Danes come talent-spotting

By PAM GRAHAM

Participants at the Knowledge Wave conference were not the only ones identifying future leaders.

Denmark's AP Moller/Maersk Sealand has been picking young New Zealanders for training in a course that takes them to a classroom in Copenhagen for two weeks at a time and sends them overseas to work for two years.

There are eight "MISE" (Maersk International Shipping Education) people currently in the company's Auckland office.

New Zealander Paul Williams, 27, has graduated and returned from two years at head office, Campbell Smith, 23, has been on the programme since last year, Priya Patel, 24, was recruited in South Africa and is doing her overseas stint in New Zealand and Emma Ashworth, 22, is in this year's intake.

The company is still looking for another recruit for 2003.

Bo Wegener, the company's marketing manager in New Zealand, manages the programme globally.

Maersk Sealand is known in shipping circles as a heavyweight with a culture derived from the founding Moller family and best described as thorough.

It moves more containers than anyone else around the world and has always invested in training.

A realisation around 1994 that a global business should not just be led by Danish managers triggered the development of an international training programme that extended to New Zealand in 1998.

The graduates return to the base they were recruited in after their overseas posting.