Global Mobility - Globally Mobile!

You’re a global mobility professional, but have you ever been globally mobile?  John Rason of Santa Fe Consulting: Gamekeepers becoming Poachers; As HR become Assignees discusses the impact of increasing mobility among HR professionals on the talent management and global mobility process. We think that trend from the perspective of partners and families can only be a good thing.

John Rason’s focus is on the effects on employee retention in the ever-growing “War for Talent” and he highlights a few places in which the process is not “joined up”. For example 71.6% of respondents in the 2014 Santa Fe Global Mobility Survey said they had NO procedures in place to retain returning assignees.

Writing from the perspective of supporting assignee families, this particular statistic is scary.  When we talk to prospective expat partners, they are often making significant compromises in their own lives and careers to support their partners’ career development.  The challenge for global talent management is that many partners are not willing to make those compromises.  Up to 50% of companies report that assignments have been turned down because of dual career issues and over 70% of assignees list their partner’s career as a significant factor in the expatriation decision (Brookfield 2013).  This is not an issue that is going to go away.  From a partner’s perspective, we’d challenge you as Global Mobility professionals to answer this question.

If you want more employees to be globally mobile , how can you expect to persuade them to do so when there is often no clarity for the assignee regarding the long term benefit of the assignment, never mind support for the partner?

Dual career families are become more not less prevalent. Perhaps as global mobility becomes more common among HR/Global Mobility professionals, a greater first hand experience of the challenges that a dual career situation brings to the picture will lead to more rigorous retention processes and better partner support.

Rason also quotes this article by Mary Appleton of Changeboard that highlights the extensive benefits that global mobility can bring to the HR/Global mobility function.  We’d like to add another benefit that is not on her list; Credibility with assignees and their families.   When we talk to expat partners about their experience of global mobility, one of the most frequent complaints we hear is that the global mobility professionals they are dealing with don’t understand their experience.  It can lead to resentment and difficulty in the relationship between the assignee family and their HR partners. A clear understanding of the experiences based on seeing how international relocation affects one’s own family will undoubtedly help the global mobility function to understand better and so address the needs of the globally mobile family and give them credibility and authority in doing so.

Have you ever been offered or taken an international assignment?  If you’re an HR professional working in talent management or global mobility, take our quick poll below.

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