Tag: Cost Control and Management Accounting Osmania University b.com Notes

A global project is pretty much what it says on the tin. it is a project that is based in multiple countries across the world. With global projects, multiple people or project teams are spread across different countries, each working on a single project at the same time.

Key Aspects of Handling a Global Project Team

Cultural Differences

This issue especially takes the front seat when it comes to a global project team. For example, the Chinese are very non-expressive people. Therefore, if you use too many hand gestures while you speak to a group of Chinese team members, it will cause them to lose focus and get distracted. Similarly, starting work on time and finishing on time is a concrete principle in Europe, especially Germany and France, whereas in India, people are a bit more relaxed when it comes to adhering to time. [Also read: How Cultural Differences Play an Important Role in ITIL Implementation].

Holidays are an important aspect of cultural differences. The project managers need to take into account the religious and national holidays of different countries while planning the project. They need to understand the impact of these holidays on the project schedule and ensure that they are factored in while creating timelines. In the US, people might be okay with being contacted for an important piece of information while they are on vacation, whereas in the UK, people tend to get offended when they are called on work matters during vacation.

Hofstede’s ‘power distance’ is another critical cultural factor. Employees in western countries are comfortable with putting forward their opinions and questions and having a discussion with their superiors, whereas in India or China, people might be hesitant to challenge authority. Therefore, it is the project manager’s responsibility to ensure that the team members have completely understood what is expected of them and they are in agreement to perform the tasks required from them.

Language Barrier

English is the business language in most countries. However, in countries like Germany, France, China, Japan, and a few others, business is done in their respective native languages. English itself is spoken in varying accents all around the world. The project manager needs to be mindful of these differences in language and accent while considering that team members from countries whose native language is not English might not be as comfortable as the native speakers. Additionally, he or she needs to advise his team to avoid slang and humor because the other side may not understand its subtleties and may even find it offensive.

For example, phrases such as “Roger that” and “Houston, we have a situation” are very common in the US, while someone in China or India may not understand the phrase.

It might help to learn the basic greetings of the team members’ language such as “Hello”, “Goodbye” and “Thank you”. They will appreciate the effort and will form a bond with your team though they are not physically present in the same office building. Ensure that you learn the right pronunciations of the names of your team members. People tend to take offense at their names not being pronounced the right way. The way you greet people at the end of a phone conversation or email is important too.

In some cases, when the English of the team member or a vendor is impossible to comprehend, it is advisable to use an interpreter, even if it may need extra time to complete conversations. Although it is not a comprehensive solution since the interpreter might not understand the technical terms involved in the project, it is something that needs to be worked around.

Make sure all meeting discussions and conversations are documented and sent to each of the team members involved. Some people are better at reading and writing English than listening and speaking. Therefore, a written document will help them assimilate the information and come up with questions if they have any so that everyone in the team is on the same page.

Technology

The importance of technology cannot be overstated when it comes to managing a global project team. Email and telephone used to be the most common modes of communication, whereas today, there are many more efficient and cost-effective applications such as Skype, Cisco WebEx, Citrix GoToMeeting, etc. which offer several options such as video, screen sharing, document sharing, and meeting recording facilities. As far as technology is concerned, it is important to keep it a level playing field.

For example, even if you have 4 members sitting in one office and the rest joining in from different parts of the world, make sure these 4 members log in using their individual computers. This way, the rest of the team who are not physically present in the room would not feel less important.

Time Zones

Navigating time zones is an inevitable issue when it comes to managing global projects. For example, it is a challenge to even fix a meeting that involves team members from the US, UK, India, and Australia. Scheduling a meeting at a time that is comfortable for all team members who are in four different time zones is a herculean task. Additionally, the different daylight savings slots in different countries complicate it further.

The project manager could use a meeting planner and ensure that the meeting is scheduled at a time that is comfortable for everyone in the team. For example, you could schedule a meeting for 4 pm in London which is 8.30 pm in Bangalore and 8 am in San Francisco. This time slot would work for everyone. Furthermore, before you schedule the meeting, ensure that the team members are comfortable with the time slots and have the necessary equipment to be a part of the meeting if they are dialing in from their home.

Project initiatives and requests can originate either in head office or the business units

Decision to implement: each project request or initiative is examined against a set of criteria (scorecard) to determine whether it is suitable for global or local implementation. This decision is made jointly by the head office and representatives of the units, who examine the extent to which the project is aligned with the corporate strategy, its ability to succeed on a global basis (review of needs in the business units), the amount of implementation resources available, etc. The project is then rated and inter-unit collaboration initiated.

Planning processes: global projects are planned at head office. The requirements of the local units are ascertained and the scope of the project is mapped according to core and business unit activity.

Core activity includes definition and implementation of the solution which constitutes the greatest common denominator for all the business units. For example: the core activity in a global system integration project will include the system specifications and development based on the requirements common to all the local units.

After implementation of the core activity, individual projects are executed in each of the units.

This distinction eliminates rework. The joint, global portion of the project only needs to be executed once and is followed by simultaneous implementation of individual local projects in the business units.

Multi-year work planning: the strength of an organization lies in its ability to forecast and plan the project portfolio one to three years in advance. Advance planning allows resources and budgets to be prepared at both a global level (collaboration between the head office and the business units) and locally, in each of the individual units.

Implementation and controls: the people executing a global program are the key to its successful implementation. The good relations and regular communication between them can counteract any partitions, conflicts of interest or politics inside the organization. It is important that the project management team is deployed to reflect the project structure, including a local project manager for both the core activity and each local project. These then report to the manager of the global program, who collates and synchronizes all information. The program projects can either be managed sequentially or concurrently, depending on the nature of the project and the availability of resources. Defining clear-cut areas of responsibility and organizational structure supports the efficient management of individual processes, retains knowledge and professionalism, streamlines communication between the head office and the business units and ensures that resources are utilized throughout the organization.

Closure: the closure of a global program is important for two main reasons. When projects are conducted on a sequential basis, clear closure of each project makes overall management of the program easier to monitor. Secondly, closure is used to tie up loose ends and learn lessons for the future.

Project management is challenging at the best of times and managing international projects only compounds these complexities and increases these challenges, some of the challenges and global issues of international project management that will need to be considered will differ greatly depending on the countries your project will involve.

Differing Standards

The problem with standards in a global sense and very much so in international project management is that they are not standard. Standards differ from country to country and consideration will need to be given as to which standards will be used will multiple standards be required. Some key areas of consideration are:

• Political & Legal Systems
• Accounting Standards
• Quality Standards and Unit Of Measure
• Language Barriers
• Time Zone Changes
• Economic Conditions

Cultural Differences

Of these international project management challenges, one of the most difficult to provide a framework of understanding is the cultural differences of each country, while some countries are well aligned, others can be completely different in their cultural and social norms, an obvious example of this is the differences between western countries like Australia or America and Asian Countries such as China and Japan. These differences can greatly impact international projects and require a specific international project management approach to solve these challenges of international projects.

If a project manager was delivering an international project across multiple countries and did not consider these social and cultural differences, it would be difficult to gain buy-in, support and the project would be carrying significant risks of failure, or significant costs to recover. These are the additional considerations and risks that must be managed with international project management and if you are involved in an international project then I urge you to consider the cultural differences and how they might impact your project. A great tool and ideal starting point is Hofstede’s Cultural Dimensions model.

