Language pervades every aspect of organizational life. It touches everything. Yet remarkably, leaders of global organizations, whose employees speak a multitude of languages, often pay too little attention to it in their approach to talent management. As we have observed in countless organizations, unrestricted multilingualism creates inefficiency in even the most dedicated and talented workforces. It can lead to friction in cross-border interactions, lost sales, and a host of other serious problems that may jeopardize competitiveness (see also “Global Business Speaks English,” by Tsedal Neeley, HBR May 2012). Developing a comprehensive strategy for managing language can help transform that vulnerability into a source of competitive advantage.
Choosing a lingua franca, or common language, can dramatically improve how employees collaborate across borders—even though it also introduces new challenges. For one thing, the decision to adopt a lingua franca must be balanced with the need to speak local languages and adapt to local cultures. For another, individuals’ proficiency (or lack thereof) in the common language can cloud leaders’ judgment about how suitable those people are for specific assignments and promotions. Decision makers may undervalue or overvalue language skills and therefore misjudge talent.
We have learned through more than a decade of Tsedal Neeley’s research on language in global organizations and teams, and more than 20 years of Robert Kaplan’s leadership of global organizations, that language strategy is critical for global talent management. As a leader, you can factor language and cultural skills more deliberately into the hiring, training, assessment, and promotion of talent—and into the management of global teams—whether or not your company adopts a shared language. Of course, in a global firm, choices and tactics will vary somewhat according to the needs of each unit and region. But those differences must exist within a cohesive system that allows employees to function effectively across the organization and achieve key strategic priorities.
Indeed, your language strategy must fit with your firm’s value proposition to customers if you hope to penetrate various markets and coordinate among them. You need to consider how to infuse language into your core talent practices in order to deliver that value.
Hiring and Training
When seeking superb job candidates, recruiters at global companies must be aware of potential blind spots regarding language. First, they may allow fluency (either in a lingua franca or in a local language) to overshadow their assessments of a candidate’s skills, growth potential, and knowledge of markets and cultures. To ensure that you are hiring the best people, you may need to accept some limitations on language capabilities and be prepared to provide training to meet both global and local language needs.
For example, although IBM long ago adopted English as its lingua franca, the company has identified eight other languages as important to serving local markets. IBM hires global professionals with the expectation of strengthening their language skills through immersive training, private coaching, or online learning. Further, employees know that certain international assignments carry with them a language-training requirement.
Neeley, T., Kaplan, S., What’s Your Language Strategy?, Harvard Business Review
Retrieved from http://hbr.org/2014/09/whats-your-language-strategy/ar/1
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