by S. Tamer Cavusgil

Globalization of markets and competition has transformed the way we do business in a remarkable way over the past three decades. Yet another facet of globalization has been the formation of a global market for talent. When multinational enterprises recruit talent, they no longer need to confine their search to a domestic market. Indeed, these companies are sourcing talent everywhere, wherever it is available.


The practice of recruiting human resources from a global talent pool actually represents yet another phase of offshoring. As you will recall, manufacturing jobs have been relocated to low labor cost countries since the 1970s. Beginning with the early 1990s, IT applications began their migration to India.

A New Phase

Over the past decade, we have witnessed yet another phase. Today offshoring is not just about moving highly codified, transactional work such as credit card processing, claims administration and call center functions. It is about sourcing talent everywhere. And the talent that is sourced is not only procurement, HR, legal services or engineering services, but also white-collar employees for high-skilled, high-paying jobs.

This is borne out by a recent survey (Duke/Booz Allen Offshoring Research Network Survey), which suggests that advanced economies such as the United States no longer have a lock on high-skilled, high-paying jobs. High-end work such as chip design, financial and legal research, clinical trials management, and book editing is now being sourced to countries such as India, China, Hungary, Brazil and the Philippines. What is different about this phase of offshoring is that, while cost-reduction remains a key reason for moving offshore, companies are also seeking to gain access to highly skilled scientific and engineering talent available in these countries.

The global mobility of white-collar employees is evident in the ranks of many multinational companies such as Coca-Cola. These companies benefit by tapping top talent from wherever it is available. Often the corporate office draws from the subsidiaries and vice versa.

Global Market

While recruiting talent on a global scale is not without its challenges, many multinationals are getting better at recognizing and exploiting this opportunity. Many maintain databases of their global talent pool accessible through company intranet. The global talent market also means that companies often have to compete for such talent. For highly skilled individuals in science and engineering, this trend provides opportunities to search for best positions around the globe.

This newest facet of globalization simply implies global access to intellectual capital. Those with critical skills can now join the global talent pool. It also implies that the graduates of Georgia State University who equip themselves with proper skills, knowledge and a cosmopolitan view can expect to find employment opportunities far from Atlanta, Georgia.

Welcome to the new realities of global business.

The second edition of Tamer Cavusgil’s co-authored textbook International Business: Strategy, Management, and the New Realities is forthcoming later this year from Pearson Education. First published in 2008, it has been translated into Mandarin, Korean, Turkish and other languages. More than 100 universities across several continents use the book to teach international business to students and executives. International Business examines crossborder trade with an emphasis on the increasing role of emerging markets – high-growth economies that are experiencing rapid economic transformation. It offers an in-depth examination of emerging markets and their unique features, including the dominance of family conglomerates.

S. Tamer Cavusgil is Fuller E. Callaway Professorial Chair and director of the Institute of International Business of the Robinson College of Business. A Fellow of the Academy of International Business, he researches and writes about global business strategy, early internationalization, emerging markets, and risk measurement and mitigation in international markets. Cavusgil is the author of more than a dozen books and over 180 refereed journal articles, is founding editor of the Journal of International Marketing and Advances in International Marketing, and serves on the editorial review boards of a dozen professional journals, including the Journal of International Business Studies.