Trade missions

Gone are the times when trade missions were mainly tours of capital cities, filled with politicians who posed for photo ops with celebrated exporters.

Replacing them are the new trade mission models, the SME-focused missions, with pre-qualified prospects to meet in-market and targeted minimum numbers of meetings to be conducted.

They have a demand-driven approach to recruiting delegates, as opposed to the traditional supply-driven model. Engagement of the Canadian Trade Commissioners in the destination market is also key, providing pre-mission briefings on cultural differences in international trade and, very frequently, matchmaking teams that consists of both Canadian and destination market consultants. There you go: a recipe for success.

Most trade missions that I am aware of today are conducted by trade and industry associations or economic development agencies, at times with government assistance. Some cover more than one province or territory, and some focus on a particular sector focus, while others have a multisector focus.

Most of these missions now offer a tailored matchmaking service to delegates, a service that, in my experience through 25 years of international trade, has the best ROI if the trade mission delegates prepare adequately and follow up accordingly.

Consequently, I believe that your matchmaker should be your new best friend!

Matchmaker, matchmaker make me a match

Great trade missions start long before you leave. They start when you sign up, when you meet your matchmaker, when you are put on the spot to describe your preferred client criteria, your value added and your competitive advantage. This is critical information for a matchmaker – how else can they pre-qualify a prospect for you? You are not going to travel to Japan just to meet with someone. You are going to want to meet with someone who is briefed on your company, on your products/services and someone YOU have had the opportunity to research prior to accepting the meeting.

A good matchmaker will likely never represent your prices and conditions. They should remain neutral, rather than selling for you or taking a percentage of any sales. They should simply set you up with the best qualified prospects. Yet you need to assist them in this task, so the onus is on you to ensure the matchmaker understands what you can do, and cannot do, and your formulated and targeted criteria for meetings.

A good matchmaker knows that if you are looking to meet with local ministers, they will avoid putting in meeting requests around cabinet meetings, and provide you with information on key ministerial initiatives. A great matchmaker will have a local partner in-market who can provide local information, so you can attend the meetings informed and ahead of the game.

The matchmaker should clearly understand what market intelligence you are looking for too. Are you looking for information on logistics, trade tariffs, or local partnering opportunities? You should have this information at your fingertips, not find out post-mission.

Next is gaining a cultural understanding of the destination market. This is, believe it or not, one of the most overlooked factors yet. If your trade mission is going to the U.S., you are likely not going to be spending a lot of time researching the culture. If your trade mission is going to any country not utmost familiar to you – maybe Jamaica, Colombia or Poland – you should spend a lot of time learning about the country’s culture, its history and preferably a few phases in the local language.

Again, the matchmaker can be your best friend. They know the market and local customs, and they can tell you whether to follow up in person, via email or phone. They know what interests people in the market, and more perhaps importantly, what they don’t want.

You can also gain valuable information through the Canadian Trade Commissioners Service; the trade staff at the local offices can be as invaluable as a good matchmaker. Together, they make an unbeatable team for you. If you want to hit it out of the park, you can check out FITT’s workshop on the cultural aspects of international trade.

Here’s why you need matchmakers with local knowledge

I would like to share a story with you from a recent trade mission to Jamaica. One of the delegates was in the manufacturing sector. They had some high end, technology-based solutions, and they were initially wondering if the market was ready for these, or if the more traditional lower priced solutions offered by competitors were a barrier to entry.

The matchmaker started researching, utilized their local network and found that several institutions were open to meeting with the delegate and discussing the new technology. The delegate stayed in contact throughout the weeks leading up to the mission, checking in, sharing new developments, and making sure the matchmaker was up to date.

When arriving in-market, the delegate made sure to spend time with both the home-based matchmaker and the in-market one. The delegate was assigned a local driver to take him to and from meetings in Jamaica. The driver turned out to be very well connected throughout the island too, so well in fact that she made recommendations in her network, opening even more doors for the delegate. The delegate secured orders in market from the meetings set by the matchmaker, and ended up hiring the driver as their sales representative!

The end result is YOU becoming more competitive overall!

The information gained in foreign markets, from potential clients, Trade Commissioners and fellow delegates are most often cited as the number one factor in developing competitiveness, both nationally and internationally. This, combined with previous statements from Statistics Canada claiming that exporting builds your competitiveness, are more reasons to consider trade missions.

So, are you FITT for a trade mission? Is your next job in matchmaking?

Are you looking for a career in international trade? It is not all about searching, it is also about researching and showing potential employers that you are serious and that you make contact with them having already done your research.

If you are looking for a career in international trade, it requires a commitment to, and an understanding of, global competitiveness, cultural awareness and through research!

1) Know what employers are looking for

If you are looking for a job in international trade, you need to appreciate what employers are looking for:

• Are they seeking a sales and business development person?
• Are they seeking a logistics expert, a global financial person or a marketing wizard?

No matter which of the above, or any other job in the field of international trade, you need to carefully examine the requirements of the job position and, if not more importantly, the company itself.

2) Research the company and the position

I am often amazed at how little applicants know about our company when they apply for a job.

If they ask, ‘How did you come up with the name for your company?’, their application goes to the bottom of the pile—30 seconds on our website and this question is answered—wonderful that they are curious enough to ask, but this information is readily available on our website.

If an applicant is not willing or able to do enough basic research prior to speaking with us, how can we, as their potential future employer, expect them to fulfill the requirements of a job in international trade?

If our website says we work in over 60 countries, we obviously work in different time zones and we need a flexible workforce. Consider highlighting your willingness to do this when you make contact with us.

