Every year the CFR Global Executive Search Network meets in a different member city around the globe. This year was no different with us all meeting in Mexico City, being hosted by Jorge Segovia, Monica and their team at LYCANS Group www.lycansmx.com.
This year was, however, different as Jorge and his team arranged a new format including a weekend of sightseeing and activities for all members and their partners. The format of the conference included a Board Meeting on the Friday and then formal conference days on the Monday and Tuesday, following.
The formal conference was themed around “Human Talent and Trending Topics” and included speakers and panels discussing Artificial Intelligence, Executive Coaching, New Business Partner Attraction, Board Consulting, and Assessment. All were very interesting, and the speakers were all highly regarded in their areas of expertise.
It was heartening to hear from Miguel Gonzalez Mendoza http://homepage.cem.itesm.mx/mgonza/ that artificial intelligence will never take over the role of an executive search partner, although we must as an industry embrace the technology and use it to assist us and our clients to get to the right outcomes.
Juan Esteban Gutierrez www.bvalueconsulting.com spoke in detail about the benefits of executive coaching and the reasons why you may consider coaching; as it’s not only good for you personally but also for your business and some of the people working in it. The biggest take-away for me was to make sure that you are doing it for the right reasons and at the right time. Executive coaching is not appropriate as a tool for performance management. It should be used as a performance enhancement tool and not as an exercise to remove someone from the business.
Hector Alcazar www.alcazar.com.mx spoke on the subject of “New Business Partner Attraction”. Hector is well known in Mexico for his work in assisting with the franchising of businesses and also consults in the area of business structuring, incubation and business acceleration. He is a very enthusiastic and engaging speaker on this subject and I am sure any business that is working with Hector would be in very good hands.
Ernesto Vega Velasco is a professional board member and gave a very interesting talk on the need for more professionalism on boards and how boards need to be made up of the right people with the right experience rather than the “friend and family of friends” model. This was a high area of interest as more small to medium size companies are setting up boards and executive search businesses are becoming more involved in order to get a pool of appropriate candidates for these positions. The regulatory environment, around the world, is also putting more pressure on boards to be engaged and to have the right skills; as in many cases board members are as responsible in the eyes of the legislature as the executives in the business.
Martin Lanik www.pinsightcom gave a very interesting presentation on a new assessment tool which is being widely used in the US and Europe. This tool is largely used for building stronger leadership skills and identifying potential in high performers, managers and directors. The conference was very interested in this presentation and it resulted in robust discussion in the room. Again, I found this session one where we need to be aware of all the tools in the marketplace and be able to advise our clients on the appropriate option to use in any given situation.
Over my time with the group we have held our annual meeting in San Diego, Istanbul, China, Sydney, Linz and now Mexico City. In closing I would say that this conference has again been a real highlight. The inclusion of more time to interact with colleagues, friends (and family) from around the globe can only help to further strengthen the Network and bring us all closer together.
I am already looking forward to seeing all my colleagues and friends next year in Singapore 2020.
David Hollander, CEO – JacksonStone & Partners