs them more, it is uncompetitive pay to uncompetitive employees that costs a lot more, and it is uncompetitive pay to competitive employees that eventually costs the most.

In the past years, we have seen numerious cases that MNCs had difficulties retaining their top local hires in China. Limited career advancement is the primary reason. Competitive pay becomes another as when professionals don't see great career opportunities, they turn to higher pay. Given the limited supply, there are always companies out there willing to pay more to recruit these top notch people. These are typically medium or small companies that don't have a deep pocket to train people. Fortune 500 companies like IBM, Honeywell and Motorola become the training camps. Needless to say, this type of turnover can be extremely costly to the empoyers.

About the Author

The Young Local Hires

2009-09-27T15:44:09Z

No matter which MNC office you visit in China, most likely you will notice a common phenomenon: local employees are much younger than their counterpart at headquarters. Most local hires are in their 20's, some 30's, and very few over 40's. Very unlikely you will see anybody over 50 except janitors and cleaners. There are multiple reasons.

]]> The Missing Generation

This relates to the Cultural Revolution (1966 - 1976). In those 10 years, universities and colleges were shut down, and students sent to villages or factories for "re-education." That's Chairman Mao's most controversial idea and probably the most dumb one in the whole human history. That generation is now in their 50's and virtually non exsting. Occasionally you will see entrepreneurs out of them, but you won't see many professionals at all, especially professionals who can speak English. Few of them are assuming senior executive positions. Instead, these senior executive positions are pushed down to younger generations who are now in their 40's or late 30's.

This applies to both MNCs and local companies. Recently we visited Haier, a $19B home appliance leader and the General Electric of China. Haier clearly illustrates how a generation was missing. Their chairman and president are well over 60, and their No. 3 person is below 50. Their CIO, CPO, heads for the two biggest business units, and multiple VPs/Managing Directors are all in their 40's. At the director level, you won't see many people in their 50's either. As a result, the whole management team looks 10 years younger than what you would see at a multi billion U.S. company.

The Language Barrier

Before 1976, English teaching or learning virtually didn't exist in China. After China decided to reopen to the world at the beginning of 1980s, schools started to teach English nationwide as a foreign language. It took about 10 years to see the effect. When the English speaking college students graduated in volume, it was already around 1989, the year of Tiananmen Incident. That generation is now in their earlier 40's, which is the upper limit of English speaking work force in China.

Unfortunately, Tiananmen Incident impacted the relationships between China and Western countries. Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) decreased significantly for a few years, which led to fewer job opportunities from MNCs. Most of those college graduates didn't get exposed to English speaking work environment, and gradually lost their English skills. When more opportunities eventually came as FDI increased, MNCs had to hire more people right out of school, not from the existing workforce. This further pushes the upper age limit down to late 30's.

Looking 20 years back into MNCs' hiring practices in China, you can see a clear pattern. In the early years, MNCs primarily hired English majors simply because they could communicate in English. Gradually, as engineering majors caught up on their English skills, MNCs shifted focus to Engineering disciplines. Now days, English skill remains a very important factor for MNCs to make a hiring decision in China, which virtually excludes the whole generation in their 50's or late 40's from the candidate pool. The local hires will remain looking young. Time would be the only factor that can change it as the MNC eligible workforce ages.

The Abundant Opportunities

The bilingual professionals have been a rare commodity. The trilinguals who can speak Chinese, English and the language of a profession are even rarer. While the candidate pool has grown significantly, supply still can't meet demand. On one hand, this is driven by the MNCs' business growth in China; on the other hand, it is also due to local Chinese companies expanding globally.

Nowdays, for the limited talent pool, MNCs not only have to compete with each other but also premiere Chinese companies like Haier, Lenovo and Huawei. The competition is even more fierce at the middle management level. Local companies systematically hire trilingual managers and directors away from MNCs -- these managers can bring in Western management approaches to help build better systems and processes at local companies which is greatly needed for them to become significant global players.

