A company entering Vietnam, Indonesia or India usually needs one person on the ground before it has much else, someone who sets up the entity, builds the first team and opens the first accounts.
What a country head does at the entry stage
At entry stage a country head sets up the business and makes the first sales, and the job is closer to a founder's than to a manager's.
The usual scope has five parts. The first is entity set-up: choosing the legal form with advisers, registering the company and opening bank accounts. The second is licences and approvals, which differ by industry and by country. The third is the first hires, often a finance lead, a sales or business development lead and an office or plant manager. The fourth is government and partner relations, which means dealing with ministries, provincial authorities, distributors, joint venture partners and industry bodies. The fifth is the first customers, including the first quotations, trials and orders.
The mix varies. A manufacturer may spend most of the first year on land, permits and a plant, while a trading or services business may spend it on distributors and customers. The brief is where that gets said.
What to settle before the search starts
Four things tend to be settled first: the reporting line, the decision rights, the budget, and whether the role is to build or to run.
Reporting line. Whether the country head reports to the group chief executive, a regional head or a business unit head matters a good deal, since a country head three levels down from the decision maker will find it hard to act at the speed a new market needs.
Decision rights. These cover what the person can decide alone and what needs approval, typically hiring, spending limits, pricing, signing contracts and dealing with regulators. Candidates tend to ask whether every item needs head office approval, so the answer is better known early.
Budget. The budget for the first two years, including set-up costs and the team, is what lets a candidate plan a market entry. Without knowing the funds behind it, they cannot.
Build or run. A build role needs someone who is comfortable with unclear rules and no team, and a run role needs someone who can manage an existing business and its people. Some people are best at one and some at both. It is worth deciding which is needed first, and how the role will change later.
Should the hire be local or relocated?
Either can work, and the choice depends on what the role needs and on the legal position for each person. The points below are an overview, and a local adviser can confirm the detail.
Work permits apply to foreign nationals, whatever their nationality, in each of the three countries. Rules change, so the current position is worth confirming before an offer is made.
Vietnam. Foreign nationals working in Vietnam generally need a work permit, unless they fall within a listed exemption. Decree 219/2025/ND-CP, in force since 7 August 2025, sets the rules, and provincial People's Committees issue the permits.
Indonesia. An employer that wants to use a foreign worker needs an approved foreign worker utilisation plan (RPTKA) from the Ministry of Manpower. The worker then needs a visa and stay permit from immigration.
India. Foreign nationals who will work for an Indian company generally need an employment visa. The current eligibility conditions, and any registration duties after arrival, are best confirmed with a local adviser.
On any of these routes, permit time belongs in the timetable, and a start date is best set only once the permit position is clear.
How important are language and relationships?
The role needs the working language of the market to the extent the job requires it, and relationships with the people the job deals with. Both are best decided early and written into the brief.
On language, the useful question is what the person must do in it, since negotiating with officials, running a team meeting and reading a contract are different tasks. The brief can state which ones the role needs, and whether an interpreter or a local deputy can cover the others. That keeps the requirement tied to the job, which is what fair hiring rules ask for.
On relationships, the question is which ones matter in the first year, such as a licensing authority, a distributor, a joint venture partner or a handful of customers. A candidate may already know some of these people, or may be able to build the contacts within a stated time, and both are legitimate. The claim is best checked by speaking to people who dealt with the candidate, and not by taking the contact list at face value.
What to look for in candidates
Four things tend to tell most: start-up experience, scale, dealings with regulators, and references.
Start-up experience. It helps to ask what the person has set up from nothing, what they did themselves and what a team or adviser did, and what went wrong and how they dealt with it. A person who has only run an established business may not have faced these problems.
Scale. The size of what the candidate has run is compared with what the role needs. A person who has run a plant of 500 may or may not suit a first year with a team of five, and how they worked at the smaller size is a fair question.
Regulatory dealings. Specific cases tell the story: a licence applied for, an inspection handled, an approval that took longer than planned. What the candidate did at each step shows whether they have done the work or only watched it.
References. People who worked with the candidate during a set-up or entry, including former managers, partners and team members, can say what the candidate was responsible for and what the result was. This is done with the candidate's agreement and at the right stage of the search.
First-year milestones
Milestones are best agreed before the person starts, and a typical set, in order, looks like this.
In the first three months: the entity is set up or its registration is well advanced, advisers are appointed, a bank account is open, and a plan for the first year has been agreed with head office.
By month six: the main licences have been applied for, the first one or two hires are in place, and the person has met the main authorities and partners.
By month nine: a base is in operation, such as an office or a leased site, and the first customer discussions have reached quotations or trials.
By month twelve: the first orders or revenue are in, the core team is working, and the plan for year two is agreed against what was learned.
Dates will differ by industry and by country, and licensing time is often outside the country head's control, so milestones the person can influence work best, and they can be reviewed when an outside approval slips.
How does the role change once the business is running?
Once the business has customers and a team, the job shifts from building to running, with less time on approvals and more on people, budgets, customers and results.
Some country heads move into the running role. Others have built the business and are better placed to start the next market or take a regional role, and neither is a failure. Talking about this at the start helps the person and the company share the same view of what happens after year two.
If the company decides to appoint a different person to run the business, a planned handover helps: the builder can brief the successor, introduce them to the authorities and partners, and stay for a fixed period. The brief for the second role will look different from the first, with more weight on managing a team, controlling costs and growing sales, and less on set-up.
Questions clients and candidates ask
Does a country head need to be from the country?
No fixed rule applies. What matters is that the person can do the job as it is described. Some roles need local relationships and language skills, in which case the brief says which and why. Foreign nationals need to meet each country's work permit rules.
Do foreign nationals need a work permit in all three countries?
Generally yes, with exemptions that vary by country, and Vietnam, Indonesia and India each have their own rules. A local adviser can confirm the current position before an offer is made.
How long should we expect the first year plan to run?
A common pattern is set-up in the first three months, licences and first hires by month six, a base and first customer talks by month nine, and first orders by month twelve. It shifts by industry and country, since approvals can take longer than planned.
Should the country head also run the business later?
Not always. Some people are suited to building and others to running, so it is worth deciding this before the search and discussing it openly with the candidate.
Sources
To discuss a search, write to teamsg@maxima.com.sg.
We assess every candidate on experience and ability alone. We follow Singapore’s Tripartite Guidelines on Fair Employment Practices and the Fair Consideration Framework, and we already work to the standard of the Workplace Fairness Act 2025. We never charge candidates a fee. How we hire fairly