assignment comes from hr organization management

data dictionary
 

List of Important SAP Security Tables AGR

Sap security tables agr.

The following are the important tables are used in SAP that starts with AGR. In our previous training tutorials we have learnt about tables of user master record .

You can view tables in SAP by using transaction code “SE16”.

Table AGR 1251

Table AGR_1251 is used to check the authorization data of roles. It provides the details of role name, menu id for BIW, authorization object in user maser maintenance, authorization name in user master record, variant for profile, field name of an authorization, High and low authorization values, object status, note id , etc.

TABlE AGR_1252

It is used to view the details of organization data for roles. It provides the details of role name, menu id, profile generator of organization levels and authorization values.

SAP table AGR_USERS

This table is used to view the roles assigned to users. It provides various details of the role name, user name in master record, user validity period, an assignment that comes from hr organization management, and assignment from the composite role. etc.

SAP Table- AGR_PROF

This table is used to view the profile that is defined for roles. It provides the details of the role name, profile name, and profile text in the user master record.

SAP Table AGR _HIER

This table provides details of the menu for a role. It contains the fields of the role name, the object is, parent id, Customized (‘C’) or standard menu (‘S’) flag, Counter for Menu ID, Report type, and program name.

Table AGR_TIME

The table agr_time provides the details of the change of date and time for a role, it contains the fields of the role name, a timestamp for the role, user name, last date, and time change and changed by.

and there are some important tables like AGR_AGRA, AGR Define, AGR OBJ, AGR_PROF, AGR_TCDTXT, and so on.

11.1 An Introduction to Human Resource Management

• What has been the evolution of human resource management (HRM) over the years, and what is the current value it provides to an organization?

Human resource management over the years has served many purposes within an organization. From its earliest inception as a primarily compliance-type function, it has further expanded and evolved into its current state as a key driver of human capital development. In the book HR From the Outside In (Ulrich, Younger, Brockbank, Younger, 2012), the authors describe the evolution of HR work in “waves”. 1 Wave 1 focused on the administrative work of HR personnel, such as the terms and conditions of work, delivery of HR services, and regulatory compliance. This administrative side still exists in HR today, but it is often accomplished differently via technology and outsourcing solutions. The quality of HR services and HR’s credibility came from the ability to run administrative processes and solve administrative issues effectively. Wave 2 focused on the design of innovative HR practice areas such as compensation, learning, communication, and sourcing. The HR professionals in these practice areas began to interact and share with each other to build a consistent approach to human resource management. The HR credibility in Wave 2 came from the delivery of best-practice HR solutions.

Wave 3 HR, over the last 15–20 years or so, has focused on the integration of HR strategy with the overall business strategy. Human resources appropriately began to look at the business strategy to determine what HR priorities to work on and how to best use resources. HR began to be a true partner to the business, and the credibility of HR was dependent upon HR having a seat at the table when the business was having strategic discussions. In Wave 4, HR continues to be a partner to the business, but has also become a competitive practice for responding to external business conditions. HR looks outside their organizations to customers, investors, and communities to define success—in the form of customer share, investor confidence, and community reputation. HR’s credibility is thus defined in terms of its ability to support and drive these external metrics. Although each “wave” of HR’s evolution is important and must be managed effectively, it is the “outside in” perspective that allows the human resource management function to shine via the external reputation and successes of the organization.

Catching the Entrepreneurial Spirit

Human resources outsourcing—entrepreneurial ventures.

Human resources is a key function within any company, but not all companies are able to afford or justify full-time HR staff. Over the last decade, HR outsourcing has become a good business decision for many small companies whose current staff doesn’t have the bandwidth or expertise to take on the risks of employee relations issues, benefits and payroll, or HR compliance responsibilities. This has led many HR practitioners to try out their entrepreneurial skills in the areas of HR outsourcing and “fractional HR.”

Human resources outsourcing is very commonly used by smaller companies (and often large companies too) to cover such tasks as benefits and payroll management. This is an area that has been outsourced to third parties for many years. More recent is the trend to have “fractional HR” resources to help with the daily/weekly/monthly HR compliance, employee relations, and talent management issues that companies need to address. Fractional HR is a growing industry, and it has become the service offering of many entrepreneurial HR ventures. Fractional HR is essentially as it sounds—it is the offering of HR services to a company on a part-time or intermittent basis when the company may not be able to justify the cost of a full-time HR resource. An HR professional can be available onsite for a specified number of hours or days weekly or monthly, depending on the company’s needs and budget. The HR professional handles everything from HR compliance issues and training to employee issues support. Also, for companies that are keen on development of employees, the HR resource can drive the talent management processes—such as performance management, succession planning, training, and development—for companies who require more than just basic HR compliance services.

How does a business leader decide whether HR outsourcing is needed? There are generally two factors that drive a leader to consider fractional HR or HR outsourcing—time and risk. If a leader is spending too much time on HR issues and employee relations, he may decide that it is a smart tradeoff to outsource these tasks to a professional. In addition, the risk inherent in some HR issues can be very great, so the threat of having a lawsuit or feeling that the company is exposed can lead the company to seek help from a fractional HR professional.

HR entrepreneurs have taken full advantage of this important trend, which many say will likely continue as small companies grow and large companies decide to off-load HR work to third parties. Some HR companies offer fractional HR as part of their stated HR services, in addition to payroll and benefits support, compensation, and other HR programmatic support. Having a fractional HR resource in place will often illuminate the need for other HR services and program builds, which are generally supported by those same companies. Whether you are an individual HR practitioner or have a small company of HR practitioners and consultants, fractional HR and HR outsourcing can be a very viable and financially rewarding business model. It can also be very personally rewarding, as the HR professional enables smaller companies to grow and thrive, knowing that its HR compliance and processes are covered.

• What do you believe is contributing to the growth of the fractional HR and HR outsourcing trend? Do you expect this trend to continue?
• At what point should a company consider bringing on a full-time HR resource instead of using a fractional HR resource? What questions should the company ask itself?

Human resource management provides value to an organization, to a large extent, via its management of the overall employee life cycle that employees follow—from hiring and onboarding, to performance management and talent development, all the way through to transitions such as job change and promotion, to retirement and exit. Human capital is a key competitive advantage to companies, and those who utilize their human resource partners effectively to drive their human capital strategy will reap the benefits.

Human resource management includes the leadership and facilitation of the following key life cycle process areas:

• Human resources compliance
• Employee selection, hiring, and onboarding
• Performance management
• Compensation rewards and benefits
• Talent development and succession planning

Human resources is responsible for driving the strategy and policies in these areas to be in accordance with and in support of the overall business strategy. Each of these areas provides a key benefit to the organization and impacts the organization’s value proposition to its employees.

Concept Check

• How has the function of human resource management evolved over the years?
• In what way do you usually interact with human resources?

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Access for free at https://openstax.org/books/principles-management/pages/1-introduction

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Faculty Resources

Assignments.

The Human Resources Management course includes a series of openly licensed written assignments and discussions aligned to specific learning outcomes and chapters. If you import this course into your learning management system (Blackboard, Canvas, etc.), all of the assignments and discussions (listed in the table, below,) will automatically be loaded into your LMS assignment and discussion-board tools. They can be used as is, modified, combined with your own assignments, or removed altogether.

