The past few years have seen tremendous change in China. An economic boom is transforming the country. Already, China is the world’s fourth biggest economy and one of the fastest-growing parts of AEGON’s businesses. Last year, AEGON decided to set up the AEGON Asia Leadership Academy (AALA) in the southern Chinese city of Zhuhai to encourage the emergence of a new generation of Asian business leaders for the company.

“We’ve recognized for a long time that China is a huge potential market for us. And we’ve known that if you don’t focus on attracting, developing and retaining people in a region like this, you’ll lose your competitive edge very quickly. AALA is all about leadership development and succession planning, not only in China but for the whole of Asia.

These past few years, our business in China has grown very rapidly. We formed our joint venture with CNOOC back in 2002. Now we have offices across the country and a potential market of more than 200 million people. On top of that, we have a very successful, established business in Taiwan and in the last year or so we’ve announced new joint ventures in both India and Japan. So Asia is an area of very strong growth for us. That’s why we decided to set up the AEGON Asia Leadership Academy: because we are committed to China and committed to Asia and because we want promote young, talented managers who will be the future of AEGON in this region.

AALA will bring in talent from across Asia and give them the opportunity to get to know each other, as well as to share their knowledge and experiences. At the academy, there’s a lot of talk about strategic issues, teamwork, corporate thinking, talent management as well about problem solving. For our inaugural class last May, we had 39 students – mainly from Taiwan and Mainland China but also one each from the United States, the Netherlands and Hong Kong. For these students, it’s also important they get an idea of the international scope of AEGON businesses and the personal opportunities that can open up for them.