HR Essentials EP3: Preparing For Tomorrow's Workforce Today

When Kimberly Clark's HR team approached us about bringing 47 foreign specialists to Malaysia for a critical manufacturing expansion, they expected the usual challenges: visa paperwork, regulatory compliance, and processing timelines. What they didn't expect was the leadership crisis that nearly derailed their entire project three months later. The work permits arrived on schedule. The expatriates settled into Kuala Lumpur. But by month three, productivity had dropped 35%, two senior engineers had resigned, and the local Malaysian team was requesting transfers. The problem wasn't immigration. It was integration. And it revealed a blind spot that costs Malaysian companies millions annually: the failure to lead across cultures.

Do we have what it takes to find those vital connections? Ong Ewe Hock, a faculty trainer with Leaderonomics, joins us to discuss how we can better define our own dots.

How important is it to have a powerful dream and to live it? In this week's episode of Leadership Nuggets, Prof. George Kohlrieser of IMD Switzerland and veteran hostage negotiator shares the story of a man who had a dream and then lost it