Hofstede Cultural Dimensions

Hofstede identified 5 key areas of cultural differences and called these the 5 cultural dimensions or 5-D model, the model allows you to compare any 2 or more countries with each other and quickly shows what cultural differences exist, which are aligned and which are uniquely different, each of the 5 categories below are scored on a scale of 0 to 120.

• Power Distance
• Individualism
• Masculinity
• Uncertainty Avoidance
• Long-Term Orientation

Power distance is that gap between equality and the acceptance of the distribution of power. A flat management structure would be seen as having a low Power Distance as their is greater enfaces on equality. In an international project management environment in a country of high Power Distance you might only engage with the most senior of stakeholders and everyone else would not be privy to the project or engaged in the process.

Individualism

Measures the importance of personal achievements and needs against the needs of the group. In a culture of high individualism it might be necessary to engage closer with key personnel and allow the to provide more input and take ownership of certain parts of the project while recognising their individual skills and achievements.

Masculinity

Masculinity vs femininity is the score that measures a country’s need for competitiveness and the importance for male and female roles. In a country with high masculinity a male project manager might face less resistance than a female or at lease do not blur the boundary with male and female roles.

Uncertainty Avoidance

This is the degree as to which country’s are more acceptance of being flexible and accepting of uncertainty, scores of high Uncertainty Avoidance will generally suggest lots of rules and well documented procedures. These country’s will struggle with the uncertainty of change and may required longer times and additional costs to ensure change is managed effectively.

Long Term Orientation

Measures the preference of the long term horizon over the short term. Long Term Orientation is seen more commonly in Asian countries with their Confucius background, countries with high Long Term Orientation may see little value in the importance of sticking to short term deadlines and milestones.

International Project Management And Cultural Dimensions

The application of Hofstede’s 5-D model was originally used for International Business and Marketing applications, because it is quite effective in understanding a country’s cultural differences and social norms and gaining insights into the subtle differences and needs of different cultures, we can quickly see the value in its application in international project management, particular from an engagement perspective.

International Project Management Uses For Cultural Dimensions

The model could be used to select the most aligned countries when evaluating and considering which countries should be involved in the project, for example if you are embarking on an international change project, it might be unwise to start with a country with a high Uncertainty Avoidance score, it might make your life as an international project manager easier and the project more successful to start in a country that is open and embraces change. Then move in some senior managers to the countries with high Uncertainty Avoidance to show confidence in the change project.

But quite often, you may not have the luxury of selecting which countries will be part of the project, in this situation analysing the country’s cultural dimensions will give you great insight into how best to manage within these culture for the greatest change of success.

From an international project management perspective, lets consider an international project that includes Australia and China. A quick comparison using the 5-D model highlights the areas of close alignment and the areas of stark difference.

Close Alignment – We can see quite quickly that the Masculinity of both country’s are pretty close, masculinity is slightly more important in China than Australia, but not by much. We can infer that both country’s consider masculinity slightly important and it is probably wise to not lead with talking about your feelings and it is safe to say that males would dominate the workforce and generally competitive in nature.

Reasonable Variances – It is also clear that Uncertainty Avoidance scores differ, but not but a great amount. Interestingly we note that China has a lower score and is less concerned with uncertainty. This might suggest that there are slightly more informal business rules, possibly based more on personal relationships and in the case of China short term changes are of less concern as long as the long term strategy is the key focus. It might be wise to relate how the changes this project will help to enable the long term goals.

Key Differences

The graph highlights the key differences between to two countries being Power Distance, Individualism and Long Term Orientation with widely opposing scores. These high variances suggest these cultural differences are complete opposites between the two countries and careful consideration will need to be given as to how to effectively manage these if the project is to be successful.

Power Distance

On inspection of the graph we can see that the Power Distance between China and Australia differs considerably and that China has a much higher score for Power Distance than Australia. This usually means that Chinese company’s respect seniority and their is a strong hierarchal management chain. This is quite the opposite to Australia, with many flat management styles that empowers individuals to make decisions and work autonomously.

If you are faced with this at an international project management level it might be necessary to show respect to their management and don’t expect too much involvement from the employees down the line, even if they are directly effected by the project. Project Meetings will often be closed door and it is important that the Project Manager is equally seen to have a great deal of power and respect.

Individualism

Another key differentiator between Australia and China in our international project is the level of Individualism of the 2 countries. Again these are polar opposites and each country will require a different management style to effectively engage with the project stakeholders.

In Australia, we can see a high level of Individualism, which might suggest that many team members will want to voice their opinions and have their thoughts considered in the project. They are more likely to require praise and acknowledgement for good work and a more self centred approach to work.

The opposite will be true for China, where collectivism is more important that the individual and this might mean that closer consideration needs to be given to tradition and implement change slower with a focus on the group benefits. Engage with elders in the group and respect their wisdom.

Long Term Orientation

The Long Term Orientation scores of these comparison country’s are greatly different and completely opposite and will require equally differing approaches to our international project management approach.

In Australia with their short term orientation will be looking for short term wins with rapid change expected. They would expect equality and project managers should lead by example. There will be the constant focus on the next reporting period which is usually monthly and quarterly financial reporting.

However in China their high Long Term Orientation will show more respect to their elders and an expectation that project managers are well educated with years of experience. The focus will be maintained on long term strategies (often years into the future) over short term wins. The secret is commitment and a respect for tradition and respecting age as well as position in both society and business.

HR in MNCs

HRM is a strategic function concerned with recruitment, training and development, performance appraisal, communication and labor relations. HR policies guide the various functions of HRM. The need for a particular type of HRM is determined by the need for standardization or adaptation. Managing human resources in an international context is more complex than in a domestic set up because of the many differences between headquarters and the subsidiaries. The HR policies of certain companies seem to discriminate on the basis of religion, race, caste, sex or nationality. Companies like Ford and Volvo, however, strive to maintain equality in work and pay.

Staffing is an important aspect of HRM. The staffing policies of MNCs are determined by their approach to globalization. MNCs with an ethnocentric approach fill all top management positions with home country nationals to ensure that home country practices are replicated in subsidiaries. Companies that adopt a polycentric approach to globalization, fill all senior management positions with local nationals to ensure maximum adaptation to local conditions. Companies that adopt a geocentric approach to globalization, identify managers irrespective of their nationality for various international assignments to ensure that best practices are identified and replicated in all the units of the organization. Managers belonging to a particular country and working in another country are called expatriates. The selection, training, period of stay abroad, compensation and repatriation of expatriates are delicate issues that have to be managed by the HR department. On their repatriation, they must be provided suitable challenging assignments that give them the autonomy they have become accustomed to. Since maintaining expatriate managers is expensive, a company must develop local talent.

Companies can identify and develop local talent through in-house Management Development Programs (MDP). These programs will help improve the coordination between employees with diverse cultural, religious and educational backgrounds. Performance appraisal is another activity where there can be differences of opinion between headquarters and subsidiaries.

Subsidiary managers must be involved in setting of unambiguous targets and the establishment of criteria for measuring performance. Performance Management attempts to link performance appraisal to employee training and development, and possibly to compensation. There are three theories concerning the autonomy of subsidiaries in decision-making.

They are: limited autonomy, variable autonomy and negotiated autonomy. According to the theory of limited autonomy, the degree of autonomy will depend on the MNC’s approach to globalization. The theory of variable autonomy states that the degree of autonomy varies with the degree of internationalization of the company.

