Vice President & Country Manager, Healthcare – Myanmar

Scenario

Our client is a leading organisation renowned for partnering with MNCs in the pharmaceutical industry, where they provide expert support services in distribution and market expansion. With an ever-growing presence across emerging Asia markets, the business was urgently seeking top-tier talent to drive ongoing progression in local markets regionally and ensure the continuation of their impressive pace of development. However, their reputation for excellence led them to be highly selective in their hiring processes, which posed a potential challenge when recruiting in the ASEAN’s talent-short markets.

Recognising the complexity of the recruitment, our client appointed Page Executive for the search of their Vice-President & Country Manager based in Myanmar. This leadership position would combine strategy planning, accountability for profit and loss, organisational development and the management of over 400 colleagues. In addition to having traditionally-required skill sets, the executive must also have had a record of maximising growth and profitability in emerging markets and possess strong pharmaceutical and OTC industry experience, plus in-depth market knowledge and cultural sensitivity.


Solution

In order to best shape our recruitment solution, we first evaluated the key challenges associated with the assignment:

  1. Market difficulties (relative attractiveness of Myanmar base, shortage of talent pool, lack of suitable competitors, budget limitations, etc)
  2. The organisation had run a failed search campaign directly for over six months
  3. The high pressure time constraint (desire to hire within two months)


Based on this, we recommended that our client run a high-intensity search, simultaneously bringing into play the Page Executive network, a regional media campaign and a direct search approach. Page Executive was able to select two candidates immediately from existing global networks. The other two recruitment solutions brought in three more potential candidates. After screening interviews, Page Executive facilitated the use of psychometric testing and took references before the client made its final selection. Although the new incumbent needed to relocate his family from Thailand to Myanmar, Page Executive was able to provide qualified offer management and on-boarding support, helping to create a smooth transition for the candidate.


Outcome

By understanding our client’s business, needs, expectations and current market conditions, we were able to find them a proven leader within the industry. Our world-class research function’s search methodology , combined with our powerful Page Executive global network, continued to be an effective solution and ensured consistent, quality delivery. As a specialist in healthcare and life sciences recruitment in Asia, this is just one example of our notable track record in niche-market, executive-level recruitment.

Diana Low
Asia Pacific