Xenophobic attitudes harmful to IT

By ADAM GIFFORD

A recruitment firm's criticism that New Zealand companies are ignoring IT talent from non-Western countries, has the backing of the Equal Employment Opportunities Trust.

The trust's Trudie McNaughton says that Morgan and Banks Technology's experiences are all too common.

"Consultants committed to quality, are reporting great difficulty in getting talented applicants with non-English names onto shortlists," she says.

Last week MBT's general manager Stuart Bennett said New Zealand companies were making their IT shortages worse by ignoring the talent available from non-Western countries.

He said employers seemed to think it was too hard or too risky to hire somebody from India or Asia, despite the wealth of highly-trained specialists there.

"These people could be of huge benefit to the individual companies and to the New Zealand economy as a whole.

"Xenophobic attitudes mean opportunities for growth are being lost and in some cases companies put themselves at risk by turning their back on such people.

"The rest of the world is moving at one hell of a speed and we will sit here and be left behind if companies don't change their attitudes," says Mr Bennett.

He said many New Zealand managers lacked experience in handling people from non-Western countries.

"There are implications in getting someone recruited from a non-traditional source country, flown to New Zealand and assimilated into the work force. That's where recruitment companies can help.

"Because in the past many employers have done it without expertise, people often got it wrong and concluded it can't be done. But if it's done properly it works very well," Mr Bennett said.

Mr Bennett said MBT Technology has a large business recruiting Indians for Singapore companies.

"We target Madras, because a large percentage of Singapore's Indian population are Tamils, so when they arrive they can find their temples, get their food and do all the cultural things they need to do to feel comfortable.

"Then three months later when the next person from Madras comes off the plane, they must act as a mentor for the first month while the new arrival acclimatises."

Another joint-venture partner recruited programmers from the University of Hyderabad in India, into Japan.

They did that "very successfully" by taking Japanese language graduates and qualifying them in a programming language, so they became technically competent.

"Then the two key requirements are they must be able to live on a fish-based diet and drink beer. Otherwise they will not be able to work with Japanese work mates who have a beer after work."

New Zealand employers and supervisory staff also needed to learn how to manage non-New Zealanders.

"With a Kiwi employee you may say what you want done and then say 'Got that?'

"With other people, you may need to ask simply 'What have I told you or what are you going to do now?' That tells you how much they have understood."

Ms McNaughton says MBT's experiences are all too common.

"A non-Kiwi accent is also a barrier. These people are perfectly easy to understand but their accent is different, so this is considered a difficulty.

"On the positive side, some of the smarter employers of IT people are consciously seeking diversity, because they want to hire creative, extremely smart people. They recognise the more diverse people are in their approach the better, so you have two extremes."