Companies that adopt an export strategy can afford to have centralized decision-making, whereas strategic business units (SBUs) will require decentralized decision-making. According to the theory of negotiated autonomy, the degree of autonomy of a subsidiary will depend on its ability to negotiate with headquarters.

HRM plays an important role in maintaining harmonious industrial relations. Companies are often intimidated by the strength of the union and the political support it enjoys. Certain companies like Volvo ensure cordial relations with the labor union by actively participating in their development. But certain other companies, like Bata have had frequent labor relations problems in India.

Roles & responsibilities are as follows:

Professional Development: Building up the employees professionally by enrolling them into conferences, seminars etc.

Training: To help new hires get acquainted with the company and also the company to get to know their employee well.

Appraisals: HR work just don’t stop at hiring employees but also their timely performance analysis and promotion appraisals. HR also needs to motivate their employees.

Resolving Conflicts: The HR should be available at the disposal of the conflicting parties and hear out their issues without being judgmental.

Maintaining Work Culture: It’s the one the most important responsibility of the HR that is to maintain a healthy and happy environment within the company. The company employees should be able to freely communicate and voice their opinions in the professional yet happy environment.

ome of the most common challenges multinational companies are facing in terms of HR management include:

Cultural Divide: Main goal of HR management in multinational companies is to build global employee community with unique company culture and values. This can be tricky because diverse languages, cultures and customs can hinder the alignment of HR policies in different company branches.

HR Disconnect: Multinational companies need to implement the same policies and procedures on recruiting, hiring, benefits and compensation in all of their branches and business units across the globe.

Legal compliance: Every country has its own labor law and HR department of each foreign subsidiary needs to fully align company policies with it.

Industrial Relations in MNCs

Managing human resources effectively in companies that do business globally requires cultural awareness and the ability to respond quickly in dynamic environments. Human resource professionals typically handle the recruiting, interviewing, hiring, training and developing of employees that businesses need to achieve their business goals.

They also establish the policies and procedures designed to ensure a fair, safe and productive work facility. Managing individuals in international settings requires motivating and inspiring employees to work collaboratively, even when they don’t reside in the same location.

Fostering Global Collaboration

As companies become more international, human resource professionals have become more generalist. They tend to know less about day-to-day, internal operations and focus more on ensuring personnel work effectively together as teams. They care about competitive advantage, profitability and economic survival during tough financial times.

Their role may have been restricted to hiring employees, managing benefits and handling disciplinary action in the past, but human resource professionals now deal with controlling health care costs, reducing employee attrition and participating in the community, as well.

One major difference between domestic and international HRM is the need to address different countries’ labor laws. Another is to be sensitive to cultural issues that might not seem like a big deal to workers in one country, but might easily offend employees in another.

Working with Managers

Years ago, human resource professionals in traditional small business settings focused on completing administrative tasks, such as recruiting and hiring personnel, often without input from department managers.

As companies become more global, human resource professionals act as business partners to interview and orient new employees to the workplace. A complex business operation typically requires specialized personnel, so human resource professionals must work cooperatively with managers on the production lines.

Providing Ongoing Training

Human resource professionals working for multinational companies can maintain a productive environment by ensuring that an internationally diverse employee pool has the skills and knowledge to work together, explains Strategy + Business magazine. They make arrangements for training courses that enable employees to get the proper credentials for performing their function. This also ensures that companies adhere to all government regulations.

For example, all companies must be certain that employees follow the standards for that assure a safe and healthy workplace setting. In Europe, work councils composed of both employers and employees might mandate training not covered by other trade union agreements.

Building and Managing Teams

Human resource professionals who support international business operations typically must to ensure that diverse teams work well together, explains the Society for Human Resource Management. By conducting team-building workshops, promoting acceptance of cultural diversity and motivating employees to achieve strategic goals, they help their company build strong teams.

By recognizing that in some countries individual recognition plays a larger role than others, human resource professionals can create awareness about how teams can function effectively across borders to maintain company profitability.

A virtual organization is a temporary or permanent collection of geographically dispersed individuals, groups, organizational units, or entire organizations that depend on electronic linking in order to complete the production process. Virtual organizations do not represent a firm’s attribute but can be considered as a different organizational form and carries out the objectives of cyber diplomacy.

Unfortunately, it is quite hard to find a precise and fixed definition of fundamental notions such as virtual organization or virtual company. The term virtual organization ensued from the phrase “Virtual reality”, whose purpose is to look like reality by using electronic sounds and images. The term virtual organization implies the novel and innovative relationships between organizations and individuals. Technology and globalization both support this particular type of organization.

Virtual can be defined as “not physically existing as such but made by software to appear to do so”, in other words “Unreal but looking real“. This definition precisely outlines the leading principle of this unconventional organization, which holds the form of a real (conventional) corporation from the outside but does not actually exist physically and implicates an entirely digital process relying on independents web associates. Thus, virtual organizations are centred on technology and position physical presence in the background. Virtual organizations possess limited physical resources as value is added through (mobile) knowledge rather than (immovable) equipment.

Virtual organizations necessitate associations, federations, relations, agreements and alliance relationships as they essentially are partnership webs of disseminated organizational entities or self-governing corporations.

Planning, recruitment, development, maintenance, retention, and socialisation are the common HR issues that ensure right HR tor right job. These also control and regulate the antecedent conditions of performance. Virtual organisations are staffed by highly proficient workers who are left to do their own things and produce highly competitive products or services.

Jobs in virtual organisations being knowledge-based are assumed to require greater skills, have greater variety and offer better quality of working life (QWL). From HR point of view, virtual organisation has both sides of the coin. The one (positive) side is greater job autonomy and more financial stability, which are the most sought-after things by the workers in any organisation. This is so because of the reduced commuting, lunches and the clothing costs.

The employee selection is a very crucial area in virtual organisation. The reason being people have to work in a virtual set up. Hence, there are certain requirements need to be met to work in virtual organisations.

The important ones are:

• Self-guided and motivated because employees are left to ‘do their own thing’
• Knowledgeable about the organisational procedures
• An effective communicator
• Adaptable
• Familiarity with the job
• Result-oriented

Features of Virtual Organization

Information is power. The absence of information and knowledge renders virtual teams to emas­culate and ineffective. Information technology, i.e., seamless web electronic communication media does not allow happening this and keeps the organisation going. According to Pattanayak, following are the salient features of virtual organisations:

Technology:

New technology has transformed the traditional ways of working. In particular, the worlds of computing and telephony are coming together to open up a whole new range of responsi­bilities. Computer Telephony Integrations (CTI) will usher in a new revolution to the desktop. The CTI has traditionally been used in all call centre applications.

E-mail Integration:

Integrating Short Message Service (SMS) into the existing e-mail infrastruc­ture allows the whole organisation to take advantages of SMS products such as ‘Express Way’.

Office System Integration:

SMS technology can greatly enhance the existing or new office systems, e. g., phone messages can be sent via SMS rather than returning it in a message book.

Voice Mail Alert:

SMS technology added to the existing voice mail system builds an effective method of receiving voice mail alerts.

Mobile Data:

This enables a laptop to retrieve information anywhere through the mobile phone network. Mobile data communications revolutionize where and how work is done. In the past, corpo­rate information has been inaccessible from many places where it is needed. One’s ability to link laptop to mobile phone keeps one connected to his/her virtual organisation from anywhere.