Middle level executives, mostly in their middle 30's to early 40's, also consider local companies for better career growth. This is because creer opportunities at MNCs are mostly execution related as the majority of decisions are typically made at headquarters. At the beginning of their career, bilingual professionals are willing to stay at a MNC for better training and exposure to Western management approaches. As many don't see a clear career path at a specific company or industry, they make frequent career changes, not only driven by financial rewards but also better career development opportunities. It is not surprising to see a person change jobs two or three times in a year or two. This will remain a challenge for MNCs until the economy growth slows down in China.

About the Author

The Trilinguals

2009-09-24T14:14:06Z

A former CPO at a Fortune 1000 company said, in order to manage China supply chains well, being bilingual is not enough; you have to be trilingual. We all know what bilingual means. So what is the third language?

]]> It is the language of supply chain management.

In China, it is easy to find somebody who can read English, it is difficult to find people who can understand spoken English, and it is very difficult to get someone who can speak and communicate in English.

This is due to the education system. People in China learn English mainly through books. Very few have ever lived in an English speaking environment. So the candidate pool for bilinguals mostly ends up with two types of people: English majors and experienced employees working for multinational companies. Even for English majors, only a very small portion can really communicate well in English. For example, we interviewed over 10 English majors for a project in China, and ended up with only 3 that can meet the bare minimum requirements as an interpreter.

Now in this small bilingual pool, how many speak the language of supply chain? Even fewer. The education system China doesn't produce any at all. Universities overseas don't produce many either. For example, Arizona State University has at most 10 MBAs every year who can speak Chinese, so do Michigan State University and most other business schools in western countries. Then we'll have to rely on MNCs who are the biggest producers for trilingual professionals. In major cities like Shanghai and Beijing, there are quite some MNCs and relatively more trilinguals. How about the second or third tier cities? Employers have very limited choice. They have to train their own trilinguals. So you know how steep and how long the learning curve will be.

An alternative is to relocate a trilingual. MNC's used to hire people from places like Hong Kong and Singapore, and relocate them to China. This comes with a big price tag. For example, a European company was paying over $150,000 a year for such a senior materials manager, 3 to 4 times of the cost of a local candidate.

A less costly approach is to relocate someone from tier 1 to tier 2 or 3 cities in China. For example, we recently relocated a candidate from Shenzhen to a tier 2 city in North China with only half of what a typical expat from Hong Kong or Singapore would cost. This candidate is a typical trilingual: he got his MBA in supply chain from a premier business school in the U.S., has over ten years of work experience in both China and the U.S., and can communicate well in both Chinese and English. Now he is adding unique value to the project.

The key to this less costly alternative is finding such candidates. Trilinguals are a rare commodity in China. They are highly sought after and typically not on the job market. As a result, it is very difficult to reach them using standard recruiting practices. It is more effective to reach them through personal connections and referrals. This requires the recruiting firm to have broad connections not only in the Chinese community but also in the supply chain profession. This can take years to establish.

The Big Nose

2009-09-18T14:57:22Z

CSCS International helped a premium U.S. supply chain consulting firm win a significant contract in China. The consulting firm asked Bob Liu, Managing Director of CSCS, to give its team a quick overview on sensitive culture issues before they depart for China. Bob started with a story.

When I was a little kid in China, the stereotype was Americans have a big nose, are quipped to teeth and kill people around the globe. This was the image formulated by the national media. It was 1970's when the world was still deeply trapped in the Cold War. National media in China was a primary political propagation tool and the only way to get information about the rest of world.

]]> When I first came to the U.S. in 2000, with much surprise I found out that not everybody's nose is that big. People are nice, just like what we are in China.

The lesson is we are all biased by what we were exposed to. Americans could be even more as people are more self centric than the rest of world. As the biggest economic body and most influential democracy, Americans have great reasons to be self centric. The issue is people didn't realize they know less and less about the rest of world. Then they have a higher risk of being occupied by the "big nose" stereotypes. I can safely say people outside the U.S. know much more about Americans, not the vice versa. Example? Whenever I called my mom who still lives in a little village where she was born, she always had more global news than I did although the only communication channel for her is a TV. Why? Close to being a typical American, I seldom watch global news anymore, and even when I wanted to watch, there is simply not much to watch on TV anyway.

