Lessons from the Road — The power of culture and exploration

If you want to attract the best people for your business, look to your company’s culture and how you encourage capacity for exploration, creativity and career self-determination. Here is a lesson from the road — from Pakistan. (This column originally ran in The Nation newspaper in Bangkok on February 24, 2015.)

In Islamabad, Pakistan a couple of weeks ago, I was speaking to an employee assembly about our company’s strategic priorities and our business environment. Looking out across the thousands of faces, I was struck first by how personally invested they all were in such high-level presentations, and secondly, by how young they are.

Pakistan is among the world’s youngest countries with a median age in the early 20s, so the youthfulness of our company should be no surprise. But this, in combination with their energy, their piercing questions, their active interest and their outspokenness on the future and the culture of our company made it striking. Our operations in Pakistan has for years been consistently ranked as a top — if not the top — employer and is sought after by Pakistan’s top young talent as one of the best places to work. These are the people I was face to face with at our assembly in Islamabad — and it was a timely reminder of what we have done right, and how we can continue to build on this in Pakistan and across our Asia region.

The way we operate as employers in Pakistan is the same in the rest of our Asia region and in all 13 of our global markets. And just one word is sufficient to describe how our established brand in an established industry wins over talent that may otherwise be lured by the perceived greener pastures of new companies in newer industries. That word is “culture.” It’s this that has allowed us to attract the best young talents in countries with neither a shortage of youth nor talent.

Whether in Thailand or Pakistan, our culture will not ever be for everyone. To work with us and to be happy here, you have to embrace the culture we have. What we call the “Telenor Way” encapsulates our culture, and other companies should find similar approaches to defining theirs. Ours is a culture where passion, competition, integrity, informality and innovation all come together. It’s a culture where we expect people to speak out, take risks and be heard. This is important for all companies seeking to attract the best people: start with not trying to attract everyone. Build a culture that is so strong, so clearly defined, that you get the people who fit you, and who will thrive operating the way the company does.

The second thing we have learned and built into to our culture: We don’t go after people who seem to have their careers all planned out. Too many young people think too much about what they want to “be”. Have dreams and ambitions but don’t turn them into narrow goals, steps, or positions. Open minds, versatility, a range of talents, interests and good ideas are what the best employers should be looking for. In our company’s culture, young recruits should not expect a rigid career program to fall into. They have to build it themselves.

In our culture you can be anything you want. It’s a place where you can invest in yourself and build your own path. You might come in as a government relations manager and retire as a CEO or head of branding or sustainability. This open-endedness is a part of healthy professional growth and a part of keeping things fresh for the curious and ambitious people we want to attract and retain.

We grow them via hands-on collaboration with upper management, by keeping them hungry, challenging them by moving them around and making sure our leadership knows them well. And we recognize them not with certificates, but by seeing them and meeting them informally, by listening to their inputs on our company’s direction. Knowing who the young talents are, helping develop them, and recognizing them are key jobs of a CEO. Don’t outsource this to human resources.

One final thought that cannot go without mentioning: Increasingly so, young people expect their employers to be companies that do the right things. The best talents want to work for companies with strong codes of conduct, who operate transparently, have flat organizations and open work environments. They want to take part in innovating products and services with positive local impact and make a difference to society. This again is a question of culture.

Our Pakistan operations, consistently ranked as the best employer in the country, is now also one of the operations from which my company actually exports talent to our other business units around Asia and Europe. Like Maham Ashan, who started in financial services and moved throughout the organization into technology and risk management. Today a fresh “export” from Pakistan, she is among those leading the roll-out of Myanmar’s first commercial mobile network in history. To me she is an example of two things; one is that our people share our company DNA of being explorers, of pushing their own boundaries and venturing into the unknown. And two, they are sought after across the world for their attitude and their skills. Our role is to continue taking risks on young people with talent but without plans or experience. These are daring, but calculated bets. Companies who want to remain successful, need to be prepared to make them.