Advantage:

Virtual organisations offer the following advantages:

1. It saves time, travel expenses and eliminates lack of access to experts.
2. Virtual teams can be organised whether or not members are in reasonable proximity to each other.
3. Use of outside experts without incurring expenses for travel, logging and downtime.
4. Dynamic team membership allows people to move from one project to another.
5. Employee can be assigned to multiple, concurrent teams.
6. Teams’ communication and work reports are available online to facilitate swift responses to the demands of the (global) market.
7. Employees can accommodate both personal and professional lives.
8. Virtual teams allow firms to expand their potential labour markets enabling them to hire and retain the best people regardless of their physical locations.

Disadvantages:

1. The lack of physical interactions with its associated verbal and non-verbal cues and also the synergies that often accompany face-to-face interaction
2. Non-availability of paraverbal and non-verbal cues such as voice, eye movement, facial expression, and body language which help in better communication.
3. Ability to work even if the virtual teams are miles apart and the members have never or rarely met each other face-to-face.

But the fact remains that despite these drawbacks; virtual organisations have become a reality and are growing in popularity. By now, several successful cases of virtual organisations abound in our country. It is the explicitly designed ‘Group Ware’, computer based system to support virtual groups, enables the virtual organisations to work in order to achieve a common goal.

The term GLOBAL ETHIC refers to a set of common moral values and ethical standards which are shared by the different faiths and cultures on Earth.

These common moral values and ethical standards constitute a humane ethic, or, the ethic of humanity. In view of the process of globalization this ethic of humanity has been termed by the famous Roman Catholic theologian and philosopher Professor Hans Küng as the “GLOBAL ETHIC”.

Although the concept of a GLOBAL ETHIC was at first introduced by Professor Hans Küng in 1989 it is, in his own words, “not a new invention but only a new discovery” of common principles which are as old as humankind.

There can be no doubt that a globalizing world with its tremendous social, ecological and moral problems needs a globalization of moral values and ethical standards, in short: a GLOBAL ETHIC, in order to survive as a place where our grandchildren and great-grandchildren can live a decent life.

In fact, already now and in the past quite a big number of fellow human beings all over the world have not been able to live a life in dignity, exactly because human beings have been unable to follow the most basic rules of humane coexistence which our religious and non-religious traditions have provided for since thousands of years.

The GLOBAL ETHIC is not a new religion but a set of common moral values and ethical standards which are shared by all faiths and belief systems. Without a basic consensus over ethics any society is threatened sooner or later by chaos or a dictatorship. Therefore, there can be no sustainable world order without a GLOBAL ETHIC.

In the words of Professor Hans Küng “the GLOBAL ETHIC means neither a global ideology, nor a single unified global religion transcending all existing religions, nor a mixture of all religions. Humanity is weary of unified ideologies, and in any case the religions of the world are so different in their views of faith and ‘dogmas’, their symbols and rites, that a ‘Unification’ of them would be meaningless, a distasteful syncretistic cocktail.”

Just as people look to history to understand political, technical, and social changes, so too do they look for changes in thinking and philosophy. There is a history to how thinking has evolved over time. What may or may not have been acceptable just a hundred years ago may be very different today from how people present themselves and how they act and interact to customs, values, and beliefs.

Ethics can be defined as a system of moral standards or values. Cultural beliefs and programming influence our values. A sense of ethics is determined by a number of social, cultural, and religious factors; this sense influences us beginning early in childhood. People are taught how to behave by their families, exposure to education and thinking, and the society in which they live. Ethical behavior also refers to behavior that is generally accepted within a specific culture. Some behaviors are universally accepted for example, people shouldn’t physically hurt other people. Other actions are less clear, such as discrimination based on age, race, gender, or ethnicity.

Culture impacts how local values influence global business ethics. There are differences in how much importance cultures place on specific ethical behaviors. For example, bribery remains widespread in many countries, and while people may not approve of it, they accept it as a necessity of daily life. Each professional is influenced by the values, social programming, and experiences encountered from childhood on. These collective factors impact how a person perceives an issue and the related correct or incorrect behaviors. Even within a specific culture, individuals have different ideas of what constitutes ethical or unethical behavior. Judgments may differ greatly depending on an individual’s social or economic standing, education, and experiences with other cultures and beliefs. Just as in the example of bribery, it should be noted that there is a difference between ethical behavior and normal practice. It may be acceptable to discriminate in certain cultures, even if the people in that society know that it is not right or fair. In global business ethics, people try to understand what the ethical action is and what the normal practice might be. If these are not consistent, the focus is placed on how to encourage ethical actions.

While it’s clear that ethics is not religion, values based on religious teachings have influenced our understanding of ethical behavior. Given the influence of Western thought and philosophy over the world in the last few centuries, many would say that global business has been heavily impacted by the mode of thinking that began with the Reformation and post-Enlightenment values, which placed focus on equality and individual rights. In this mode of thinking, it has become accepted that all people in any country and of any background are equal and should have equal opportunity. Companies incorporate this principle in their employment, management, and operational guidelines; yet enforcing it in global operations can be both tricky and inconsistent.

Though many experts believe that co-located teams still work best, most feel that virtual teams can be successful if they are formed, trained and managed correctly. Team members must be able to communicate well and work independently. They also should possess a good work ethic, initiative and creativity. Employees who are stimulated by interaction with other people or who need external structure to stay on track may be unsuccessful in a virtual environment without training and acclimation.

Employees’ training needs can be hard to assess, because any struggles they have taken place behind the scenes. For task-related skills training, managers must encourage team members to make their needs known.

Five areas of training that are especially useful for virtual team members:

• Understanding the technology infrastructure.
• Using technology tools.
• Collaborating effectively in a work group.
• Conducting virtual meetings.
• Planning and managing tasks.

Team Challenges

Communication represents a tremendous problem for virtual teams. Davidson says that managers have to give more support and positive messages when they’re working virtually. “The written word can be so much more harsh than the spoken word; even a critique needs to be phrased positively,” she says.

Another challenge arises when team members cross time zones: The window of opportunity for contacting each other can diminish. These delays may frustrate team members who can’t proceed without an answer from a colleague.

Technology and cooperation can resolve many of these problems, but team members have to work hard to overcome the gaps left by their inability to communicate face-to-face.

Managers Are Key

Worthy points out that when companies use virtual teams, they can take advantage of “just-in-time” talent. Companies can bring together people “from wherever they are to wherever they need to be, almost instantly,” he says.

The downside to this flexibility is that team members with vastly differing levels of trust, expectations, experiences, cultures and personalities can clash. Managers must hold the team together and keep members motivated, but they face significant challenges of their own.

Besides having to think through and formalize almost every aspect of communicating, socializing, team building and productivity, managers must often change their management style. Many initially feel discomfort when they can no longer keep tabs on an employee’s progress with cubicle visits or by asking questions during a coffee break.

Process

Communication Is the Key

When you are interacting on calls or via chat or emails, it means that you need to draft a detailed communication plan with clearly-defined steps to ensure the free flow of accurate information across the team.

• Hire talent with excellent communication skills: To gauge one’s communication skills, you can hold several rounds of interviews using different mediums. You can conduct a writing test (which can be conducted on email), a telephonic round where you can judge a person’s speaking and listening skills, and a face-to-face interview (which can be conducted on Skype if the need be).
• Provide Regular Updates: To foster a culture of communication, give updates to your team on a regular basis and review what each member has done providing them feedback and suggestions on a timely basis.
• Write down Detailed Communication Guidelines: In the cross-cultural communication (where workers are culturally diverse and are working across different time zones), the biggest challenges are ambiguity in communication, language barriers and time barriers. These guidelines should clearly outline which kind of messages should be sent through which mediums and how one will respond to them.

