After the Fanfare of an Asia Trade Mission … now what?

The Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada has always touted that Canada needs to be more Asia Competent as it rightly states, “a number of Canada’s friendly competitors have taken important steps to improve their own strategic and economic positioning within the region”.  So it was with great interest that I followed Toronto Mayor John Tory’s recent trip to China and Japan.  A delegation of 35 spent went to Shanghai, Hong Kong, ChongQing, Tokyo and Sagamihara to drum up business, heighten awareness of Toronto and generally build relationships … an understated but essential means to successfully do business in North Asia.  Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne’s recent China mission and India mission netted $1.7B and $250 million in signed deals respectively.

Asia has to be top of mind for Canadians beyond trade missions.  This “out of sight, out of mind” approach has repeated itself far too often and is one of the reasons why Canada falls behind the United States, Germany, Australia and New Zealand in its Asia Engagement.  There was great enthusiasm with every trade, government and media delegate I met during my 20 years in Asia and every time, I had hope that the momentum would continue after the mission; that there would be additional questions, discussion, queries, requests for information and networking.  The words I heard afterwards were “there are other priorities right now”, “we’re continuing our due diligence”, “we’ll reach out if we have additional questions” … but the messages I heard were “Asia’s too far away”, “we don’t get it”, “engaging sounds really hard”.  I grew to be unsurprised by such responses … no one would argue that Canada has and continues to rely on traditional economic and political partners in the United States and to a certain extent, Europe, because they’re not far away, its’ cultures are relatively similar and engaging them isn’t as hard.

Two calls to action come to mind.  First, the Canadian media and other information outlets need to do a better job of heightening the attention of these trade missions and its results.  A Google search of Mayor Tory’s recent mission resulted in an article about the cost of the trip, a $3.5mill deal but nothing about the Mayor’s mission debrief on 27 April (a search on Premier Wynne’s missions netted better results).  Heightening the importance and awareness of these trade missions and deals is a first step towards building Asia Competence.

All participants on the trade mission should be held accountable for follow up.  What actions need to be taken to realize the return on the investment of time, effort and money of the trip?  How do we keep the conversation going? If we were to measure the progress, constructive engagement and goodwill gained on these trips a year from now, what would result?

I applaud the government and business officials who have taken the important step of proactively engaging with Asia, but now what?  After the fanfare of an Asia trade mission … we all have a responsibility to keep the momentum moving, keep Asia top of mind and build our Asia Competence.

Lawrence Chi is a coach for expatriates and cross-cultural consultant.  His mission is to grow expatriates professionally and personally and to make organizations more international.  Visit his website www.TheExpatCompass.com.