Your agency’s expanding for the first time in a new market. Who’s your first hire?

A lot rides on those first few staffers hired: culture, reputation and commercial momentum. Get it right, and they could be the bedrock for your success abroad. Get it wrong, and your overseas venture could fail altogether. So, how can you go about getting it right? We spoke to seven agency leaders who had been through this process before to get their advice.

How do you solve a problem like… staffing up in an overseas market?

Amy Williams, founder and chief executive, Good-Loop: “Expanding overseas requires a dual strategy: bringing in staff who already know the company and its processes and gaining local expertise through new full-time hires. When expanding to the US, we made some permanent transfers and introduced three-month secondments for our UK staff to share their expertise and learn from their new colleagues. Enabling team building and knowledge exchange is crucial for ensuring both hubs can work as one team going forward. This approach, coupled with our 30-day work-anywhere policy, empowers people to cultivate their own networks with clients and colleagues worldwide. Fostering closer cooperation between offices benefits everyone, including the business, boosting motivation, helping career development, and enriching the work experience.”

Desmond Bateman, global head of strategy, Spark Foundry: “I don’t see it as a problem, but an opportunity. Talent is global and there are things to be learned from every market. I’ve lived and worked in three different places around the world, Hong Kong, Miami and London, and I wouldn’t have the same breadth and understanding of those markets if my employers hadn’t encouraged me to go overseas. Being in a global role, I need to have that lived experience of how different markets work and how every campaign will land locally, where appreciating the commonalities and nuances of local markets ensures our work makes the most impact. For example, knowing where to place pharmaceutical ads in the UK/Europe vs the US, or knowing the best locations/times (in-home or OOH) to target families in the likes of LATAM vs APAC.”

Gabriel Richy, enterprise consultant manager, Media.Monks: “You can develop talent from within, but you need one or two people who know retail and can upskill and disseminate knowledge among the org. Or you need to acquire that talent to upskill the rest of the talent (a rather good investment, I would think).

“Some of this knowledge may exist already. A benefit is that agencies work with various clients, including FMCG clients, who will look to them for strategic guidance on retail media. People who already work with these clients should already possess a great deal of knowledge of retail. End clients expect agencies to guide them through the retail media landscape - to plan and buy cross-channel. Agencies need to understand the retail ecosystem and think outside the box, as retail partners aren’t just retail players, for example, cinema chains (example here). Agencies generally possess the skillsets required. However, there is a need for multidisciplinary stakeholders who can understand the world of retailers and suppliers. Therefore, upskilling and allowing resources to do so will be critical.”

Cassiano Surek, chief technology officer, Beyond: “Businesses have a lot to consider when expanding overseas, so sending someone trustworthy and ambitious to drive the strategy is vital. Solid knowledge of the company, including its processes and values, can accelerate integration and ensure a smooth transition of the critical elements of the company culture - something that’s crucial for building and maintaining close connections with teams in other offices. I did this when establishing our Lisbon hub in September 2020; and we’ve quickly grown to a team of 30. I’ve seen many Brazilian companies successfully use this approach in Portugal, sending in their core teams to set up and only hiring local talent once the new hub is established and the strategy is clear.”

Mike Petricevic, co-founder and creative partner, Waste Creative: “When it comes to staffing up overseas, it really depends on which market you’re talking about. We recently opened in Tokyo, where the language barrier was a significant barrier, meaning hiring locally was crucial. There’s a marked difference between fluent and native speakers, with the latter building trust more rapidly within a culture where trust-building is a gradual process.

“Additionally, we observed that the Japanese working culture favors a collective approach to identifying business problems, before moving to a solution. This is in stark contrast with the approach in the UK and US, where agencies tend to lead with an insight-driven, problem-solving approach.”

Hannah Langton, regional lead APAC, Canvas8: “Credibility is key. In opening our Singapore office last year, we sent an experienced member of staff to set up the Canvas8 Singapore as part of our global offering, but beyond that it’s been all about hiring local talent. It’s crucial that we have a deep understanding of the region, rather than a western perspective that could come from bringing in external candidates. Understanding even the most nuanced cultural and behavioral differences are of course incredibly important, especially in the marketing and media industries. To get that, you really do need people that live and breathe the markets they serve.”

Craig MacIntyre, senior vice president, BMF: “Building an international presence means getting into the export/import business. How do we effectively export our brain trust, relationships and organizational culture? And how do we import in-market expertise, local networks and cultural insights?

The answer is balanced and multi-layered – a permanent international ‘hub‘ team who have expertise working on a global stage to lead and coordinate global projects, plus a network of project-based local contractors who serve as subject matter experts and on-the-ground execution leads. This allows for flexible and controlled international growth, with permanent local hires or international employee transfers happening only when business volume has been successfully sustained.”

Sedge Beswick, founder, SeenConnects: “To succeed in market, you absolutely need local talent AND head office that know your business inside out to relocated to that market… even if it’s a team of two to start with; business expert, market expert.

“The market expert does what it says on the tin – they lead and guide the business on everything from salaries, desirable office locations, local nuances and based on level, they should also come with their own network also. The benefit of a business expert is someone with experience of the brand will be able to get the process up and running, to understand the client briefs/needs and evolving the company’s vision/values from which ever market they’re in. This allows the market expert to focus on what they’re good at, with the nuts and bolts falling into place. Whether the appetite from a business perspective has declined, the appetite from an employee perspective absolutely hasn’t – the request for transfers come in thick and fast.“

Want to join our readers in future debates? Give me a shout via sam.bradley@thedrum.com and I’ll clue you in on next week’s prompt.