In cases where non-native speakers are a part of your team, you might want to suggest that people should avoid using slang or colloquial language in verbal or written communication.

Build an Appropriate Tech Arsenal: Virtual teams run on technology. You need to define tools your team will use for:

• Chatting (such as Google Hangouts or Skype)
• Project management (such as Trello)
• Web and video conference (such as Skype and Google Meet)
• Collaboration (such as Adobe XD)
• Workflow automation (such as Microsoft Flow)
• Scheduling (such as Doodle)

You can employ these tools on a trial basis and determine which of them work best. Once you have decided on a set of tools, it is time to train your staff to use all these tools efficiently and effectively.

Building Trust in Virtual Offices

Employees and managers can only work towards a shared vision or goal when they trust each other. Teambuilding exercises onsite is a common HR practice. Virtually, it can be done through:

• Establish a Mission Statement: Millennial and mavericks in the workforce are more likely to work for mission-driven organizations. It means that you need to show how you as an organization and as an industry are working for the greater good of humanity. You may ask your workforce to donate to chosen charities, volunteer for the cause wherever they are, and contribute in any way they can. You can discuss these efforts in the team news bulletins as a cohesion effort.
• Define Clear Goals and establish Accountability of each Individual: While this is obvious, many startups and small businesses fail to define clear job roles for each person on the team. In the case of remote workers, it is imperative that each person should know what he or she needs to do, by when and how it will affect the team’s performance. They should also know who they need to report to avoid any confusion. Regular video conferences and review meetings can also help develop familiarity among the team members.

Track Employee Performance

In a virtual environment, where people often work on a flexi-hours basis, it is not possible for a manager to track the number of hours each person has worked. In such a case, the performance of a person can be judged by the quantity and quality of work done by an individual.

Tools like Toggle or Harvest can be used by the members of virtual teams to track the number of hours they have worked on a project. This also makes it easier for a business to quote the number of hours to a client while generating their invoice.

In most organizations, 20 percent of the knowledge workers generate 80 percent of the knowledge. Those who generate and disseminate knowledge do so for the benefit of everyone in the organization, yet they are only rewarded if the knowledge is used. Without sufficient incentives over time, knowledge providers have less reason to generate knowledge. Moreover, unless knowledge contribution incentives are in place, people may hoard such knowledge and use it as a source of power within or against the organization.

Some HRMSs manage compensation and incentive schemes, such as annual bonuses and merit increases. Many of these incentives, however, do not account for whether an employee has contributed ideas or insights; they measure how well employees perform their jobs rather than how much they contribute to the firm’s knowledge. To properly encourage knowledge contributions, organizations must realign incentive schemes to accurately account for these vital contributions.

Organizations constantly change. Employees may seek more lucrative or more secure jobs, while organizations downsize or rightsize to reduce cost and meet numbers. In the middle of all this commotion, employees may decide to withhold their knowledge and take such insights when they leave at the expense of the organization. The most effective way to thwart this situation is to establish a knowledge market.

Knowledge Marketplace

An internal knowledge market is a place within an organization where individuals can buy and sell knowledge. It facilitates and motivates employees to share information while contributing to a climate for organizational knowledge exchange. A market mechanism provides various options for pricing knowledge, which can be used to reward employees. Such markets can be deployed over corporate intranet portals and linked to an HRMS.

Knowledge creation is only the beginning. The next issue is deciding where this knowledge should reside. How is knowledge moved from creators/producers to seekers/consumers? This problem is challenging because organizations reorganize perpetually through downsizing, rightsizing, outsourcing, and mergers and acquisitions. Hence, people with requisite knowledge get moved around or taken out of the organization; others with new knowledge enter the organization. Reorganization modifies job duties and departments, while downsizing and outsourcing may cause an organization to lose valuable tacit knowledge that stored within the minds of those removed from the organization.

Again, HRMSs can help cultivate this knowledge. These systems have internal directories or databases with phone numbers, e-mail addresses and other information for staff. Adding several extensions will help identify knowledge providers and sources, creating a knowledge map. While these mechanisms have been implemented in big consulting firms, their diffusion to the rest of the marketplace has been slow.

All it takes to implement such a knowledge map is to add two more fields to the existing employee database: one for areas of expertise and one for modes of communication. Then individuals can use the database to find expertise.

Employees have multiple means of communication. Moreover, not all employees are located in one area. Hence, while knowing who has the requisite knowledge is important, knowing how to get in touch with such individuals is critical. Within this system, employees can provide their preferred communication medium for knowledge exchange, along with alternatives.

The development of this database has a secondary benefit when it comes to the development of knowledge replenishment and training programs.

Knowledge Evaluation and Training

Over time, old knowledge can become a burden to the organization. Too much knowledge might institutionalize practices and make organizational change more difficult. Unless old knowledge is purged and deleted, individuals may not be ready to generate new ideas or adapt to new knowledge and thoughts. Hence, the constant evaluation of one’s stock and replenishment through training programs and/or hiring new personnel will be an important part of knowledge management.

The knowledge market discussed earlier incorporates a price mechanism that is suitable for knowledge evaluation. For example, in Fujitsu’s FIND2 system, knowledge not frequently accessed will be priced lower than other items and eventually will be deleted. Knowledge used frequently will be priced appropriately and appreciated.

Once an organization successfully eliminates junk or useless knowledge, it will need to replenish knowledge. Knowledge maps, if successfully updated in a timely fashion, might help an organization provide the right training to the right employees. The distribution map of expertise pinpoints whom or which unit or department has more expertise in valued knowledge domains. To fill gaps and discrepancies in expertise distribution, effective job rotation programs could be devised. Moreover, the organization could look at areas where employees may need to seek training to develop more skills.

Knowledge Protection

Since knowledge is a valuable resource that makes an organization competitive, it must be protected. To preserve the value of any asset, one needs to conduct routine maintenance activities. Protection and destruction practices safeguard organizational knowledge. Knowledge with strategic importance must be protected from planned and unplanned depletion. Planned depletion includes the loss of knowledge from personnel downsizing, mergers and acquisitions, and voluntary movement of personnel.

In such cases, an organization must have mechanisms to capture and retain knowledge. One common method is the use of exit interviews that capture individuals’ job-performance knowledge before they leave an organization. Another popular defense mechanism is debriefings after missions. Debriefings capture tacit insights gained and make them available to the rest of the organization.

While these activities are widely conducted in organizations, they could be improved with technology. With developments in video imaging, bandwidth and storage media, such debriefings could be electronically recorded for ease of dissemination. Moreover, they need not only happen when an employee leaves an organization; they could occur on a routine basis to capture the unstated insights of employees. These extractions could take the form of on-the-job supervision and recording of activities, so that new employees can learn from recordings. Most experts cannot articulate well how they perform their tasks. Such mechanisms will go a long way in helping newcomers learn by protecting such knowledge in its true form.

Unplanned depletion of knowledge can occur through human actions such as theft, knowledge leaks and intelligence activities from competitors, and through natural events such as earthquakes, floods and tornadoes that may damage organizational premises. Adequate security, backup and control mechanisms need to be in place to prevent such sabotages and to recover from natural disasters. Protection capabilities must be adequate to secure both tacit and explicit forms of knowledge.

