Geoff Skingsley is executive vice president of human resources for L’Oreal Global. He recently sat down with Executive to discuss hiring conditions in the Middle East, as well as the ins and outs of managing 65,000 employees. How do you encourage local hires in countries such as the Gulf states where they are not as readily available? The GCC [Gulf Cooperation Council] is a different place from Lebanon. I think in Lebanon we actually have a pretty good situation. We’ve had a great history of exporting Lebanese managers. But we also have a good record of allowing Lebanese people to rise up inside the company. The GCC is a different story; even there, where there is less of a tradition of having talent moving up the pipeline, it’s still our objective to nurture young talent where we can. I spent this morning talking to a group of young people with