The assignments in this course align with the following scenario:

You are a college senior who has been selected to participate in a hybrid internship/onboarding program with an elite HR research and advisory firm. Your training consists of a combination of formal education—specifically, enrollment in this Human Resource Management course—and a rotation in support of the principals of the firm. In your rotations, you will synthesize what you’ve learned in the relevant modules to address firm or client issues, conducting additional research as necessary and developing draft deliverables as instructed by the principal consultant. The quality of your deliverables – that is, your ability to convert learning into practical insight – will largely determine whether, at the end of the internship period, you are offered a position with the firm or simply thanked for your participation.

You can view them below or throughout the course.

Rubric for Assignments

There is also a sample rubric to assist you in grading. Instructors may modify these guidelines or use their own.

Discussions

The following discussion assignments will also be preloaded (into the discussion-board tool) in your learning management system if you import the course. They can be used as is, modified, or removed. You can view them below or throughout the course.

Rubric for Discussion Posts

Answer keys for the discussion posts are available to faculty who adopt Waymaker, OHM, or Candela courses with paid support from Lumen Learning. This approach helps us protect the academic integrity of these materials by ensuring they are shared only with authorized and institution-affiliated faculty and staff.

• Assignments. Provided by : Lumen Learning. License : CC BY: Attribution
• Pencil Cup. Authored by : IconfactoryTeam. Provided by : Noun Project. Located at : https://thenounproject.com/term/pencil-cup/628840/ . License : CC BY: Attribution

ORG_FLAG is a standard field within SAP Table AGR_USERS that stores Flag: Assignment Comes From HR Organization Management information. Below is the list of attribute values for the ORG_FLAG field including its length, data type, description text, associated data element, search help etc... You could also view this information on your SAP system if you enter the table name AGR_USERS or data type ORG_FLAG into the relevant SAP transactions such as SE11 or SE80 etc. Also check out the Contributions section below to add and view useful hints, tips and screen shots specific to this SAP table field.

Key data for field AGR_USERS-ORG_FLAG

Below is everything you need to know about the SAP org_flag field in table AGR_USERS, Including example ABAP code to show you how to select data, attributes/info such as that it is a none Key Field of table AGR_USERS and that it stores Flag: Assignment Comes From HR Organization Management

Attributes of ORG_FLAG field in SAP Table AGR_USERS

Below is the field in the previous position and the next position of table AGR_USERS

Comments on this SAP object

SAP Table AGR_USERS

Assignment of roles to users, recommended now, fire tv stick lite essentials bundle.

This bundle contains Amazon Fire TV Stick Lite and Mission USB Power Cable. The USB power cable eliminates the need to find an AC outlet near your TV by powering Amazon Fire TV directly from your TV's USB port. Includes special power management circuitry that enhances the peak power capability of the USB port by storing excess energy and then releasing it as needed.

The table AGR_USERS ( Assignment of roles to users ) is a standard table in SAP ERP. It belongs to the package S_PROFGEN .

Technical Information

Fields for Table AGR_USERS

SAP ERP Dictionary

• SAP Transactions
• SAP Customer Exits
• SAP Authorization Objects
• SAP Authorization Object Classes
• SAP Programs
• SAP Function Groups
• SAP Function Modules
• SAP Message Classes
• SAP Packages
• SAP Search Helps

SAP Master Data

• Access Control List
• Characteristic
• Material Document
• Notification
• Purchasing Document
• Sales Order
• Selected Set
• WBS Element

The new possible: How HR can help build the organization of the future

Business leaders watching their organizations experience profound upheaval because of the COVID-19 crisis may find it difficult to understand what it all means until the dust settles.

But the pandemic hasn’t afforded them, or any of us, that luxury. It has created profound and immediate changes to how societies operate and how individuals interact and work. We have all witnessed an at-scale shift to remote work, the dynamic reallocation of resources, and the acceleration of digitization and automation to meet changing individual and organizational needs.

Organizations have by and large met the challenges of this crisis moment. But as we move toward imagining a postpandemic era , a management system based on old rules—a hierarchy that solves for uniformity, bureaucracy, and control—will no longer be effective. Taking its place should be a model that is more flexible and responsive, built around four interrelated trends: more connection, unprecedented automation, lower transaction costs, and demographic shifts.

To usher in the organization of the future, chief human-resources officers (CHROs) and other leaders should do nothing less than reimagine the basic tenets of organization. Emerging models are creative, adaptable, and antifragile . 1 Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder , New York, NY: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2012. Corporate purpose fuels bold business moves. “Labor” becomes “talent.” Hierarchies become networks of teams . Competitors become ecosystem collaborators. And companies become more human: inspiring, collaborative, and bent on creating an employee experience that is meaningful and enjoyable .

After the pandemic erupted last year, we spoke with 350 HR leaders about the role of uncertainty in their function. They told us that over the next two years they wanted to prioritize initiatives that strengthen their organization’s ability to drive change in leadership, culture, and employee experience.

How are they doing? In this article, we discuss ways that CHROs can continue to meet the moment by rethinking processes in three fundamental areas: identity, agility, and scalability.

How HR fits in the big picture

McKinsey has recently conducted research on how businesses can best organize for the future . The experimentation underway suggests that future-ready companies share three characteristics: they know what they are and what they stand for; they operate with a fixation on speed and simplicity; and they grow by scaling up their ability to learn and innovate.

HR can help propel this transformation by facilitating positive change in these three key areas, as well as with nine imperatives that radiate out from them (Exhibit 1).

Identity: HR can clarify the meaning of purpose, value, and culture

Companies that execute with purpose have greater odds of creating significant long-term value generation , which can lead to stronger financial performance, increased employee engagement, and higher customer trust.

Home in on the organization’s purpose

What is your company’s core reason for being, and where can you have a unique, positive impact on society? Now more than ever, you need good answers to those questions—purpose is not a choice but a necessity.

CHROs play a vital role in making sure the organization is living its purpose and values . HR can articulate and role-model desired individual mindsets and behaviors linked to purpose by identifying “moments that matter” in the company’s culture and translating purpose into a set of leadership and employee norms and behaviors.

For instance, commercial-vehicle manufacturer Scania holds an annual “Climate Day,” during which the company stops operations for one hour to hold sustainability training, in line with its purpose to “drive the shift toward a sustainable transport system.” 2 Scania Annual and Sustainability Report 2019 , Scania, scania.com.

HR can also ensure that clear changes are made to recruitment and capability-building processes by determining the characteristics of a “purpose driven” employee and embedding these attributes within recruitment, development, and succession planning.

HR can also incorporate purpose-driven metrics into compensation and performance decisions. Companies across industries have embarked on these metrics lately. For example, Seventh Generation, a maker of cleaning and personal-care products, recently built into its incentive system sustainability targets for the company’s entire workforce, in service of its goal of being a zero-waste company by 2025. Shell has plans to set short-term carbon-emissions targets and link executive compensation to performance against them.

Think deeply about talent

Organizations that can reallocate talent in step with their strategic plans are more than twice as likely to outperform  their peers. To link talent to value, the best talent should be shifted into critical value-driving roles. That means moving away from a traditional approach, in which critical roles and talent are interchangeable and based on hierarchy.

