While we know about the benefits of global talent attraction and how it can positively affect both organizations and employees, there is another side also worth discussing. As with any hiring practices, there are challenges that must be overcome to ensure that an organization is operating to the best of their abilities, while also still functioning as a socially responsible organization.
Global talent management refers to the practice of ensuring that people with specific skill sets are recruited, on-boarded and made available for an organization, across all their operating locations. This process may include hiring workers from all over the world to work at one office, or ensuring that relevant employees are hired to work at many different branches for a multinational company.
One of the biggest challenges when working with a multinational company and a global workforce is ensuring that the actions and intentions of the workers are in alignment with the mission, vision, values and practical operations of the organization. Even different communication styles between employees from multiple nations may create possible strain on the overall company culture.
Additionally, multinational organizations with many locations need to be constantly aware of each country’s federal and local employment laws and payment structures. Moreover, organizations must pay attention to differences in statutory holidays and ensure that different holiday schedules are accounted for in the overall organization’s operations. Communicating between regions may also become difficult due to the fact that everyone’s time zones must be accounted for when scheduling meetings.
The creation of advertising and marketing campaigns can also become an issue in a multinational workplace. What is permissible in one country or region may not be acceptable in another, therefore it is important to roll out cohesive marketing across all of their regions taking into account the different cultural expectations and standards. Overall, multinational organizations must take appropriate caution and provide due diligence when they create any advertising or marketing campaigns that will be presented to a variety of countries.
Training can also be a challenge for a multinational company, as the industry standards may differ from country to country. For example, what is considered common knowledge in the USA may be perceived as advanced applications in the eyes of Brazilian employees. Thus, creating employee learning and development standards that are acceptable across an entire organization, all of the countries that they operate in, as well as across all of the different cultures and nationalities of people that they hire, is a daunting task even for more advanced HR professionals.
In summary, while working with global talent has its benefits, there are also a number of obstacles to be overcome. The benefits and challenges that have been outlined are just some very small examples of the actual effects of employing a globally distributed talent pool within your organization. With proper preparation and strategic planning, employing a global workforce can be both a rewarding and gratifying process for your organization.