Protecting explicit documents is a function of traditional security mechanisms such as passwords on documents and secured access to corporate property. These precautions fall under the realm of efforts associated with traditional disaster recovery and crisis planning. Securing tacit knowledge is much more difficult. One must ensure that employees are bound by non-disclosure agreements and background checks, and that they are trained appropriately.

Features:

New Technology

Businesses of all sizes continue to adopt cloud-based applications that are simplifying HR knowledge management.

For example, it is now possible to procure tools that automate the onboarding of new starters: add them to your system and they will send an automated chain of emails that gathers, processes and stores signed documents. Simple, automated knowledge management.

For existing employees, there is a range of self-service knowledge base tools to choose from. Think of knowledge bases as libraries. It’s where your company policies and information go to get organised into easily digestible content. These self-service libraries give your staff the information they need when they need it and are used for all sorts of things: holiday allowances, policies, training and more.

Collaborative culture

Collaborative software and instant messaging platforms make it easy for people to share both explicit and tacit information in real time. This helps not only to improve collaboration but also to disseminate time sensitive information on a grand scale.

According to Slack’s Future of Work study, 91% of workers are interested in feeling closer to their colleagues. By gathering, organizing, and sharing tacit knowledge with the right tools at work, you can provide an environment where people can establish more meaningful relationships. The result is increased trust between team members and a more satisfied and productive team overall.

Spend Less Time Recreating Existing Knowledge

Time is valuable, why spend it answering the same questions over and over or digging up a document you’ve already created. Without a centralized repository that employees can access, that’s exactly what happens to most HR teams. Worse, an HR employee may recreate a document that already exists because they don’t know about it or can’t find it. While that happening once might not be a big deal, unnecessarily creating documents, policies, etc. repeatedly is a waste of valuable HR resources.

Transparency

According to a Gallup study, employees who have high confidence in their organization’s financial future are nine times as likely to be engaged in their jobs compared with those who have lower confidence.

Similarly, a lack of transparency in how knowledge is shared and used to make decisions often leads to gaps in employee knowledge. It also chokes off opportunities for growth and innovation. If everyone is on the same page, they can work together to improve the organization’s explicit and tacit knowledge bases.

But, with proper investment in knowledge management systems, it will become increasingly easier for businesses to disseminate information throughout their workforces. Not just when it comes to company financials and strategies, but also with lessons learned.

Improve Onboarding New Employees

Employee onboarding can make or break a new employee’s experience. Onboarding packets are helpful, but they’re easily misplaced and cumbersome for HR to update. In the end, onboarding inefficiencies can cost more than $250,000 annually for an organization of 1,000, according to the Workplace Knowledge and Productivity Report. And as organizations grow, so does that cost.

Role-Based Access Control and Customizable Permissions

A major benefit of HR knowledge management is allowing employees to find and access the information they need without the assistance of HR. But if you make all information accessible to every employee, they can become overwhelmed or access information not meant for them. Implementing proper permissions and role-based access controls mitigates this issue. This is important from a practical business perspective in that not every employee should be able to see all of a company’s available HR documents, policies, and agreements. It also makes the HR knowledge management portal easier for employees to use by quickly surfacing exactly the information they need.

Before the internet and email, connecting with job seekers meant phone, face time or a letter. In the 21st century, it’s routine for companies to post openings online, and require job seekers to apply through an online applicant tracking system. That frees up a great deal of time that HR would have spent dealing with paper resumes or personal calls.

However, HR practices don’t always take into account how well the system works for the candidates. Online forms have a standardized format that often makes it hard to tell a star performer from a slacker. A badly designed system with confusing instructions and slow response times can actually turn job seekers off to applying with a firm.

Ease of Communication

With email, text and messaging apps it’s easier than ever for HR staff to stay in touch with the rest of the company. If a manager wants to share a new schedule with a project team, one email with an attachment or a conversation on Slack can share the word with a dozen people at once. There’s a risk of relying too much on tech as a time-saver though. Information in a two-page email may be better off delivered to the group face to face. That way everyone can ask questions and hear the answers.

Data Analysis of Employee Performance

Analyzing employee performance used to depend on personal assessments and obvious standards: Did the employee finish the task on time? Does their boss trust them?

Technology makes it easier to gather and break down data on employees to get an overall picture. Which tasks do they perform best? Do they meet all the goals from last year’s performance appraisal? If they fell short, was it by 12 percent, 50 percent or 75 percent? Software programs can even take over much of the work in evaluating employees.

Too Much Data

As HR makes more use of data collection and analysis, employees might feel their privacy shrinking. If, say, a company has security cameras that monitor employees every second, it can be easier to find the facts behind a harassment charge or someone drinking on the job. However, being constantly monitored can alienate employees as well. Good HR practices involve not only knowing how much data can be gathered but also how much should be gathered.

Another risk is that the HR department can end up getting more data than it can manage. After a certain point, wading through data to pick out the relevant material becomes an impossible task. It’s also possible that HR will misread data or make assumptions that a face-to-face conversation could clear up.

Security Practices

Securing employee records used to mean locking a file cabinet. In the 21st century, best HR practices have to include security for the digital data. Some security is more an IT matter, such as a good firewall. HR needs to have good policies in place, though, governing who can access confidential data, both hard copy and in electronic form.

Scope of IT in HRM

• Administration: All the basic data identified with the workforce, like their name, address, email, contact no., capability, compensation benefits, encounter, date of passage in organizations, employment status (contract, perpetual, full-time, low maintenance, and so on), are incorporated in a database that can be recovered at any time.
• Human Resource Planning: With the help of innovation construct databases, voluminous information about the employees can be stored, which not just aides in distinguishing the involved and vacant positions, additionally it also helps determining if the individual is the best fit or not.
• Recruitment: The web has brought on the biggest change to the enrollment procedure in the previous decade, as it connects the companies and the job seekers.
• Compensation and Benefits: The e-pay bundles offer straightforward, simple, precise and assessable data on the compensation structure of the employees.
• Training and Development: E-learning is a progressive approach to enable the workforce to keep pace with a quickly evolving market. By connecting the evaluation process to the HR database, the e-learning framework can be used effectively.

Challenges:

• Acknowledgment: Because of IT usage, different issues like skills/knowledge for its utilization, job dangers and so on dependably ascend in its direction. Acknowledgment from the workforce is required for using it up to its fullest.
• Fetched: “Technology pulls cost”. An innovation-based HR framework is expensive, but once executed, it decreases the operational expenses. Substantial organizations may introduce HR gateways/bundles, while small- to mid-size organizations find it difficult to bear the cost.
• Back-ups and Security: Maintenance cost is high if we need to prevent hacking/open to all arrangement/illegal acts. A lot of thought is required on these lines.
• Increasing Isolation: Due to the arrangement of virtual networks through intranet or eHR gateways, the individual collaboration among the representatives has reduced. In the traditional frameworks, they collaborate with the representatives, and were integral to the organization. They are disengaged from each other now, and are connected for all intents and purposes through such entryways only.

Opportunities:

• Accessibility: Data is accessible to everyone, through web or intranet. Any employee can get any information effortlessly HR entryways permit the representatives to get to all the required data at a transgression click.
• Competitive Advantage: Giving customized applications through HRM portals implies that e-HRM can be a key technique in innovation.
• Rapid and Mistake free exchanges: Technological innovations have expanded the pace of administration in organizations. Mechanical frameworks eliminate human errors.
• Interactive Atmosphere: Technology enhances interactions among the representatives through the electronic gateways. Bigger organizations have more data needs, and they can take more points of interest from these data. With mid-size organizations, it enables data spread over various structures and locations.

