Charles FergusonGeneral Manager APAC, Globalization Partners
Charles Hamilton Ferguson is the General Manager and head of Globalization Partners’ business in Asia. In this capacity, he is responsible for establishing scale and efficiency for Globalization Partners and its customer’s business expansion in one of the most dynamic markets in the world. Globalization Partners breaks down the barriers to global business by making it fast and easy for companies to hire anyone, anywhere. Through its AI-driven global employment platform, Globalization Partners enables companies to hire employees throughout 187 countries without having to set up international branch offices or subsidiaries. Globalization Partners’ in-house worldwide HR experts take on the burden of payroll, tax and legal complexities.
In 2020, as an acknowledgement of his impact in the HR technology space, Ferguson was appointed as a startup advisor and mentor for The Workplace Accelerator, which helps discover and incubate the future of HR technology from Asia and beyond, and joined Advent International, the private equity firm with over USD 54 billion in AUM, as an industry advisor for Asia Pacific.
Before joining Globalization Partners, Ferguson was Group Chief Commercial Officer for Tricor Group: a leading business expansion specialist in Asia. Due to his vast network of senior executives across Asia, status in the market as a cloud computing expert, and reputation as a trusted advisor among his peers, Ferguson was responsible for designing and executing the global sales, marketing, and product innovation strategy for Tricor Group. Prior to this role, Ferguson was President and General Manager for the Asia-Pacific region at ADP, where he brought his experience and passion for technology to the fore as the driver for delivering ADP’s employee engagement and human capital management (HCM) solutions to firms of every size in Asia. Charles moved to this role from his previous positions as Division Vice President of Asia Pacific, and Vice President of Multinational Corporation Sales and Marketing, leading these efforts across Asia.
Before joining ADP, Ferguson co-founded the management consulting and advisory services firm ReedHamilton, where he led the technology and innovation practice. ReedHamilton had a team of consulting associates and offices in Singapore and Hong Kong, serving firms across virtually every industry and providing guidance ranging from talent acquisition to go-to market strategy. Prior to co-founding ReedHamilton, Ferguson was Regional Vice President for SAP’s OnDemand business, cloud services, and outsourcing for Asia Pacific and Japan. In this capacity, he was responsible for helping design, deploy, and manage SAP’s software-as-a-service (SaaS) business and cloud computing evangelism for the region. Before this role, he led SAP’s Southeast Asia and emerging markets and technologies marketing organization. In the early days of SaaS in Asia, he joined Salesforce.com as the North Asia Regional Director where he built and led the team in new market penetration efforts for Hong Kong SAR, Macau SAR, PR China, and Taiwan ROC. Previous to SAP and salesforce.com, he held senior sales, consulting, and services roles at Microsoft Asia and Intel’s supercomputer and enterprise platform group.
In addition to his corporate career, Ferguson has had several other successes as an entrepreneur. He founded and managed the jazz club and bistro “Number Five” on the Bund in Shanghai, which spanned a decade of service. He also launched several startups that burned brightly and failed gloriously, providing invaluable lessons on life and business. Ferguson accredited an EMP in international management from Stanford University Graduate School of Business and the National University of Singapore. He also holds a master’s degree in innovation management from the Helsinki School of Economics at Aalto University and completed his undergraduate studies at Bard College in the United States. He sits on the advisory board for several firms serving the HR, cloud computing, and consulting industries, and volunteers in his community as a Grassroots leader focused on new immigrant integration and new media advocacy.