Now my client has won a significant contract in China, and needs to send a great team there for a few months. They have a lot of good reasons to be nervous - they don't know much about the country, it is their first customer in China, and they don't feel comfortable with certain ways their customer does business. Most team members are very experienced professionals and in their 50's or 60's. They have a lot of experience, they also have a lot of things embedded in their mind about China - its companies, people and the ways people do things over there.

My advice was simple: Leave everything you know behind and just go there figure out on your own. China has developed so much in the past 10 to 20 years, and a lot has changed since then. However, media's opinions in the U.S. haven't changed that much or that fast. So what we learned from the media could be 5 or even 10 years old. This means a generation behind given China's economic development clockspeed. Rather than being occupied with old and biased mindset, why not just go there with a fresh mind and find out on our own? Most likely things are neither as good nor as bad as we imagined. And indeed that's what they found out and now the project is well under way.

This applies to whatever we do with a different country, culture or people. We are all biased with all kinds of stereotypes, big or small. We rely much on other people or media's input which is mostly biased as well. Leaving our mind open and trying to test out on our own could be the best solution. That's why it is so important to just go there and meet with the people face to face. This doesn't mean we don't trust anything from any third party. It is just to remind us the risk that we could be importing other people's "big nose".

Don't Limit Yourself to Your History

2009-06-06T22:39:39Z

We were helping a recent MBA graduate land a commodity manager job. His background is impeccable no matter what criteria you use: multiple years as the distribution manager for a Global 500 company, an expert in planning, logistics and warehousing, and MBA education from Arizona State University, a very top supply chain program in the nation. Furthermore, he is a rare trilingual candidate best suited for China supply chains: he speaks Chinese, English and the language of supply chain. This is evidenced by the interview opportunities he got: whenever companies came to campus, he was surely on the interview list. However, he seldom made the second round. Why?

]]> The answer: he let his history hold him hostage.

When companies come to ASU, they bring purchasing and supply management jobs as that's what the school is best at. Since his background is mostly logistics, this candidate views himself as a logistics professional, although he indeed had great experience with supply management. For example, as a distribution manager, he was actually managing transportation suppliers. This mindset dominated his interview for those purchasing type jobs: I am a logistics guy and not a purchasing professional; therefore I am not a perfect match for the job. If you believe you are not the best fit, you are not and you will not get the job.

Our advice to this candidate is very simple: Start to view himself as a supply management professional. Why not? He worked so much with suppliers, he is so good with supply chain, and he went through the rigorous 2 year full time MBA program at a top purchasing school. If his classmates who were school teachers or biologists are qualified for a commodity manager position, why not him?

Again, don't let past hold future hostage. Nobody is born for a specific profession. We all build our futuer on top of our past; however, don't let past dictate future.

Source for the picture: The Memphis Business Journal.

The Head Farmers

2008-05-31T23:10:32Z

Search firms are "head hunters." They get into the market, find the right target candidates, hunt them, and be done with it.

This is particularly true in today's China. Opportunities are abundant if you are a trilingual who speaks English, Chinese and the language of a profession. Top candidates can get calls every week from head hunters offering a better paid position, not necessarily a better career. Young professionals change jobs as frequently as patroning restaurants. Very fast they end up with many great companies on their resume but are often lost in their career.

There got to be a better way to handle this.

]]> I noticed this a few years ago and decided to do something about it. That's the start of Supply Chain Forum, a Chinese website dedicated to promoting supply chain best practices and educating supply chain leaders in Chinese community. Over years, I contributed hundreds of articles to the website on purchasing, sourcing, supply management and career development. The forum becomes the most welcomed website of its kind in Chinese community, and attracts tens of thousands of professionals every year.

