With a suddenness that has left the uninitiated ‘blinded’ like the deer in headlamps, the discovery of oil and the subsequent portents that the ‘find’ has for a rush of inward investment has compelled Guyana’s business community to raise its game, so to speak, to match the ‘force’ of what has become a tsunami of foreign investment interests such as the country has never before been prepared for. Since the disclosure of the discovery of ‘world class’ deposits of oil offshore Guyana, interest in the investment potential of what had previously been described as a ‘Banana Republic’ has sent ‘tremors’ through a private sector business infrastructure that has never really been prepared to shoulder the burden of what has been, in recent years, a tsunami of external interest.
It goes beyond the confines of the grouping of countries comprising the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), whose growth ambitions, up to this time, have never seriously envisaged the global flood of international investor interest evidenced in what, in recent years, has become a ‘nonstop’ inward flow of business delegations from across the world. Guyana, insofar as investment potential is concerned, is now viewed as the ‘hot spot’ of the Caribbean. It has the potential to have the country leave a million miles behind the loathed ‘Banana Republic’ tag with which western journalists had ‘tagged’ the country. Guyana, these past few years, has come to be seen as the emerging ‘bright spark’ in the region.
The overnight ‘attraction’ which the country has attracted for eagle-eyed international ‘big business’ not ever prepared to pass up a ‘good thing,’ in Guyana’s instance, a piece’ of the numerous petro investment opportunity that currently appear to be on offer, has been manifested in the country’s hosting of what had come to be referred to as ‘Oil and Gas Conferences’, never mind the fact that as the outcomes of these exceptionally well-attended gatherings have proven, beyond oil, Guyana is experiencing an ‘open season’ on the country’s wider investment potential.
All that said, it is entirely fair to say that at the level of both the public and private sectors, the country was altogether unprepared for this dramatic transformation of its circumstances. At the level of both the public and private sectors, the structures necessary to absorb a near global investor surge were almost entirely non-existent, a condition that appeared to occur to both the public and private sectors only after the earliest wave of investment seekers began knocking on the country’s door.
To say that the private sector was altogether prepared for this investment surge is to indulge in considerable understatement, the country’s two more prominent private sector umbrella bodies, the Private Sector Commission and the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry having previously benefitted from little exposure beyond addressing the overwhelmingly ‘local’ issues that arose in the private sector. For the most part, ‘oil and gas’ and its implications for the local business culture came as a ‘shock’ to both the public and private sector institutions of the
country. Even now, while there is evidence that sections of both the state and private sectors are gradually ‘catching up,’ there is evidence that both are still lagging… considerably.
Just over a week ago, the Stabroek Business met with Lisa-Ann Joseph, the Managing Director of Reputation Management Caribbean, (RMC) a Trinidad and Tobago company that seeks to engage both the state and the private sector on issues pertaining to absorbing the ‘shock’ of the still vigorous waves of investor invasion which the country is experiencing. Specifically, RMC is concerned with the importance of local state and private sector entities being ‘in shape,’ so to speak, to respond the transformations that are occurring on account of the still raging oil-driven investment interest in Guyana.
Established in 2007, the primary concern of RMC is with providing support for both public and private sector entities in Guyana to help position them in the various aspects of communication that would better situate them to secure the interest and confidence of potential investors. RMC, Joseph told Stabroek Business, is particularly concerned with equipping Guyanese private sector entities with Coaching, Training and Development in all aspects of Public Relations, Communications, Crisis Communications, Media Relations and Events Management, skills which she says can help build investor confidence in both private and public sector institutions and in the final analysis can make a considerable difference in the matter of ‘clinching deals.’
Joseph told Stabroek Business that public and private sector entities wishing to prepare for the challenges that lie ahead would do well to acquire access to RMC’s professional support in areas that include Public Relations/Corporate & Crisis Communications/Reputation Management. She makes the point that while there is, undoubtedly, a groundswell of international interest in Guyana’s investment potential, the capacity of local public and private sector entities in enhancing investor confidence through their own ‘profiles’ could be key to how Guyana is perceived in the international private sector community.
Joseph told Stabroek Business that RMC is prepared to work with local entities, both through their executives and their substantive communication departments, to address all aspects of Public Relations, Communications, Crisis Communications, Media Relations and Events Management. RMC, according to Joseph, is also keen to support local public and private sector entities in the ongoing development of their image-building plans and the execution of activities associated with enhancing the image the concerned entities.