If our job advertisement specifies that we would prefer that applicants have Spanish as a foreign language, you can position yourself as a strong candidate if you can also demonstrate cultural awareness and knowledge of Spanish-speaking countries. Perhaps you do not speak fluent or any Spanish at all,  but if you can demonstrate a keen acumen for cultural awareness and a willingness to learn, perhaps you can still meet the qualifications.

Do you have a global network? Can you demonstrate it (by this, I do not simply mean on Facebook or Linked-In)? Do your research, and demonstrate to the potential employer that you have what it takes to take on the world!

3) Learn to sell the skills you do have

As an employer that often hires people for international positions (both short- and long-term) we receive and review a lot of CV’s every month. Of course skills and experience are obvious first requirements for further consideration. But we also consider whether the candidate has the required experience in international trade; perhaps linked to experience in specific countries, languages or sectors. Those are professional skills, achieved preferably with a mix of academic and practical achievements and knowledge.

My advice is to never underestimate the ability for a candidate to make up for a lack of direct experience in the field required by having extensive experience internationally—we are talking about international trade here.

According to a Statistics Canada report dated August 2013, as of December 2012, small businesses make up 98.2 percent of all businesses in Canada, medium-sized businesses make up 1.6 percent of the total and large businesses make up a whole 0.1 percent. Given these statistics, where do you think you are most likely to find a future?

Employers today who are hiring internationally put a lot of weight on candidates being able to interact in a global community. In large firms, many HR departments actually hire representatives and managers from the countries of origin of their largest clients or targeted clients. They do that because cultural awareness and understanding is so vital to achieving global success. But again, this accounts for 0.1 percent of businesses in Canada. SMEs however, do not always have the financial clout to be able to do this, and as such, SMEs are even more in need of multitasking, multicultural and flexible staff.

SMEs often hire people that are required to handle both national and international accounts and clients. Landing that job as the bookkeeper is no longer as simple as just know SAGE 50; it is also being able to communicate with clients in foreign countries, in foreign languages. To land that job in sales, it is no longer sufficient that you can demonstrate a track record of national accounts, you may have to demonstrate your ability to interact globally, a willingness to travel internationally and a thorough knowledge of free trade agreements.

We see a growing trend in assessing how potential candidates fit, not just culturally within an organization, but also with its clients—flexible mobility and what network and knowledge they bring to the table rather than assessing just what grades have they accomplished in school/academia.

4) Get a professional designation

In our company, we always try to hire Certified International Trade Professionals (CITPs) for any staff involved in international trade, no matter what function.

The CITP designation is our guarantee that the candidate has the best of both world, the practical experience and the academic achievements. MBAs are great—however, they do not, like the CITP, ensure the hands-on experience and real-life, private-sector TRADE know-how that is so critical for success in international trade. If the best candidates do not already have the certification, we support new staff in achieving it.

I am going to start by asking you to do two things:

1. Put aside the stereotypes for a moment and,
2. Please undertake to always spell the country’s name correctly…..it’s Colombia, not ColUmbia!

Mention Colombia to people a few years back and coffee, drugs and FARC guerrillas were often the three things people affiliated with Colombia. But today, fair trade, organic coffee is growing rapidly and the two latter are both on the decline. There is just so much more to Colombia these days.

Rapid evolution of Colombia’s business landscape

As the fourth-largest country in South America, and one of the continent’s most populous nations with more than 46 million people, the Republic of Colombia has witnessed a revolution of its business landscape thanks to mobile communications. In 2011, internet connections doubled to six million, with mobile making up almost half of these.

The country now enjoys a dynamic market with penetration rates unimaginable a decade ago. In 2012, in Barcelona, Spain, for the first time in history, Colombia won the award as the Government with the most innovative telecommunication policies in the world. It won the “Government Leadership Award 2012” for the Live Digital Plan, at the Global Telecommunications Conference in Barcelona. (source: GSMA)

As I write this, I am near the end of an eighteen day Canadian-Colombian Export Rally for Colombian small and medium exporters (SMEs). This Export Rally was put on by my firm with the assistance of PROEXPORT, Colombia’s Export Promotion Department, and made possible by assistance from Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development Canada through the CATRTA program administered by Conference Board of Canada.

We have held the Export Rally in Bogota, Cali, Medellin and Barranquilla (Colombia’s four largest cities). This is my third tour of these four cities in the last couple of months and my fifth visit to Colombia this year.

 I have met over four hundred Colombian SMEs on this trip alone, and their commitment, skill and enthusiasm is changing Colombia’s landscape.

Diverse opportunities for Canadian SME’s

Our company is an SME, and we have already been active in Colombia for almost two years. Based upon the foregoing, I am very surprised that we haven’t seen more evidence of Canadian SMEs already on the ground in Colombia.

If you are a Canadian company in need of ICT (Information and Communications Technology), digital animation and good programmers, head to Colombia! If you are in agrifoods, specialty food or health food, head to Colombia to sell your products!

And – if you are gluten intolerant/allergic – Colombia is the land of yucca, the gluten free alternative to make your pancakes, English muffins and sandwiches – Loblaws in Canada just introduced 8 brand new Gluten Free products for sufferers of one of the fastest growing allergies in North America.

If you are a Canadian buyer – on 4 and 5^th September, PROEXPORT is hosting a Matchmaking Forum for Canadian Buyers , a Business Matchmaking Forum to uncover buying opportunities of the Colombian Agribusiness, Manufacturing, Textile and Apparel Industry benefiting from 0% import tariff.

Are you planning to go? I am!  It is time to push aside the stereotypes and look to Colombia as an exciting, vibrant and growing market for Canadian goods and services.