Winds of change in Latin America

A breath of fresh air is blowing in Buenos Aires with a new government under the leadership of Mauricio Macri … and the winds of change may soon be blowing throughout Latin America.

According to reputable local political analysts and global press releases, under the former government, Argentina lost its political and economic weight in the region, during a decade of uncertainty in rules, intervention in the economy and confrontation with key elements in the international community. Unrealistic exchange rates and export controls, failure to produce reliable official statistics and undermining of both media and the courts were key features of this period – deterring foreign investment and constraining economic performance.

The ending of the commodity boom has forced economic reality onto other regimes, most notably Brazil and Venezuela. The signs of transformation, integrity, transparency, sacrifice and challenge to corruption that are now evident create positive hope for change across the continent. And with this change comes the need for enhanced commercial and contract management skills, the ability to compete and strike business deals on an international basis.

Collaboration instead of ideological struggles. Certainty in the rules. Transparency…These emerging values remind me of the IACCM themes for 2016: “Transformation: agility, collaboration and reputation. In fact, at IACCM we anticipated this scenario in Latin America, so we decided to strengthen our efforts and invest in the region by re-launching our learning programs and appointing this year Pablo Cilotta as our director for South and Central America.

Already Pablo is experiencing the speed with which change is occurring, in both private and public sector. For the private sector, the issue is one of competitiveness; for the public sector, it is a matter of reconciling growing demand with reducing budgets.  This issue of affordability is not only affecting markets such as the UK, the USA and Australia (where the IACCM has been contributing to commercial reform), but also in these LatAm nations where their government policies must now focus on driving revenues and reducing costs.

In the past, the public sector tended to gaze inwards when looking for solutions, but what we are seeing is that governments are engaged in fast-moving global competition, which therefore requires new attitudes and skills. This needs to happen in Argentina and in the rest of Latin America too, following these trends in the more developed nations.

The opportunities in Latin America in 2016 will be exciting for many companies – not least IACCM, helping both the private and the public sectors to realise their enormous potential. It is a demanding, yet remarkably exciting, period in our development and of the emerging contract and commercial professionals across Latin America.