Increment in the utilization of data and analytic tools:

In the present the crucial factor of managing and recognizing the competitive situations related to business lifecycle is able with the collection, processing and analyzing of big data. To gain the increasing competitive edge the companies must use analytics to gain data-driven insights into the workforce trends and engage to achieve refine recruitment, performance incentives, and compensation to arrange the evolving interests and goals of the employees. At this instant data can be pulled from a firm’s HR tech systems. Predictive algorithms are used and applied to make decisions to hire and manage the workforce. With this, the productivity could be increased and turnover could be decreased which is seen as a big win.

The greater focus on a significant tech trend is at the master data hr management trends. The analytics have seen a tremendous growth in the last few years but the master data management was not present. With being aware of analytics power the companies have also understood the need for standardization of data. Data cannot be rolled up and analytics cannot be performed if everyone does things differently.

Alteration in the rules of Overtime:

The rule is proposed to raise the minimum level of salary for the white-collar exemptions. Which could result in currently working 4.6 million exempt employees losing their exemption instantly. Rest of the 500,000 to one million exempt employees working currently could lose their status of exempt in the next ten years. This is due to the automatic increase in the threshold level of the salary.

Requirement of integrated workforce management system:

For establishments with or more than 50 full time or equivalent employees an Act has transformed which was once an annual enrollment event into the process of reporting and tracking the extensive data on a monthly basis. To meet the terms of the law various workers in Finance, Tax, Legal, IT and HR who didn’t share data may now need to incorporate to help avoid expensive penalties. It will be a challenge to gather the required data from the multiple systems. Owing to this it will become more significant that a business considers an integrated management solution for human capital. Changing the tech support models in the HR organization would be a great help.

The HR could take it to greater level with the support of IT and Tech support. Employers still use separate payroll, benefits administration and HR systems for management and applicant tracking which might be appropriate for some organization but there is some disadvantages and integration seems difficult. The employers are choosing single system for several work. Moving to single vendor who could provide all areas of HR technology solution in a single integration.

Priority- Engagement of the employee:

Gradually most of the firms are focusing on driving better performance by improving the engagement of the employee. According to the research by Gallup the establishment’s success financially such as profitability, productivity and customer engagement is strongly connected to employee engagement which leads to essential outcome from business. The midsized companies require revenue, growth and innovation to thrive which could be derived from the engaged employees. According to a study, the larger midsized companies with 150 to 999 employees quoted three talent related reasons to find out the decline in the growth. Out of which 23 percent were the disengaged employees, 18 percent were employees unable to attract qualified talent and 17 percent were the employee unable to retain key talent.

Organizations big concern in the last few years is to find and keep the great talent. Employees with the ability to perform with technology would help in development of the workforce. Organizations look for methods to engage different employee demographics due to shifting workforces. Engaged employee with knowledge of Technology could be a great help. Integrated systems to stand-alone systems there are various solutions available to match the requirements of the talent in a company.

Merging of Business:

As for the HR trend of the year the Merging of the business would continue and the situation will continue to stay challenging for most of the industries. More and more challenges will be raising for the organization with Generation y on one hand and affectivity and effectiveness of the HR paired with analytics on the other hand. Becoming the most attractive employer for the future workforce would not be easy.

Remaking performance reviews:

The hr management trends performance review is to better understanding of changes that needs to be done to improve the ability to perform. The most trending topic is remaking performance reviews which include dropping rate of performance several companies have already implemented this tactic. Some are directing it in their firm. While few are abolishing individual bonus. Many of the companies in some times have done interesting things to improve their performance.

More Millennial:

While much of the workforce in the organization consists of the retiring generation Z on the other end the growth of millennial workforce is indicated. According to research approximately, half of the global workforce would be Millennia’s by 20202. While in some companies, the majority is already millennial. The organization that wants to hold and attract fresh talent would have to recruit the unit of digital natives. As this generation is a tech trend it is also important to ensure that their journey right from the hiring phase to on-boarding is supported on social and mobile platforms.

Development in the human side of the business:

In the present vibrant business setting most organization have the ability to flourish but are instead struggling since they don’t tap into their complete potential or empower people. The success was driven by structure, process and encouraging employees to function like a machine. These approach needs to be changed the success in the future would need the industry to work more on the human side of the business. People have evolved to deal with uncertainty by the means of cooperation, collaboration and utilizing the conflicts in a productive manner. It is essential that business encourages their employee to grow mindsets equipped towards conversation, connection and experimentation. Curiosity is a must, we need to question constantly whether we are performing things simply as that is how it has been done always and acquire new perspective to recognize potential better solutions.

The clarity of role and accountability is maintained with the help of various departments and reporting lines. Apart from it, they also create artificial obstacles that block progress. Consolidating people into silos with similar skills and function supports the pattern that is needed to solve simple as well as complex problems. However, it discourages them from working with people from other department or separate from business. It does not inspire to have any kind of conversation that would help to solve the major issues that are faced currently. The perspective of viewing fear and failure needs to be redefined by the businesses. Most of us allow fear to control us. One could eliminate it by taking back the control and looking behind the curtains created by our fear that is enacted by ourselves. With more integration, fewer silos and risks success becomes quite easy.

Cloud remains in the projection:

Human Resource Management moving to the cloud is hardly new concept. However, it is still in its early stage of adaptation. Almost every major HR software dealer is offering or planning to offer its solution in the cloud form. Cloud computing provides faster updates, increased flexibility, innovation and decrease in the cost. The HR managers could be in relief who deal with the expense of upgrading the system each year and downtime. As it will now be done by the vendor automatically. Oracle, ADP, Workday, SAP, Ultimate Software and Info are included in the Core HR solutions on the cloud along with other solutions.

Going Mobile:

The using of the mobile app within Human Resource Management is still in its initial stage. However, with the appearance of more cloud-based apps and SaaS approach, things are changing. The Millennial employees have great expectancy in this area. The growing use of mobile apps will ease the administrative burden on HR and will considerably develop the usage of self-service. People involved with digital means apply for jobs through the help of mobile devices. To attract the talents from Generation X the employer needs to offer hiring and valuable information for mobile devices. Vendors are stepping up with attractive interfaces and mobile games and improving the ease of use. More vendors will be witnessed taking out their system from the mobile version of their system to mobile apps because apps tend easy navigation, provide more functionality and are visually attractive. The Mobile apps are advantageous despite it apps pose major data privacy issues for eg: local laws can put serious restrictions on using mobile apps for employee data.

Understanding the working environment and contributing to the success of the organization is the main role of the HR Management Trends professional. Following the latest trends of the Human Resource management will help the organization to thrive amongst other competitive industries. Apart from following the trend, it is vital that significant changes in the method of Human resource management are modified from time to time. The modern up to date techniques will not only be beneficial but also will be less stressful. It aids in selecting the talented workforce for the business. Simply by following the significant HR Management Trends would help the organization to maintain their hold in the industry.

Operating human resources across geographic and cultural boundaries can often prove difficult for small-business owners and managers. Nonetheless, with the widespread use of technology, the ability to communicate with anyone around the world and access to new and varied markets, international HR issues are important to grasp.