Getting the best people into the most important roles requires a disciplined look at where the organization really creates value and how top talent contributes . Consider Tesla’s effort to create a culture of fast-moving innovation, or Apple’s obsessive focus on user experience. These cultural priorities are at the core of these companies’ value agendas. The roles needed to turn such priorities into value are often related to R&D and filled with talented, creative people.

To enable this shift, HR should manage talent rigorously by building an analytics capability to mine data to hire, develop, and retain the best employees. HR business partners, who articulate these staffing needs to the executive management team, should consider themselves internal service providers that ensure high returns on human-capital investments. For example, to engage business leaders in a regular review of talent, they can develop semiautomated data dashboards that track the most important metrics for critical roles.

Create the best employee experience possible

Companies know that a better employee experience means a better bottom line. Successful organizations work together with their people to create personalized, authentic, and motivating experiences that tap into purpose to strengthen individual, team, and company performance.

The HR team plays a crucial role in forming employee experience. Organizations in which HR facilitates a positive employee experience are 1.3 times more likely to report organizational outperformance, McKinsey research has shown . This has become even more important throughout the pandemic, as organizations work to build team morale and positive mindsets .

HR should facilitate and coordinate employee experience. Organizations can support this by helping HR evolve, strengthening the function’s capability so that it becomes the architect of the employee experience. Airbnb, for instance, rebranded the CHRO role as global head of employee experience. PayPal focused on HR’s capability and processes to create a better experience for employees, including coaching HR professionals on measuring and understanding that experience, and using technology more effectively.

Strengthen leadership and build capacity for change

Culture is the foundation on which exceptional financial performance is built. Companies with top-quartile cultures (as measured by McKinsey’s Organizational Health Index ) post a return to shareholders 60 percent higher  than median companies and 200 percent higher than those in the bottom quartile.

Culture change should be business-led, with clear and highly visible leadership from the top, and execution should be rigorous and consistent. Companies are more than five times more likely to have a successful transformation  when leaders have role-modeled the behavior changes they were asking their employees to make.

To strengthen an organization’s identity, HR should ask the following questions:

• How can we develop an energizing sense of purpose that has a tangible impact on our strategic choices and ways of working?
• How can we identify key talent roles and focus them on creating value?
• How can we build a data-driven, systemic understanding of our organizational health?

Agility: HR’s role in flattening the organization

Organizational agility improves both company performance and employee satisfaction . HR can be instrumental in shifting an organization from a traditional hierarchy to a marketplace that provides talent and resources to a collection of empowered small teams, helping them to achieve their missions and acting as a common guiding star.

Adopt new organizational models

For instance, as a part of a multiyear agile transformation, a large European bank worked to establish an in-house agile academy led jointly by coaches and the HR function to drive capability building for the transformation.

To be successful, a transformation should touch every facet of an organization—people, process, strategy, structure, and technology. HR can help create an iterative approach by developing core elements of the people-management process, including new career paths for agile teams, revamped performance management, and capability building. It should lead by example as well, by shifting to agile “flow to work” pools  in which individuals are staffed to prioritized tasks.

Create a flexible—and magnetic—workforce

Because many roles are becoming disaggregated and fluid, work will increasingly be defined in terms of skills . The accelerating pace of technological change is widening skill gaps, making them more common and more quick to develop. To survive and deliver on their strategic objectives, all organizations will need to reskill and upskill significant portions of their workforce over the next ten years.

According to a 2018 McKinsey survey , 66 percent of executives said that “addressing potential skills gaps related to automation/digitization” within their workforces was at least a “top ten priority.” HR should help prioritize these talent shifts.

In a more recent survey McKinsey conducted with global executives  about the postpandemic workforce, more than a third of respondents said that their organizations were unprepared to address the skill gaps exacerbated by automation and digitization. The shift to digitization has accelerated during the pandemic: 85 percent of companies have picked up the pace of their digitization (including a 48 percent rise in the digitization of customer channels). In light of these trends and the need to shift skills, there is a clear business rationale behind workforce strategy and planning.

HR should be a strategic partner for the business in this regard, by ensuring that the right talent is in place to deliver on core company objectives. HR can also drive workforce planning by reviewing how disruptive trends affect employees, identifying future core capabilities, and assessing how supply and demand apply to future skills gaps.

Moving to a skills focus also requires innovative sourcing to meet specific work-activity needs (for example, the gig economy and automation), and changing which roles companies need to source with traditional full-time-equivalent positions and which can be done by temporary workers or contractors. In the survey with global executives, about 70 percent said that two years from now they expect to use more temporary workers and contractors than they did before the COVID-19 crisis.

During the pandemic, we’ve seen how organizations have come together to utilize talent with transferable skills. For instance, McKinsey has supported Talent Exchange , a platform that uses artificial intelligence to help workers displaced by the crisis.

Make better decisions—faster

Companies that make decisions at the right organizational level  and that have fewer reporting layers are more likely to deliver consistently on quality, velocity, and performance outcomes and thus outperform their industry peers. The pandemic has trained the spotlight on the power of fast decision making, as many organizations have had to move dramatically more quickly than they had originally envisioned. For example, one retailer had a plan for curbside delivery that would take 18 months to roll out; once the COVID-19 crisis hit, the plan went operational in just two days.

HR can help with strong decision making by empowering employees  to take risks in a culture that rewards them for doing so. McKinsey research revealed that employees who are empowered to make decisions and who receive sufficient coaching from leaders were three times more likely to say that their companies’ delegated decisions were both high quality and speedy .

Introduce next-generation performance management

Companies are experimenting with a wide variety of approaches to improve how they manage performance. According to a McKinsey Global Survey , half of respondents said that performance management had not had a positive effect on employee or organizational performance. Two-thirds reported the implementation of at least one meaningful modification to their performance-management systems.

We identified three practices—managers’ coaching, linking employee goals to business priorities, and differentiated compensation—that increase the chances that a performance-management system will positively affect employee performance. HR plays an important role in embedding these practices in performance management by supporting the goal-setting process, decoupling the compensation and development discussion, investing in manager’s capability building, and embedding technology and analytics to simplify the performance-management process.

To strengthen an organization’s agility, HR should ask the following questions:

• Can we enable more effective decision making by pushing decisions to the edges of the organization, creating psychological safety  that empowers people, and building capabilities?
• How do we accelerate the shift to a more diverse and deeply motivated talent base, one that is supported through a human-centric culture that enables outperformance and superior experience?
• Which organizational areas or end-to-end value-creation streams would most benefit from a shift to new ways of working and organizing?

Scalability: How HR can drive value creation

The new normal of large, rapidly recurring skills gaps means that reskilling efforts must be transformational, not business as usual or piecemeal.

Lean into a learning culture by reskilling and upskilling

Effective reskilling and upskilling will require employees to embark on a blended-learning journey that includes traditional learning (training, digital courses, job aids) with nontraditional methods (enhanced peer coaching, learning networks, the mass personalization of change , “nudging” techniques).

For instance, Microsoft shifted from a “know it all” to a “learn it all” ethos, incorporating open learning days, informal social learning opportunities, learning data for internal career paths, and new platforms and products for its partner network.

