Gary Dean completes a year of study at Universitas Gadjah Mada in Yogyakarta through Acicis

Gary Dean completed a year of study at Universitas Gadjah Mada in Yogyakarta through Acicis in 1997. He stayed on in Indonesia, after his studies, founding a corporate services and market entry firm called Okusi Associates. Almost 30 years on, Gary remains in Indonesia and Okusi Associates now employs 60 staff across offices in Jakarta, Bali and Batam. His insights on Indonesia’s business environment and culture are both pereceptive and grounded: https://lnkd.in/d-nevfnj It is possible that the ambitions for greater Australian direct investment in Southeast Asia, laid out in the Australian Government’s “Invested: Southeast Asia Economic Strategy to 2040”, aka “the Moore Report” (https://lnkd.in/gbP6pn_b) and more recently in Michael Wesley’s Quarterly Essay (https://lnkd.in/dKep7AsN) will be met by changes in behaviour by Australia’s large institutional investors and traditional allocators of capital, i.e. banks and superannuation funds. Equally likely, is that progress on this front will be made through the doggedness and commitment of Australian SMEs and individual “Southeast Asia-literate” Australian entrepreneurs like Gary Dean. Acicis has produced more than a few of them.

In 2001, I wrote an essay on doing business in Indonesia for the Australian government. Twenty-five years and three-and-a-half thousand companies later, I’ve written it again! Of course, a lot has changed. Company formation that once took 6 months or more now takes weeks. Licensing that required navigating a labyrinth of offices can now be done through an online system. Labour law, social security, investment rules – all modernised, in many cases substantially. But the culture has not been modernised, nor should we expect it to be. Hierarchy, patronage, musyawarah, the premium placed on relationships over transactions – these are not problems to be overcome or relics to be swept away. They are the operating system of Indonesian society, and any business strategy that ignores them is building on sand. After thirty years in Indonesia, this remains the single most important piece of advice I can offer: what we believe to be self-evident may not be shared by everyone. Leave that possibility open, and most things follow from it. I’ve updated the essay with 25 years of hindsight – covering the Omnibus Law, the digital economy, regional hubs beyond Java, and what neo-kratonism looks like in a modern boardroom. Has anything surprised you most about doing business in Indonesia? Or are you now beyond surprise? ;) #Indonesia #DoingBusiness #ForeignInvestment #PMA #CulturalIntelligence #SoutheastAsia #Jakarta #Bali #Batam