Celebrating 10 years of working in Asia

Its (almost) my 10 year anniversary of working in Asia. Unbelievable to think that 10 years has flown since I first trod the corporate boards at JWT in Bangkok, followed by jobs at Lowe and UTV in Mumbai. I’ve been a Regional Head, Vice President, Senior Vice President, HR Director, Group HR Head and Channel Head. Not a bad collection of fancy titles for a girl from Devon, though frankly they are all pretty meaningless (as Channel Head I didn’t get to take the final calls on content, I was more the HR Legs than the Head, and I jostled for position with about thirty other Vice Presidents) but they of course count a lot in a country obsessed by ”designations” (job title = status = accolades from friends and family).

So let me take a quick glance back through the last 10 years and reflect on the highs and the lows.

JWT Bangkok was my baptism of fire in the Asian workplace, though relatively speaking, and in the context of what was to come later, it was pretty relaxed all round. I thought I “knew Asia” after a year of backpacking through India, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Laos, Cambodia, Singapore, Borneo and Indonesia. Well, I suppose I’d just about scratched the surface and had a sniff of the complexities of this region, but I hadn’t really equipped myself with the necessary ammunition to take on a job in which I had to persuade 12 very cynical local marketing teams to adopt strategies which had been devised by white people in fancy London offices. I can hardly blame them for being skeptical – these were ideas written for Thai or Indian housewives by posh blokes whose idea of getting close to the consumer was to head to the local curry house or to order a Thai takeaway. And it was my job to persuade one or the other to give in. It was my choice – either I could side with the whities and persuade the locals that years of international and cross cultural research had resulted in this extremely motivating and insightful idea which they should eagerly grab, or I could throw my lot in with the locals and try to convince the Europeans that they should respect local culture and knowledge and allow the natives to develop their own ideas. Either way I was doomed, and I varied my stance depending on whether I had the energy to fight with a bunch of upper class Brits in the stately surrounds of Mayfair, or whether I fancied taking on the great cultural divide and trying (and usually failing) to understand the nuances and needs of the Thai, Vietnamese, Chinese or Indian consumer. It was exhausting but a lot of fun, I spent my days on planes and in meeting rooms surrounded by the hustle and bustle of Asia, and my nights in bars in five star hotels drinking my expense account dry.

As if that wasn’t enough, I was seduced after 2 years by a similar job in Mumbai. Same client, same role, different Agency. I liked the sound of Mumbai, and had never really got to grips with Thailand, so I bid farewell to the tuk tuks and the bargirls, the whisky red bull buckets and the sleazy sex tourists (yuk!) and jumped on a plane to Mumbai. I’d never really spent any time in Mumbai before and imagined it to be a dirty, polluted fairly soulless city in which I’d probably spend a year or so before moving on to the next exotic location. I couldn’t have been more wrong, on all counts (except the polluted one). From the moment I landed in Mumbai, I loved it. Sure there were slums (clearly visible on landing), crazy traffic and ancient vehicles belting out thick clouds of black smoke. It felt as though I were risking life and limb on the taxi ride from the airport, I’m sure I paid about 4 times the regular taxi fare, and Mumbai smelled really bad, in parts, but still I loved it. It had an energy which was absolutely buzzing, you could literally feel the optimism and the opportunity in the air. The Mumbai job was similar to the Bangkok one in terms of the role, the salary and the clients, but there were also stark differences. For a start, I was the only foreigner in the office, and tasked with creating the first ever regional team, a team which would be required to travel extensively, at a time when travel for work was still considered a huge perk (that’s largely changed now). I was viewed with amusement by the locals, the strange white girl with a tattooed ankle who would disappear for days on end on foreign trips. I was given a company apartment, and was utterly horrified when I was shown around a filthy two bedroomed place with peeling paint on the walls bare electrical wires sprouting everywhere, and cooking stains on the tired looking gas burner. I was assured that it would be cleaned up, but it was a far cry from my luxurious condo in Bangkok. It was subsequently given a facelift and by the time I moved in it was fine, but it taught me a valuable lesson about India – looks can be very deceptive.

I set up my regional team, introduced them to the alien concept of expecting the client to treat you as an equal rather than a slave, and to various bars and restaurants around Asia, and we had a blast. I also gradually assimilated myself into the local agency and eventually became (and still am) good friends with a lot of the Indian employees. After 18 months of trying to make the Surf Excel “Dirt is Good” global strategy work for Asian markets (and superlative efforts to convince a similar bunch of white guys in London that in India, dirt is NOT always good), I was informed that my clients were all relocating to Bangkok and I’d have to go back there to continue the job. By this time I’d fallen completely in love with Bombay and the prospect of returning to Bangkok was impossible to contemplate. And so I was suddenly jobless, and more importantly, visa-less and facing the prospect of either having to find another job (and jobs for foreigners weren’t that plentiful) or leaving India.

After a couple of months spent drinking beer in Goa, I decided to pay a visit to the CEO of Lowe, the agency which I’d just left. Over a cup of tea, he completely took me by surprise by offering me the position of HR Director for the agency. I choked on my tea. I knew nothing about HR and had no training whatsoever in the discipline. He told me that he had a feeling that it would work out well. India is like that, it throws crazy experiences in your way, and you either duck (and miss out) or embrace them. And so overnight I became an HR Head, and despite an enormous salary slash (this was a “local” job without any of the expat perks) I discovered that I loved it. I spent the next 6 years as an HR Head, so I can’t have been altogether bad at it. I found that I had a natural affinity for people, enjoyed solving their problems and even being a shoulder to cry on, loved the fact that my team was brilliant and taught me heaps, and had a blast organizing parties and events.

In a similarly random fashion I also ended up as the channel head for one of India’s largest youth channels, whilst simultaneously holding down the HR Group role at UTV (I moved from Lowe to UTV in 2007). In retrospect perhaps not the wisest move, either one of those jobs was hugely challenging, and two was madness. But I loved the role, even though I knew nothing about TV apart from years of watching it, I was and still am passionate about content and had a background in marketing so it worked pretty well and I am proud of the work we did on the channel. However, I was literally glued to my blackberry 24/7, would eat, dream and sleep work and though intoxicating it was exhausting. Pregnancy eventually put an end to the two job thing, and I was asked to choose between them. I chose the (by now) more familiar territory of the HR role, and returned to a 10 hour day with free time at weekends which was relatively luxurious.

And now I’ve decided to give it all up for the time being. I’m tired to the point where I no longer have much enthusiasm for my work. I’m sick of getting up and going to the office every day, battling the traffic jams morning and evening and dodging office politics. I’m longing for a few months during which I can focus on simple pleasures – spending time with my one year old, cooking for my husband (yes really!), reconnecting with old friends and chilling with my family in the UK – with no Blackberry Breaks. And of course, writing. I am passionate about it, and intend to write write write. Watch this space.