Memo to HR: Look in the mirror

To drive and facilitate these workforce initiatives, HR must transform itself first. Talent is consistently ranked as a top three priority for CEOs, yet many lack confidence in HR’s ability to deliver. 3 Dominic Barton, Dennis Carey, and Ram Charan, “People before strategy: A new role for the CHRO,” Harvard Business Review , July– August 2015, Volume 93, Number 7–8, pp. 62–71, hbr.org. The HR function is often overburdened with transactional work and not well equipped to create value for the enterprise.

Yet people-first organizations look at business problems from the perspective of how talent creates value, and HR is well positioned to bring data-driven insights to talent decisions. HR can arm itself with data-driven insights and people analytics to support talent-driven transformation, and HR business partners can then consistently make talent decisions based on data.

Create a value-enhancing HR ecosystem

McKinsey analysis has shown that a preponderance of executives recognize how much external partnerships help companies differentiate themselves. Increased value can be created through ecosystems where partners share data, code, and skills. Success now requires “blurry boundaries” and mutually dependent relationships to share value. The need of the hour is for HR to collaborate on and leverage the landscape of HR tech solutions across the employee life cycle—from learning, talent acquisition, and performance management to workforce productivity—to build an effective HR ecosystem.

To strengthen an organization’s scalability, HR should ask the following questions:

• How can we set up platforms spanning multiple players in the ecosystem and enable new sources of value and employee experience through them?
• How can we become the best company to partner with in the ecosystem? How can we set ourselves up for fast partnering and make the ecosystem accessible?
• What are the critical skills that drive future value creation and how can we upskill our talent base accordingly?

Looking ahead: How transformation happens

As the organization of the future takes shape, HR will be the driving force for many initiatives: mapping talent to value; making the workforce more flexible; prioritizing strategic workforce planning, performance management, and reskilling; building an HR platform; and developing an HR tech ecosystem. For other initiatives, HR can help C-suite leaders push forward on establishing and radiating purpose, improving employee experience, driving leadership and culture, and simplifying the organization.

Given the magnitude of the task and the broad portfolio of value-creating HR initiatives, prioritization is critical.

In May of 2020, HR leaders attending a McKinsey virtual conference indicated that over the next two years, they wanted to prioritize initiatives that strengthen agility and identity. That included 27 percent who said that they would focus on responding with agility and 25 percent who prioritized driving leadership, culture, and employee experience. Next came mapping talent to value and establishing and radiating purpose, each at 13 percent (Exhibit 2).

At a second conference for HR leaders, 4 Survey of human-resources leaders at “Reimagine: Organizing for the future,” a McKinsey virtual conference held in June 2020. about half of the assembled CHROs said that they were focusing on reimagining the fundamentals of the organization and rethinking the operating model and ways of working in the next normal.

We see organizations making this shift. Throughout the pandemic, HR has played a central role in how companies build organizational resilience and drive value . CHROs and their teams can continue on this path by connecting talent to business strategy and by implementing changes in the three core areas of identity, agility, and scalability, as well as the nine imperatives that flow from them.

A more flexible and responsive model will also help organizations meet coming demographic shifts and other workforce changes. Millennials are becoming the dominant group in the workforce (with Gen Z close behind), creating novel challenges for organizations to meet their needs. The prominence of the gig economy and alternate models of working will only grow, with 162 million workers in the European Union and the United States working independently— 70 percent of them by choice . And the rapid spread of digital technology and automation is dramatically reshaping the global economy, with half the tasks people perform already automatable today.

These trends are not new, but they are approaching tipping points, placing organization at the top of the CEO agenda. CHROs can help leadership by transforming their own HR organizations: developing and reinforcing clear priorities; embracing new ways of working, including rapid iteration and testing with the business and seeking explicit feedback; and revamping the HR skill set by embracing agility and digital capabilities.

While clearly a trial by fire, the pandemic also provides an opportunity for HR to accelerate its shift from a service to a strategic function, helping to shape a more dynamic organization that is ready to meet the postcrisis future.

Asmus Komm is a partner in McKinsey’s Hamburg office, Florian Pollner is a partner in the Zurich office, Bill Schaninger is a senior partner in the Philadelphia office, and Surbhi Sikka is a consultant in the Gurugram office.

The authors wish to thank Talha Khan for his contributions to this article.

This article was edited by Barbara Tierney, a senior editor in the New York office.

Explore a career with us

Related articles.

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Browse Course Material

Course info, instructors.

• Prof. Diane Burton
• Prof. Paul Osterman

Departments

• Sloan School of Management

As Taught In

• Industrial Relations and Human Resource Management

Learning Resource Types

Strategic hr management, assignments, course schedule.

Session 1: The Strategic Importance of HR Case: Southwest Airlines: Using Human Resources for Competitive Advantage (A), Stanford Case #HR-1.

Reading: Pfeffer, Jeffrey. The Human Equation: Building Profits by Putting People First . Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1998, chapters 1 and 2.

Assignment Questions

• What is Southwest’s competitive strategy? What are the sources of its success? How does it make money?
• What are the foundations of Southwest’s competitive advantage?
• How are these sources of competitive advantage produced and sustained by what the organization does and how it does it?
• To what extent are Southwest’s sources of advantage difficult to imitate and likely to persist over time?
• To what extent is Southwest’s success based on Herb Kelleher?
• How serious is the competitive threat? To what extent can United and/or Continental duplicate Southwest’s business model? Why or why not?

Session 2: Strategic Execution and Economic Value: Internal and External Alignment Case: Portman Hotel, HBS 9-489-104.

• What is Portman’s strategy for competing successfully in its chosen market?
• What behaviors, skills, and attitudes will it need from its people, particularly the personal valets, to execute its strategy?
• How do Portman’s human resource management practices (recruitment, selection, compensation, training, career development, performance appraisal, staffing and organizational design, management and supervision) help or hinder the development of the skills and behaviors listed in Question 2.
• Is Portman having problems? What are the symptoms? What are the causes of the problems Portman is experiencing?
• What should Portman do?
• How much should Portman be willing to invest to address its difficulties? Or alternatively, what is the successful implementation of Portman’s strategy worth? Some operating figures are given in the case. FYI: the capital costs of the hotel work out to $310,000 per room.

Session 3: Work Systems Cases: New United Motors Manufacturing, Inc (NUMMI), Stanford Case #HR-11.

Optional Reading: Rubinstein, Saul R., and Thomas A. Kochan. Learning from Saturn: Possibilities for Corporate Governance and Employee Relations . Ithaca, NY: Cornell University/ILR Press, 2001.

• What is motivating the workers at NUMMI?
• What are the design elements of the Toyota team-based manufacturing system?
• Why has General Motors had so much trouble learning from NUMMI and Saturn?
• Jamie Hresko is now running one of GM’s largest assembly plants. What advice would you give him for how he might introduce some of the NUMMI methods to this facility?

Session 4: The Role of the HR Function

Reading: Ulrich, Dave. Human Resource Champions: The Next Agenda for Adding Value and Delivering Results . Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1998, pp. 23-31 and 231-254.

Session 5: Self-Managed Teams Case: Slade Plating Department, HBS #9-496-018

Reading: Wageman, Ruth. “Critical Success Factors for Creating Superb Self-Managing Teams.” Organizational Dynamics . Summer 1997, pp. 49-61.

