Why Talent is Global and What that Means for Gulf Countries

Human capital has always played the key role in economic success.

Talent here refers to the ownership of a skill set that has high market demand. In addition, we also constrain the term to those skills that are generally difficult, in terms of cost, to acquire. That is, we are separating those individuals with talent from, say unskilled and semi-skilled workers. The Gulf countries, for example, have many guest workers. The majority are unskilled or semi-skilled workers. These workers typically travel to the Gulf countries in order to economically survive.

They normally leave their families behind. While it is clear that their perception is that they will be economically better off, it is unclear that they believe their personal welfare is likely to be enhanced. In short, here we distinguish the talent workers who may have multiple reasons for going abroad from those workers who are seeking to economically survive.

Talent workers typically wish to test their skills in many ways. They wish to go to where the challenges are. Currently we have the World Football Cup being played in South Africa. Many of the players on their country teams play in other countries for club teams. In fact, it is thought that playing in a small set of European leagues is the ultimate test of a player. It is not different in other fields. Most talent wants to move to where their talent can shine its greatest light. Of course, compensation and work requirements play an important role, but overall highly talented people tend to be globalists in the sense that they wish to test themselves in the most challenging places.

In addition to the talented worker’s own viewpoint, the fact that the talent is scarce puts the worker in the global demand market. That is buyers of talent are acutely aware of the scarcity of talented workers and compete to gain their production. The greater and the more rare is the talent, the more likely that the talented worker will be sought after globally.

Unlike their unskilled and semi-skilled counterparts, the talented worker typically can bring their spouse and children with them. They can normally afford a comfortable living space, send their children to private school, and live more affably then in their previous location. These factors reduce the cost of working abroad and encourage global mobility.

What then are the implications? In the Gulf States there is sensitivity to the role that foreign citizens play in the economy.

The Gulf States, as a group, are heavily dependent on professional talent from abroad. This has led to movements to create more positions of importance for the local professional workforce. I think these movements are misguided. What we need to create in the Gulf are talented workers who can go anywhere. That is, the message is that talent is global. It does not really matter where the talented worker’s country of origin lies.

We are in a new global world. Resources of all kinds, money, materials, and, yes, labor are global. We need the Gulf Country Universities and the overall education system to create citizens who can work and compete anywhere. That is the true message of human capital development and that is the goal to which the Gulf States should strive.

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