Latin American Capital Markets

478 CATHERINE CHANDLER-CRICHLOWtions have a limited number of professional associations and training institutions thatprovide ongoing opportunities for development of leadership competencies in thecapital market sectorHuman Capacity DevelopmentThe intrinsic need to learn could diminish when environmental factors mitigate the abilityof the individual to engage in active learning.The acquisition of knowledge could beattained through formal instructional methods such as seminars, workshops, lectures,and self-paced learning materials. Alternatively, techniques such as networking and mentoringcould be used in informal instructional models. Irrespective of the instructionalmodel used, the litmus test of success in developing the human capacity of any grouplies in the ability to create a synergistic integration of formal and informal strategies.Thisis a key consideration in defining an agenda for building the human resource capacity ofcapital markets in Latin America and the Caribbean. Whether the groups are investors,regulators, dealers, stockbrokers, or issuers, there is a need to consider the linguistic, cultural,and infrastructure contexts in which programs can be introduced.An additional factor that needs to be considered in defining a human capitaldevelopment agenda for a region is the phase of development of capital markets inthe area or country. For example, the developed countries cited in this article are ina more advanced phase in the development of their markets, and their workforce developmentapproaches appear to generally keep pace with market trends and evolution.Conversely, many member states of Latin America and the Caribbean are in earlyformative stages in the development of their domestic markets and place greater emphasison start-up activities rather than the development of the human resourcesneeded to sustain growth of the sector This perhaps points to a lesson to be learnedfor these countries in that there should be a co-incident focus on both physical infrastructureand human capital development. A focus on workforce development andsector governance of human capital investment should help to define the needs ofthe region in more concrete terms.Growth of Capital MarketsA sector model for human capacity development could be approached from twoperspectives.The first would use a theoretical model of best practices and apply it toa sector at the macro level.This would allow for a top-down, systematic approach toCopyright © by the Inter-American Development Bank. All rights reserved.For more information visit our website: www.iadb.org/pub