• How would you describe the culture of the Sarto group? Be specific. How has it evolved? What impact has it had on the effectiveness of the group?
• What are the determinants of social status and influence within the plating department? The Sarto group? The Clark group?
• What do you learn by analyzing the data provided in the exhibits? How does this influence your interpretations of what is going on?
• Why did management previously ignored the illegal “punch-out” system?
• What actions would you take if you were Porter? What are the risks associated with these actions?

Important supplemental information: The 1996 starting salary in the Plating Department was $8.00; Tony Sarto’s hourly wage was $12.00. The average wage for semi-skilled workers in the U.S. was $12.00. Firms similar to Slade in the Michigan area, such as suppliers to the auto industry, paid an average hourly wage of $14.70. United Auto Workers working at the ‘Big Three (General Motors, Chrysler and Ford), had starting salaries around $13.00 an hour and earned on average $19.00 an hour. The minimum wage in 1996 was $4.25, raised to $4.75 on October 1, 1996.

Session 6: Participation and Involvement Film: Breakdown at Eastern Airlines

Reading: Pfeffer, Jeffrey. “Can You Manage With Unions.” Chap. 8 in The Human Equation: Building Profits by Putting People First . 2000, pp. 225-251.

Session 7: Training and Development Case: ServiceMaster Industries, Inc., HBS #9-388-064.

• What role have ServiceMaster’s values and goals played in the firm’s success?
• Why haven’t other companies successfully copied the ServiceMaster approach?
• How important are training and development in the ServiceMaster system? How does ServiceMaster socialize its employees? How does training and development affect the organization’s continued growth?
• Why has ServiceMaster been willing to spend the resources it has on training and development for a set of jobs that many might see as comparatively low-skilled and for positions that typically experience high turnover?
• There have been proposals (particularly by former U.S. Secretary of Labor, Robert Reich) that the U.S. follow the lead of some other countries (e.g., France, Singapore) and mandate a certain level of training–for instance, as a percentage of the firm’s payroll. What do you think of this policy? Why and when might organizations spend less than a socially optimal amount on training? What else might be done if one believes that too little training and skill development are occurring in the economy?

Session 8: Culture Case: Morgan Stanley: Becoming a One-Firm Firm, HBS #9-400-043.

Reading: Kaplan, R. S., and D. P. Norton. “Linking the Balanced Scorecard to Strategy.” California Management Review 39, no.1 (Fall 1996).

• What do you think of Mack’s strategy for increased integration? Is this compelling to you? Why or why not?
• Given his strategy, what do you think of his emphasis on revamping the performance management system? What are the pros and cons of implementing a new system of the type being discussed?
• If Mack is to be successful at changing the strategy and culture at Morgan Stanley, what other actions would you recommend he take? What other HR levers should he be thinking about using?
• Given your answer to question #3, what recommendations do you have for how he should proceed? How should he implement these changes?

Session 9: Performance Appraisal Case: The Firmwide 360 Performance Evaluation Process at Morgan Stanley, HBS #9-498053 and Rob Parson at Morgan Stanley (A), HBS #9-498-054.

• What is your assessment of Parson’s performance? Should he be promoted?
• Using the data in the case, please complete the Evaluation and Development Summary presented in Exhibit 3 of the Rob Parson (A) case.
• If you were Paul Nasr, how would you plan to conduct the performance appraisal conversation? What would your goals be? What issues would you raise and why, and how would you raise them?
• If you were Rob Parson, how would you conduct yourself in the performance evaluation meeting? What are your goals? Be prepared to role-play the appraisal conversation in class as either Nasr or Parson.

Cases to be distributed in class: Rob Parson at Morgan Stanley (B), HBS #9-498-055, (C), HBS #9-498-056, and (D), HBS #9-498-058.

Session 10: Diversity Case: The Case of the Part-time Partner.

Reading: Thomas, David A., and Robin J. Ely. “Making Differences Matter: A New Paradigm for Managing Diversity.” Harvard Business Review (September-October 1996): 80-90.

• Would you vote to make Julie a partner? Why or why not?
• What are the pros and cons from the firm’s viewpoint and from the society’s viewpoint of this decision?
• What is your assessment of how the firm handled the situation?
• How might they have proceeded differently?

Session 11: Information Sharing Case: Jack Stack (A) and (B), HBS #9-993-009 and #9-993-010.

Reading: Case, John. “Opening the Books.” Harvard Business Review (March-April 1997): 118-127. (Reprint 97201)

• What does it take to succeed in the engine remanufacturing business? What are the critical skills and organizational competencies?
• What is it like to work in such a plant?
• What are the major risks of a leveraged buy-out such as this?
• What do you think of Stack’s ideas about management?
• What are the key elements of the program Stack put in place?
• Can this approach be used elsewhere? Under which circumstances would it be more (less) appropriate? How could it be implemented?

Session 12: Benefits Case: The SAS Institute: A Different Approach to Incentives and People Management Practices in the Software Industry, Stanford Case #HR-6.

Reading: Pfeffer, Jeffrey. “Six Dangerous Myths About Pay.” Harvard Business Review (May-June 1998): 109-119.

• What are the complementary elements of the SAS HR system that make the compensation system effective?
• Why has SAS been able to get away with a compensation system that seems to violate industry conventions?
• Could the SAS approach work in other high technology organizations?
• What would happen if VDS tried to emulate the SAS approach? Why?

Session 13: Compensation Systems Case: Visionary Design Systems, HBS #9-495-011.

• What is the basic philosophy and values of VDS?
• How would you characterize the VDS compensation (base, bonus, and stock) system? On what principles is it based?
• Why has VDS had problems with its Product Data Management effort? To what extent do you see incentive issues as important? What other issues are important?
• What should VDS do about the Product Data Management (PDM) problems?
• Would you make any changes to VDS’ compensation systems? What? Why?

Session 14: Pay for Performance Case: Performance Pay at Safelite Autoglass (A) HBS #9-800-291.

• What are the pros and cons of switching from wage rates to piece rate pay?
• Is Safelite a good candidate for switching from wage rates to piece rates?
• Should there be a guaranteed wage? If so, how should it be set?
• What are the likely consequences of a switch from wage to piece rates for turnover, recruitment, productivity, and product quality?

Session 15: Non-Profit Management Case: The John Snow Institute.

• How successful is JSI?
• How effective is their current human resource management system?
• What should Joel Lamstein do?

Session 16: Managing Service Workers Case: Harrah’s Entertainment, Inc.: Rewarding Our People HBS #9-403-008.

• What were the challenges facing Gary Loveman when he took charge?
• What were the key changes he undertook?
• What were the consequences for employees?

Session 17: Alignment and Motivation Case: Nordstrom Department Store. Center for Human Resources, Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Reading: Simons, Robert. “Control in an Age of Empowerment.” Harvard Business Review . Reprint #95211.

• How effective is Nordstom’s human resource management system? In what ways does it contribute to the firm’s success?
• Do you have any concerns about the practices described in the case?
• Would you change management systems at Nordstrom? Why? Which systems?

Session 18: Review & Wrap-up

Assignment Question

• Reflecting on the companies we have studied in this course, as well as your own work experience, what lessons do you draw about the respective roles that general managers and the HR function in organizations should play in the management of human resources?