As more and more professionals know the forum, there are more and more job opportunities posted there. That's the start of CSCS International. I founded the company focusing on satisfying MNCs' needs of Chinese speaking professionals.

Different from its peers, CSCS positions itself as "head farmers." They strive to help candidates better define their goals, understand their strength and weakness, and most importantly, find out what they truly love and enjoy doing. Instead of cold calling candidates, CSCS takes a completely different approach. They focus on educating professionals on supply chain concept, best practices, and how to become successful in multinational companies. They speak at many conferences in China and contribute regularly to multiple professional magazines. CSCS believes all these are necessary to nurture a healthy candidate pool.

When candidates become stronger in their profession and make the right career choices, everybody wins.

Click here to see some events CSCS hosted or spoke at.

For Supply Chain Professionals

2008-05-30T21:24:18Z

For years, we have seen companies struggle when recruiting for their China supply chains. Very often, the search consultants they hired outside of China don't have enough local connections in China, and couldn't get quality candidates. Search firms in China had a hard time understanding the exact needs due to communication and culture issues, and often ended up with dozens of brilliant resumes but none turned out to be a good fit.

Bob Liu, Managing Director of CSCS International, finds himself in a perfect position to fill the gap. With experiences in both China and the U.S., Bob has been managing global supply chains since long. Due to his unique background and connections in China, peers and alumni frequently came to him for help to find the right people for their China supply chains. That's the beginning of CSCS International.

]]> Barrier of entry is very low for executive search business. Therefore, there are many players in this very competitive market. For example, in Shanghai alone, there are 3,000 executive search firms in 2008, most of which claim they can fill any positions from frontdesk to CEO. In reality, there are very few who can truly stay focused in a specific industry or profession and serve the high end clients.

When starting CSCS as a business, Bob's vision is to make it the best of its kind by staying focused. Since its inception, CSCS has always concentrated in supply chain profession which we are best at. We further narrow down to China supply chain related fields. Given the trillions of dollars of business between China and the rest of world, we strongly believe this market is big enough for us to serve. We'll continue staying focused, become the choice of our clients, and provide our clients with the best services.

Again, this is a business founded by a supply chain professional to serve his peers. We understand the supply chain profession very well. We also have the expertise in human resource and executive search. This is a complimentary team well positioned to serve our clients in China and around the world.

The China Connections

2008-05-29T20:03:57Z

Executive search is a people business. You have to establish direct relationships with not only clients but also candidates. As our business is mostly in China where high caliber candidates are a scarcity, direct relationships with candidates are even more critical.

]]> We started by educating professionals in China. Bob Liu, Managing Director of CSCS International, has spent years promoting best practices in supply chain and educating professionals in China. Leveraging his MBA education and industry experience in the U.S., he wrote over 100 articles and developed dozens of case studies in Chinese, and established himself as a supply chain leader among Chinese professionals. He hosted a column at Logistics Management magazine in China, and has a Chinese website Supply Chain Forum dedicated to purchasing and supply chain. The website becomes very popular and attracts tens of thousands of professionals every year in Chinese community. When searching supply management at Baidu.com, the dominant search engine in Chinese, Supply Chain Forum consistently appears on the first page of search results, together with websites of ISM, CSCMP, and CIPS. The forum becomes a major interface for CSCS to directly connect with its candidates.

Bob also makes frequent visits to China and meets candidates face to face. He speaks often at various conferences, universities, and with special interest groups. For 2008 alone, he spent two months in China and Asia, speaking at six events. All these help gather first hand information and connect with top notch candidates in China. Check out his calendar of events.

At CSCS, we also understand the importance of connecting with professional associations, special interest groups and training organizations. We partner with multiple such organizations in China. Our partnership is another effective way to reach top candidates in China - we believe the very best candidates are seldom on the job market, and a referral system based on partner relationship is more effective than most other ways such as posting jobs on Internet. Visit our Partners for more information.