14 Oct 2014

Managing Talent Acquisition across Africa



 

Written by: Tunde Makinde, Executive Consultant, Executives in Africa

Executives in Africa, the leading international Search firm focused 100% on Africa, is delighted to be media partner to AfricaCom 2014. Globally, we have the largest team of search consultants purely focusing on the Sub-Saharan market, with longstanding results in 22 different African countries.

Increased stability in communication routes in recent years has led to Executives in Africa being able to guide their candidates through the interview and job placement process more efficiently, and we believe our patience and tenacity during the times when technology was not so enabled has helped to give us a firm foothold in this busy arena.

Time and time again our clients tell us that one of the main problems they face is that of sourcing senior executive talent and candidates for leadership roles in Africa.  President and CEO of the Dangote Group recently said, “Having comparative advantage is no longer enough. You need a superior talent pool”. This is backed up by a recent report by PWC which found out that talent shortages are a major issue in Africa. Creating and fostering a skilled workforce is highly regarded by 84% of CEO’s surveyed. 

Talent acquisition is more than just finding the ideal candidate in for the working environment and we work hard to ensure our candidates make informed decisions on where they are locating to, have a firm understanding of protocol and a belief in being able to deal with any challenges they may be exposed to.
We have recently worked with a client that had exactly this type of problem. It is a large Tanzanian Group, which was committed to diversifying into the Pay TV sector and sought a high calibre and experienced Pay TV CEO to be hired within an exceptionally tight time frame as the planned launch date was in just three months.

The senior management of the Group held no prior experience of running a business in this particular sector, so they entrusted us with the critical task of identifying the most suitable individual for the CEO role. The truly global nature of this search meant that we needed to identify and map potential candidates all over the world.  

Our Research team successfully located strong potential candidates across Africa, the Middle  East,  India,  Europe  and  the  USA. Recommendations of possible candidates were also taken from existing contacts in this sector. The list reached 187 potential candidates with a good representation of both expatriate and local candidates.

We delivered the Short List within four weeks of sign off and the successful candidate was made an offer, had accepted and was in situ Dar es Salaam within three months.

Executives in Africa was recently also approached by the leading Pay TV company across Africa, who were looking for a Chief Operating Officer in Nigeria to lead a substantial team and report directly into their high ranking MD.  The candidate, who would be tasked with setting strategy and executing the business plan, represented a key hire for the client as Nigeria is set to go digital in 2015.

The Research team set out a global search and we were delighted to be able to swiftly present a candidate who had outstanding credentials, previous experience and who starts his contract next month.

We look forward to meeting you at AfricaCom 2014. If you would like to speak to Tunde Makinde please contact him directly at tm@executivesinafrica.com.

About Executives in Africa
Executives in Africa which is a search firm focusing on sourcing senior level professionals for roles based in sub-Saharan Africa. 
We have globally the largest team of search consultants purely focusing on the Sub-Saharan market and have successfully recruited in 22 different African countries. We pride ourselves on being able to identify both international talent and local talent and on numerous occasions we have provided shortlists purely with local candidates. In fact around 55% of our placements to date have been African nationals. For more information please visit: http://executivesinafrica.com/

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