Summary of Class Sessions and Assignment Due Dates ( PDF )

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Managing International Assignments

International assignment management is one of the hardest areas for HR professionals to master—and one of the most costly. The expense of a three-year international assignment can cost millions, yet many organizations fail to get it right. Despite their significant investments in international assignments, companies still report a 42 percent failure rate in these assignments. 1

With so much at risk, global organizations must invest in upfront and ongoing programs that will make international assignments successful. Selecting the right person, preparing the expatriate (expat) and the family, measuring the employee's performance from afar, and repatriating the individual at the end of an assignment require a well-planned, well-managed program. Knowing what to expect from start to finish as well as having some tools to work with can help minimize the risk.

Business Case

As more companies expand globally, they are also increasing international assignments and relying on expatriates to manage their global operations. According to KPMG's 2021 Global Assignment Policies and Practices Survey, all responding multinational organizations offered long-term assignments (typically one to five years), 88 percent offered short-term assignments (typically defined as less than 12 months), and 69 percent offered permanent transfer/indefinite length.

Managing tax and tax compliance, cost containment and managing exceptions remain the three principal challenges in long-term assignment management according to a 2020 Mercer report. 2

Identifying the Need for International Assignment

Typical reasons for an international assignment include the following:

• Filling a need in an existing operation.
• Transferring technology or knowledge to a worksite (or to a client's worksite).
• Developing an individual's career through challenging tasks in an international setting.
• Analyzing the market to see whether the company's products or services will attract clients and users.
• Launching a new product or service.

The goal of the international assignment will determine the assignment's length and help identify potential candidates. See Structuring Expatriate Assignments and the Value of Secondment and Develop Future Leaders with Rotational Programs .

Selection Process

Determining the purpose and goals for an international assignment will help guide the selection process. A technical person may be best suited for transferring technology, whereas a sales executive may be most effective launching a new product or service.

Traditionally, organizations have relied on technical, job-related skills as the main criteria for selecting candidates for overseas assignments, but assessing global mindset is equally, if not more, important for successful assignments. This is especially true given that international assignments are increasingly key components of leadership and employee development.

To a great extent, the success of every expatriate in achieving the company's goals in the host country hinges on that person's ability to influence individuals, groups and organizations that have a different cultural perspective.

Interviews with senior executives from various industries, sponsored by the Worldwide ERC Foundation, reveal that in the compressed time frame of an international assignment, expatriates have little opportunity to learn as they go, so they must be prepared before they arrive. Therefore, employers must ensure that the screening process for potential expatriates includes an assessment of their global mindset.

The research points to three major attributes of successful expatriates:

• Intellectual capital. Knowledge, skills, understanding and cognitive complexity.
• Psychological capital. The ability to function successfully in the host country through internal acceptance of different cultures and a strong desire to learn from new experiences.
• Social capital. The ability to build trusting relationships with local stakeholders, whether they are employees, supply chain partners or customers.

According to Global HR Consultant Caroline Kersten, it is generally understood that global leadership differs significantly from domestic leadership and that, as a result, expatriates need to be equipped with competencies that will help them succeed in an international environment. Commonly accepted global leadership competencies, for both male and female global leaders, include cultural awareness, open-mindedness and flexibility.

In particular, expatriates need to possess a number of vital characteristics to perform successfully on assignment. Among the necessary traits are the following:

• Confidence and self-reliance: independence; perseverance; work ethic.
• Flexibility and problem-solving skills: resilience; adaptability; ability to deal with ambiguity.
• Tolerance and interpersonal skills: social sensitivity; observational capability; listening skills; communication skills.
• Skill at handling and initiating change: personal drivers and anchors; willingness to take risks.

Trends in international assignment show an increase in the younger generation's interest and placement in global assignments. Experts also call for a need to increase female expatriates due to the expected leadership shortage and the value employers find in mixed gender leadership teams. See Viewpoint: How to Break Through the 'Mobility Ceiling' .

Employers can elicit relevant information on assignment successes and challenges by means of targeted interview questions with career expatriates, such as the following:

• How many expatriate assignments have you completed?
• What are the main reasons why you chose to accept your previous expatriate assignments?
• What difficulties did you experience adjusting to previous international assignments? How did you overcome them?
• On your last assignment, what factors made your adjustment to the new environment easier?
• What experiences made interacting with the locals easier?
• Please describe what success or failure means to you when referring to an expatriate assignment.
• Was the success or failure of your assignments measured by your employers? If so, how did they measure it?
• During your last international assignment, do you recall when you realized your situation was a success or a failure? How did you come to that determination?
• Why do you wish to be assigned an international position?

Securing Visas

Once an individual is chosen for an assignment, the organization needs to move quickly to secure the necessary visas. Requirements and processing times vary by country. Employers should start by contacting the host country's consulate or embassy for information on visa requirements. See Websites of U.S. Embassies, Consulates, and Diplomatic Missions .

Following is a list of generic visa types that may be required depending on the nature of business to be conducted in a particular country:

• A work permit authorizes paid employment in a country.
• A work visa authorizes entry into a country to take up paid employment.
• A dependent visa permits family members to accompany or join employees in the country of assignment.
• A multiple-entry visa permits multiple entries into a country.

Preparing for the Assignment

An international assignment agreement that outlines the specifics of the assignment and documents agreement by the employer and the expatriate is necessary. Topics typically covered include:

• Location of the assignment.
• Length of the assignment, including renewal and trial periods, if offered.
• Costs paid by the company (e.g., assignment preparation costs, moving costs for household goods, airfare, housing, school costs, transportation costs while in country, home country visits and security).
• Base salary and any incentives or allowances offered.
• Employee's responsibilities and goals.
• Employment taxes.
• Steps to take in the event the assignment is not working for either the employee or the employer.
• Repatriation.
• Safety and security measures (e.g., emergency evacuation procedures, hazards).

Expatriates may find the reality of foreign housing very different from expectations, particularly in host locations considered to be hardship assignments. Expats will find—depending on the degree of difficulty, hardship or danger—that housing options can range from spacious accommodations in a luxury apartment building to company compounds with dogs and armed guards. See Workers Deal with Affordable Housing Shortages in Dubai and Cairo .

Expats may also have to contend with more mundane housing challenges, such as shortages of suitable housing, faulty structures and unreliable utility services. Analyses of local conditions are available from a variety of sources. For example, Mercer produces Location Evaluation Reports, available for a fee, that evaluate levels of hardship for 14 factors, including housing, in more than 135 locations.

Although many employers acknowledge the necessity for thorough preparation, they often associate this element solely with the assignee, forgetting the other key parties involved in an assignment such as the employee's family, work team and manager.

The expatriate

Consider these points in relation to the assignee:

• Does the employee have a solid grasp of the job to be done and the goals established for that position?
• Does the employee understand the compensation and benefits package?
• Has the employee had access to cultural training and language instruction, no matter how similar the host culture may be?
• Is the employee receiving relocation assistance in connection with the physical move?
• Is there a contact person to whom the employee can go not only in an emergency but also to avoid becoming "out of sight, out of mind"?
• If necessary to accomplish the assigned job duties, has the employee undergone training to get up to speed?
• Has the assignee undergone an assessment of readiness?

