uch is being made lately of the notion of the flat world, thanks in part to Thomas Friedman’s best-seller, The World Is Flat (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005). Few of us haven’t read a few chapters of that book on flights here and there. But he’s reporting on, or giving a lexicon to, phenomena we have been experiencing daily in corporate real estate for years. Thanks to the advent of e-mail, intranets, the Internet obviously, global supply chains and business’s natural urge to be more global in scope in order to compete effectively,
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I found Friedman’s tome to be well written and researched, if anti-climactic.
This is not a book review as much as an invitation to examine your professional world and its topography. Readers of Site Selection have portfolios ranging from local to regional to national to global. It is, of course, important to have real-time communication with project managers handling new facilities or expansions in far-flung corners of your domain; to have seamless transaction standards across borders (more on that in a future column); and transparency in business practices that conform to multiple, national legal jurisdictions.
I am more confident than ever before that you will find more and more of the insights you seek in these pages and in our online presence. We are investing right now in enhancing our New Plant Database resources; we have attended and reported on key corporate real estate and economic development initiatives in Singapore, Cannes, Dubai, Sao Paulo, the United Kingdom and throughout North America in recent months.
My colleagues and I have a new resource to help us provide insights from the Southeast Asian corner of the globe. Dennis Meseroll, director of Tractus-Asia, a leading corporate real estate services firm with offices in Shanghai and Bangkok, has already provided input for Managing Editor Adam Bruns’ China article in this issue. I personally welcome Dennis to the Editorial Advisory Board and look forward to his contributions.
Also joining the advisory board is James Hagy, who for 28 years led the Corporate Real Estate Services practice at Jones Day, a leading global law firm. Jim has joined the faculty of Case Western Reserve University and
the John Marshall Law School Real Estate Center. Serious about his commitment to work with my colleagues and me, Jim already has contributed editorially – see the asset disposition piece on page 493.
The world, in our view, is as flat as it is evolving. And that can be a good thing. If something isn’t changing, it’s probably dead. The cover story in this issue explains how IAMC member Shaw Industries is changing its asset-utilization thinking to meet today’s market demand – using yesterday’s facilities. And they’re doing that right here in the flat old U.S.A.
The globalization sirens have lured many a ship into new waters. Many have succeeded, and many new reefs prove otherwise. I would advise paying as much attention to the topography of your global corporate real estate operation – and charting the course to personal and professional success – as to the topography of the global business world.
We’ll do our part to help flatten it.
Till next time,
Mark Arend