A New Country Director

July 14, 2008: It was announced last week that there is a new Country Director hired for the India office. I think I’ve mentioned several times that the India office is in a bit of a staff transition. The charismatic Country Director, an ex-pat from the United States who had been there for 11 years, left a few months ago, followed by a number of other staff turnovers. The search yielded a number of great candidates, and the person they’re hiring has tremendous qualifications as well as the kind of personality and team building outlook that they were hoping to find.

When it was announced to the staff that the individual is an Indian man, my reaction was “great!” In my mindset, that was clearly preferable than an ex-pat for a number of reasons. For one, a national knows the culture and can therefore do a better job navigating the public aspects of the position as well as the internal aspects of working with the staff. It also appeals to my justice and equality nerve. Too often the highest levels of leadership are evasive.

I was therefore surprised to see pretty tepid reactions around the room. People’s expressions literally did not change, and I wondered what was going on. I thought perhaps it was already known and the announcement was gratuitous, or perhaps there was something about this person that people knew and did not like. But from how he (Jim, my boss, the person from the U.S. who came to India to help out during this transitional time) was introducing this man, it was clear that was not the case. About 6 of the Directors (all Indian nationals themselves) were part of the interview process, and they pretty flatly shared their impressions of the new Country Director as well.

I talked to Jim later and found out several things. A few people had come to him, concerned that having and Indian Country Director (CD) could change things for the worse. The former ex-pat CD had imparted a relative equality in the office, in a country where the caste system still has a strong presence. The drivers, sweeper/cleaner, and office-boy (the actual title…one I’m still not comfortable with) were included in ways they had not been before, and were treated with much more respect than they likely experienced elsewhere. The former CD was committed to everyone’s professional development. The driver, for example, wanted to learn how to use a computer and the CD made that happen for him.

The fear, therefore, was that an Indian man might undo some of what everyone really valued about the office culture. It was not just those who stood to directly lose from the situation who felt worried: some Director-level people expressed concern as well.

It’s always interesting how things are seen from such varied points of view.