To help the expatriate succeed, organizations are advised to invest in cross-cultural training before the relocation. The benefits of receiving such training are that it: 3

• Prepares the individual/family mentally for the move.
• Removes some of the unknown.
• Increases self-awareness and cross-cultural understanding.
• Provides the opportunity to address questions and anxieties in a supportive environment.
• Motivates and excites.
• Reduces stress and provides coping strategies.
• Eases the settling-in process.
• Reduces the chances of relocation failure.

See Helping Expatriate Employees Deal with Culture Shock .

As society has shifted from single- to dual-income households, the priorities of potential expatriates have evolved, as have the policies organizations use to entice employees to assignment locations. In the past, from the candidate's point of view, compensation was the most significant component of the expatriate package. Today more emphasis is on enabling an expatriate's spouse to work. Partner dissatisfaction is a significant contributor to assignment failure. See UAE: Expat Husbands Get New Work Opportunities .

When it comes to international relocation, most organizations deal with children as an afterthought. Factoring employees' children into the relocation equation is key to a successful assignment. Studies show that transferee children who have a difficult time adjusting to the assignment contribute to early returns and unsuccessful completion of international assignments, just as maladjusted spouses do. From school selection to training to repatriation, HR can do a number of things to smooth the transition for children.

Both partners and children must be prepared for relocation abroad. Employers should consider the following:

• Have they been included in discussions about the host location and what they can expect? Foreign context and culture may be more difficult for accompanying family because they will not be participating in the "more secure" environment of the worksite. Does the family have suitable personal characteristics to successfully address the rigors of an international life?
• In addition to dual-career issues, other common concerns include aging parents left behind in the home country and special needs for a child's education. Has the company allowed a forum for the family to discuss these concerns?

The work team

Whether the new expatriate will supervise the existing work team, be a peer, replace a local national or fill a newly created position, has the existing work team been briefed? Plans for a formal introduction of the new expatriate should reflect local culture and may require more research and planning as well as input from the local work team.

The manager/team leader

Questions organization need to consider include the following: Does the manager have the employee's file on hand (e.g., regarding increases, performance evaluations, promotions and problems)? Have the manager and employee engaged in in-depth conversations about the job, the manager's expectations and the employee's expectations?

Mentors play an important role in enhancing a high-performing employee's productivity and in guiding his or her career. In a traditional mentoring relationship, a junior executive has ongoing face-to-face meetings with a senior executive at the corporation to learn the ropes, set goals and gain advice on how to better perform his or her job.

Before technological advances, mentoring programs were limited to those leaders who had the time and experience within the organization's walls to impart advice to a few select people worth that investment. Technology has eliminated those constraints. Today, maintaining a long-distance mentoring relationship through e-mail, telephone and videoconferencing is much easier. And that technology means an employer is not confined to its corporate halls when considering mentor-mentee matches.

The organization

If the company is starting to send more employees abroad, it has to reassess its administrative capabilities. Can existing systems handle complicated tasks, such as currency exchanges and split payrolls, not to mention the additional financial burden of paying allowances, incentives and so on? Often, international assignment leads to outsourcing for global expertise. Payroll, tax, employment law, contractual obligations, among others, warrant an investment in sound professional advice.

Employment Laws

Four major U.S. employment laws have some application abroad for U.S. citizens working in U.S.-based multinationals:

• Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.
• The Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA).
• The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
• The Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA).

Title VII, the ADEA and the ADA are the more far-reaching among these, covering all U.S. citizens who are either:

• Employed outside the United States by a U.S. firm.
• Employed outside the United States by a company under the control of a U.S. firm.

USERRA's extraterritoriality applies to veterans and reservists working overseas for the federal government or a firm under U.S. control. See Do laws like the Fair Labor Standards Act and the Family and Medical Leave Act apply to U.S. citizens working in several other countries?

Employers must also be certain to comply with both local employment law in the countries in which they manage assignments and requirements for corporate presence in those countries. See Where can I find international employment law and culture information?

Compensation

Companies take one of the following approaches to establish base salaries for expatriates:

• The home-country-based approach. The objective of a home-based compensation program is to equalize the employee to a standard of living enjoyed in his or her home country. Under this commonly used approach, the employee's base salary is broken down into four general categories: taxes, housing, goods and services, and discretionary income.
• The host-country-based approach. With this approach, the expatriate employee's compensation is based on local national rates. Many companies continue to cover the employee in its defined contribution or defined benefit pension schemes and provide housing allowances.
• The headquarters-based approach. This approach assumes that all assignees, regardless of location, are in one country (i.e., a U.S. company pays all assignees a U.S.-based salary, regardless of geography).
• Balance sheet approach. In this scenario, the compensation is calculated using the home-country-based approach with all allowances, deductions and reimbursements. After the net salary has been determined, it is then converted to the host country's currency. Since one of the primary goals of an international compensation management program is to maintain the expatriate's current standard of living, developing an equitable and functional compensation plan that combines balance and flexibility is extremely challenging for multinational companies. To this end, many companies adopt a balance sheet approach. This approach guarantees that employees in international assignments maintain the same standard of living they enjoyed in their home country. A worksheet lists the costs of major expenses in the home and host countries, and any differences are used to increase or decrease the compensation to keep it in balance.

Some companies also allow expatriates to split payment of their salaries between the host country's and the home country's currencies. The expatriate receives money in the host country's currency for expenses but keeps a percentage of it in the home country currency to safeguard against wild currency fluctuations in either country.

As for handling expatriates taxes, organizations usually take one of four approaches:

• The employee is responsible for his or her own taxes.
• The employer determines tax reimbursement on a case-by-case basis.
• The employer pays the difference between taxes paid in the United States and the host country.
• The employer withholds U.S. taxes and pays foreign taxes.

To prevent an expatriate employee from suffering excess taxation of income by both the U.S. and host countries, many multinational companies implement either a tax equalization or a tax reduction policy for employees on international assignments. Additionally, the United States has entered into  bilateral international social security agreements  with numerous countries, referred to as "totalization agreements," which allow for an exemption of the social security tax in either the home or host country for defined periods of time.

A more thorough discussion of compensation and tax practices for employees on international assignment can be found in SHRM's Designing Global Compensation Systems toolkit.

How do we handle taxes for expatriates?

Can employers pay employees in other countries on the corporate home-country payroll?

Measuring Expatriates' Performance

Failed international assignments can be extremely costly to an organization. There is no universal approach to measuring an expatriate's performance given that specifics related to the job, country, culture and other variables will need to be considered. Employers must identify and communicate clear job expectations and performance indicators very early on in the assignment. A consistent and detailed assessment of an expatriate employee's performance, as well as appraisal of the operation as a whole, is critical to the success of an international assignment. Issues such as the criteria for and timing of performance reviews, raises and bonuses should be discussed and agreed on before the employees are selected and placed on international assignments.

Employees on foreign assignments face a number of issues that domestic employees do not. According to a 2020 Mercer report 4 , difficulty adjusting to the host country, poor candidate selection and spouse or partner's unhappiness are the top three reasons international assignments fail. Obviously, retention of international assignees poses a significant challenge to employers.

Upon completion of an international assignment, retaining the employee in the home country workplace is also challenging. Unfortunately, many employers fail to track retention data of repatriated employees and could benefit from collecting this information and making adjustments to reduce the turnover of employees returning to their home country.

