Unlocking Human Power: Firms need to revamp business models

What happens where East meets West? Is it like the mixing of water and oil or a perfect combination?

Well for businesses in Dubai, the modern day connection point between the East and the West, it means growth. A few weeks ago, I moderated the Dubai Economic Outlook for 2011 where leading economists and leaders of the Dubai business community shared their outlooks and predictions for the year. One thing was for sure: there were consistent references to the East and what it means for economic growth in Dubai.

The current fundamental economic growth drivers for Dubai are tourism, maximising on trade, and logistics. And the East is having a dominating impact in all three areas with India being in the first place as Dubai's trade partner followed by China. Additionally, Dubai has a growing share of tourists from China and India representing more than 2 million tourists per year. The majority of the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in Dubai also comes from Asian Countries.

Simply put, the sunshine of growth is no longer shining on the West. What happens when the sun sets in the West? It rises in the East — and the East represents growth for the region.

Silk Road

Dubai seems to be the embodiment of a revitalisation of the Silk Road, the ancient trade route. A major reason for this is the connection of extensive trade routes through the logistics networks and the appeal to people who want to connect with the sun, sand, sea, and shopping. Dubai is the hub for the important paths of cultural, commercial, and technological exchange between traders, merchants, and consumers.

The attention given to the East made me wonder, what does this mean for the business leaders in this community?

Firstly, business leaders need to leverage their market location as a driver of business. Whether you are a local business, have a Dubai headquarter for your global business or a multinational with an outpost here, you need to use it to grow your business with the East. Today's era requires all businesses to make a market shift and either serve or support the Asian population explosion that is within 2-8 hours from here by plane.

This point is commonly misunderstood to mean that businesses need to pack up their bags and physically move to the East. While for some this may be strategic, the idea of the market shift is to recognize the significance of the Asian markets and identify ways to serve them. Considering that China is strengthening its role as a trade partner with Africa, businesses should identify ways they can use their geographical location to serve the trade and logistics movements.

Next, the rise of the East requires that businesses in Dubai make a growth shift a recalibrating of what growth is. Even though Dubai and the GCC have promising growth prospects compared to the West, this growth rate is miniscule and constrained, relative to the East. Businesses need to ensure that their capital position is ready for accelerated growth.

As the connection point of the East with the West, the GCC employs a global workforce in a single locality. For every business this means they must give greater attention to diversity and inclusion than the text books teach and understand how to drive performance and improve workforce productivity in the midst of difference.

The business models in the UAE are commonly mirrored after Western models with most businesses being led by a local who studied abroad (in the West) or by a Western expat.

Maximum impact

This brings the need to shift the way that you lead. The majority of modern management theory have its genesis in North America. While these theories are good (for their home markets), they do not travel far. Instead of trying to import leadership approaches much like commodities are exported, business leaders need to recreate their approach if they hope to have the maximum impact working across the East/West connection.

Since the East is the flavour of the day and most likely for decades to come, even here in Dubai business leaders need to give consideration to what this means for their market impact, growth plans and leadership approach.

The writer is Vice-President of Leadership Solutions at Kenexa.