Question

Please respond to the following questions based upon these course objectives: Analyze the impact of organizational structure including cross-border alliances on international human resource management. Describe the issues surrounding expatriate recruitment, selection, training, and development for international assignments. Describe repatriation activities, practices, and issues. Identify the drivers of globalization and localization. Please answer the following questions with supporting examples and full explanations. For each of the learning objectives, provide an analysis of how the course supported each objective. Explain how the material learned in this course, based upon the objectives, will be applicable to the professional application.

Answer 1

Q.1 Analyse the impact of organizational structure including cross-border alliances on international human resource management.

Ans.- In today’s era of free trade, entering into international business by companies has become very common. The companies engage in international business and cross-border alliance for various reasons including for business expansion, to Take Advantage of Exchange Rates, due to the availability of cheap resources in the foreign market and sometimes even as a Response to Political and Economic Conditions of the home as well host country. With this comes the international assignment of the employees of the company. But everything has a flip side and this holds true for the impact of organizational structure including cross-border alliances on international human resource management as well. The example of the 1998 DaimlerChrysler cross-border merger can be cited in this regard as on paper this was very appealing but in reality it brought very complex management challenges which are inherent in managing cross-border alliances to the fore. Some of those human resource management challenges were related to language skills, interpersonal skills, team building& negotiation skills and knowledge transfer skills and the most importantly the lack of the knowledge of others’ culture. All these issues pose some serious issues in the management of international human resource management.

Q.2. Describe the issues surrounding expatriate recruitment, selection, training, and development for international assignments.

There are a lot of issues involved in expatriate recruitment, selection, training, and development for international assignments. These issues include family issues, cultural and language barriers, geographical volatility issues, health issues, psychological/emotional issues and safety/security issues involved in some foreign postings.

Most of the employees selected for foreign assignment have families and accommodating in a new city with family becomes challenging for some employees. The same holds true with regard to the cultural and language issues. Communicating in a foreign language hinders the expression capacity and lack of cultural knowledge of others may create serious issue for the employee concerned. Similarly, there are places where physical securities of the employees are at stake. In such situations, an employee faces serious dilemma.

Hence, in order to effectively cater such issues related to expatriate recruitment, selection, training, and development for international assignments proper training should be imparted in them so that they can easily accommodate themselves in the foreign country.

Q.3. Describe repatriation activities, practices, and issues.

Ans.- Repatriation is a phenomenon when an employee returns from a foreign assignment to the home country. An employee who returns from a foreign assignment also faces a lot of physical as well as emotional issues which needs to be prudently solved. The repatriation of an employee should be planned 3-4 months in advance. The future job plan should be done in advance for the concerned employee. The employee should be asked to complete/finish his personal works like closure of bank accounts, payment of bills etc. so that he can smoothly go back to home country. Proper amount of time should be given to the employee so that he can meet with his friends/colleagues before returning. Full updated information about the socio-cultural and poltical information should be made viable for the employee so that he can understand the changes which have happened in his home country and accordingly change himself. Finally, proper training/counselling should be given to him so that he can fully assimilate himself once again the mainstream society and can save himself from the reverse cultural shock.