Safety and Security

When faced with accident, injury, sudden illness, a disease outbreak or politically unstable conditions in which personal safety is at risk, expatriate employees and their dependents may require evacuation to the home country or to a third location. To be prepared, HR should have an evacuation plan in place that the expatriate can share with friends, extended family and colleagues both at home and abroad. See Viewpoint: Optimizing Global Mobility's Emergency Response Plans .

Many companies ban travel outside the country in the following circumstances:

• When a travel advisory is issued by the World Health Organization, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, International SOS or a government agency.
• When a widespread outbreak of a specific disease occurs or if the risk is deemed too high for employees and their well-being is in jeopardy.
• If the country is undergoing civil unrest or war or if an act of terrorism has occurred.
• If local management makes the decision.
• If the employee makes the decision.

Once employees are in place, the decision to evacuate assignees and dependents from a host location is contingent on local conditions and input from either internal sources (local managers, headquarters staff, HR and the assignee) or external sources (an external security or medical firm) or both. In some cases, each host country has its own set of evacuation procedures.

Decision-makers should consider all available and credible advice and initially transport dependents and nonessential personnel out of the host country by the most expeditious form of travel.

Navigating International Crises

How can an organization ensure the safety and security of expatriates and other employees in high-risk areas?

The Disaster Assistance Improvement Program (DAIP)

Repatriation

Ideally, the repatriation process begins before the expatriate leaves his or her home country and continues throughout the international assignment by addressing the following issues.

Career planning. Many managers are responsible for resolving difficult problems abroad and expect that a well-done job will result in promotion on return, regardless of whether the employer had made such a promise. This possibly unfounded assumption can be avoided by straightforward career planning that should occur in advance of the employee's accepting the international assignment. Employees need to know what impact the expatriate assignment will have on their overall advancement in the home office and that the international assignment fits in their career path.

Mentoring. The expatriate should be assigned a home-office mentor. Mentors are responsible for keeping expatriates informed on developments within the company, for keeping the expatriates' names in circulation in the office (to help avoid the out-of-sight, out-of-mind phenomenon) and for seeing to it that expatriates are included in important meetings. Mentors can also assist the expatriate in identifying how the overseas experience can best be used on return. Optimum results are achieved when the mentor role is part of the mentor's formal job duties.

Communication. An effective global communication plan will help expatriates feel connected to the home office and will alert them to changes that occur while they are away. The Internet, e-mail and intranets are inexpensive and easy ways to bring expatriates into the loop and virtual meeting software is readily available for all employers to engage with global employees. In addition, organizations should encourage home-office employees to keep in touch with peers on overseas assignments. Employee newsletters that feature global news and expatriate assignments are also encouraged.

Home visits. Most companies provide expatriates with trips home. Although such trips are intended primarily for personal visits, scheduling time for the expatriate to visit the home office is an effective method of increasing the expatriate's visibility. Having expatriates attend a few important meetings or make a presentation on their international assignment is also a good way to keep them informed and connected.

Preparation to return home. The expatriate should receive plenty of advance notice (some experts recommend up to one year) of when the international assignment will end. This notice will allow the employee time to prepare the family and to prepare for a new position in the home office. Once the employee is notified of the assignment's end, the HR department should begin working with the expatriate to identify suitable positions in the home office. The expatriate should provide the HR department with an updated resume that reflects the duties of the overseas assignment. The employee's overall career plan should be included in discussions with the HR professional.

Interviews. In addition to home leave, organizations may need to provide trips for the employee to interview with prospective managers. The face-to-face interview will allow the expatriate to elaborate on skills and responsibilities obtained while overseas and will help the prospective manager determine if the employee is a good fit. Finding the right position for the expatriate is crucial to retaining the employee. Repatriates who feel that their new skills and knowledge are underutilized may grow frustrated and leave the employer.

Ongoing recognition of contributions. An employer can recognize and appreciate the repatriates' efforts in several ways, including the following:

• Hosting a reception for repatriates to help them reconnect and meet new personnel.
• Soliciting repatriates' help in preparing other employees for expatriation.
• Asking repatriates to deliver a presentation or prepare a report on their overseas assignment.
• Including repatriates on a global task force and asking them for a global perspective on business issues.

Measuring ROI on expatriate assignments can be cumbersome and imprecise. The investment costs of international assignments can vary dramatically and can be difficult to determine. The largest expatriate costs include overall remuneration, housing, cost-of-living allowances (which sometimes include private schooling costs for children) and physical relocation (the movement to the host country of the employee, the employee's possessions and, often, the employee's family).

But wide variations exist in housing expenses. For example, housing costs are sky-high in Tokyo and London, whereas Australia's housing costs are moderate. Another significant cost of expatriate assignments involves smoothing out differences in pay and benefits between one country and another. Such cost differences can be steep and can vary based on factors such as exchange rates (which can be quite volatile) and international tax concerns (which can be extremely complex).

Once an organization has determined the costs of a particular assignment, the second part of the ROI challenge is calculating the return. Although it is relatively straightforward to quantify the value of fixing a production line in Puerto Rico or of implementing an enterprise software application in Asia, the challenge of quantifying the value of providing future executives with cross-cultural perspectives and international leadership experience can be intimidating.

Once an organization determines the key drivers of its expatriate program, HR can begin to define objectives and assess return that can be useful in guiding employees and in making decisions about the costs they incur as expatriates. Different objectives require different levels and lengths of tracking. Leadership development involves a much longer-term value proposition and should include a thorough repatriation plan. By contrast, the ROI of an international assignment that plugs a skills gap is not negatively affected if the expatriate bolts after successfully completing the engagement.

Additional Resources

International Assignment Management: Expatriate Policy and Procedure

Introduction to the Global Human Resources Discipline

1Mulkeen, D. (2017, February 20). How to reduce the risk of international assignment failure. Communicaid. Retrieved from https://www.communicaid.com/cross-cultural-training/blog/reducing-risk-international-assignment-failure/

2Mercer. (2020). Worldwide Survey of International Assignment Policies and Practices. Retrieved from https://mobilityexchange.mercer.com/international-assignments-survey .

3Dickmann, M., & Baruch, Y. (2011). Global careers. New York: Routledge.

4Mercer. (2020). Worldwide Survey of International Assignment Policies and Practices. Retrieved from https://mobilityexchange.mercer.com/international-assignments-survey

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Human Resource Management Assignment

2017, Human Resource Management Assignment

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the paper explores the effectiveness of the Human Resources available to an organisation.

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Note: upload the soft copy of your assignment in Moodle for plagiarism checks first finalizing your submission Human resource management has never had so much significance in today's dynamic and competitive business environment than in the last decade. It has been acknowledged by

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Abstract: In the process of organizational adaptation to environmental demands, primarily through the anticipated outputs, human resources play a key role. The procuring of necessary human resources, their working commitment and development, are the basic assignments of the management of human resources. The appliance of a contemporary concept of management of human resources, based on theoretical and practical cognizance of successful organizations, contributes to a successful execution of these and other assignments. In order to develop such a concept it is necessary to provide, in addition to the relevant basics, a whole chain of professional and managerial activities.

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