Compliance and International HRM Issues

As businesses begin to expand into the global marketplace or as they hire employees from diverse geographic and cultural backgrounds, they may have to adapt to new labor laws and tax liabilities. Doing business in Europe, for example, will require the business to pay value added tax. Hiring employees who are non-naturalized US citizens might require HR to apply for work visas and report economic data to the federal government. Compliance with international law can be an issue for the under-educated business owner or HR manager, because these laws tend to be complex and sometimes difficult to implement. Keeping well-informed of the legal requirements for the business’s operations can help alleviate some of this complexity and lessen the chances of landing in legal trouble.

Scope of Human Resource Management

With an increasing number of busineses operating on an international scale, the impact of globalization on hr can be tricky to navigate. Globalization means various laws, cultures and norms have to be taken into consideration when onboarding and crafting HR regulations. Some countries are more forward thinking where gender is concerned than others, and this distinction can lead to misunderstandings or worse, the loss of key personnel. It really would not be that hard to have a male manager handle the day-to-day operations in an area where female managers are frowned upon, just in case. Understanding the mechanism that makes each culture tick and implementing as little or as much needed so create balance is something to strive for.

Cultural Diversity and Global HR Issues

A salient issue in international HR is understanding and maintaining cultural diversity. Working with people from different locations or from different cultural backgrounds mean adapting the business’s work style to new ideas, new ways of communicating and unfamiliar social practices. If you hire an employee from England, for example, the employee might have different ideas about how to manage employees or on how to run technology processes based on her experiences back home. Being open to new work styles and cultural differences is the hallmark of cultural diversity in HR.

Benefits and Compensation

Benefits and compensation are the backbone of any HR strategy, but in international HR, benefits and compensation are even more important in focusing on the work-life balance of employees. The idea behind work-life balance is to provide employees with programs and initiatives that improve both their personal and professional lives. This is considered part of international HR, because many multinational companies have already implemented programs such as flexible working time, paternity leave, extended holidays and on-site childcare. In fact, many nations around the world, including much of Europe, mandate these programs by law. Implementing them on the local scale is one of the challenges and, ultimately, rewards of international HR.

Training and Development

Related to the idea of benefits and compensation in international HR are training and professional development programs. Training programs typically encompass in-house seminars and meetings designed to give employees on-the-job knowledge of skills that are important to doing business globally. HR might offer language classes, for example. Professional development encompasses the “extra” training that HR provides to its employees, such as allowing them to attend networking events and conferences, global training seminars and other specific competency-based programs. Professional development helps employees to hone their skills in global marketing, international business development and finance trends.

Offshoring is simply the process of getting work done in another country. You take an activity and move to an offshore location, but that activity is still completely managed within your company, so you control the outcomes.

Offshoring is the process of relocating a business or business process to another country in order to benefit from reduced labour costs or a more beneficial regulatory environment. A range of processes are commonly offshored, including manufacturing, IT, customer service and research & development.

Offshoring is controversial for a number of reasons, including reducing the economic benefits to the home country and the number of jobs available to locals, and potential exploitation concerns over mass employment of cheaper labour in the destination country. Service levels of companies offshoring customer service may also be affected, often due to the culturally-driven mismatch in expectations that can occur.

A related term is re-shoring or backshoring, which means bringing back a business process from an offshore location to the original country of operation.

Importance

Business Growth

Offshoring allows you to reduce one of the most expensive parts of your business, the labour costs. Freeing this up will allow you to reinvest funds into your business and give you the opportunity to expand your offerings and service. Essentially working on your business rather than in your business.

Higher productivity

Companies can achieve higher productivity by taking advantage of having a different time zone. The decision to offshore effectively allows an organization to have work conducted at all hours of the day and night. It also gives an organization the opportunity to support its customers when they need it and fulfill their ever-changing and on-demand needs. This high degree of customer support may result in a greater customer experience and a more loyal customer base.

Control

Many businesses may not want to relinquish control of part of their operations and production to an external party. Offshoring allows you to have dedicated staff to work for your company only. You provide the direction, train the staff and everything is done the way you want it to, which leads to accountability internal of the business.

Reduced Risk

To have multiple teams in different countries helps to reduce your risk, provide a greater marketing opportunity and allows you to support your clients when they need it.

Lower labor costs

Offshoring allows businesses to pay less for labor-intensive processes such as manufacturing, round-the-clock customer support, information technology development and coding. Depending on the particular country selected for offshoring, significant savings can come from reduced labor costs.

Access to Staff

This model gives you access to a young and vast pool of talent. In particular to English speaking foreign countries, who are highly skilled and university educated. With the current pressure to find employees with the right skillset in already developed countries, implementing offshore teams will complement the existing staff. The wide skill availability for knowledge-based processes through offshoring becomes an advantage for any business looking to fulfil specific requirements.

Greater Availability

Having a different time zone and a workforce ready for 24×7 operation gives you an outstanding opportunity to support your clients when they need it and fulfil their ever-changing needs. This results in a better level of service and a higher level of customer experience with quicker and direct contact to your business. Increasing the competitive edge in your industry.

Lower tax obligations

Countries in which offshored labor is utilized are often looking for ways to incentivize companies to enter into their geography and establish operations and hire local workers as a boon to their local economy. To do so, a lower tax rate for doing business is offered to help offset the costs to a company for setting up those operations.

Off Shoring and HRM in India

Favorable government policies:

Information technology is considered as one among the top industries in India. With the release of “IT acts 2000” bill, India has been rated as an excellent investment potential destination of the world. Through this act, the Indian government has been playing a major role in providing tax-related and other benefits, along with recognizing the electronic contracts, barring cyber crime and supporting the e-filing of documents.

Time zone advantage:

Many of US and Europe companies prefer to implement a follow-the-sun model and leverage the benefits of time zone difference. India, being strategically located in mid longitudes, could unhesitatingly serve both the western world and the eastern world around the clock, 365 days a year. In this way, India could support the businesses in those counterparts, by saving their time, cost and by reducing their time-to-market.

Indian Advantage:

There are various advantages that India could offer for the outsourcer Cost effective services, English language advantage, access to the highly skilled pool of professionals, etc. More than 20 companies in India have attained the CMMI level. 65% of CMMI level 5 companies in the world are located in India alone. India even has the highest level of ISO-9000 software organizations.

Extended support and maintenance:

The Indian offshore software development companies offer complete support, maintenance, and post-launch services once the project is up and running. They help in fixing the bugs and keeping it updated.

English Language Advantage:

Being ruled by Britishers for almost two decades, India has attained a deep-rooted connection with the English language. In the present days, English is spoken, read and understood with ease by most of the Indians. Hence, it enables better communication and understanding between the offshorer and the Indian software developments teams. This facilitates smooth workflow.

Availability of more capital funds:

Offshoring of the software development and technical support to India could reduce the need to invest in non-core business competencies, thereby increasing the availability of capital funds for important core business functions.

Availability of State-of-art technology:

Being aware and keeping up with the cutting edge technology is a need of the day. In case of an in-house team, the companies need to spend time and money on employing the latest technology and training the personnel to get a competitive edge on others. By offshoring the same responsibilities to the best in the field companies, the outsourcer could be assured of receiving efficient services and the latest technological expertise.

Peace of mind and more focus on core competencies:

Offshoring the software development and technical support to the companies that are best in the field could provide peace of mind and let the offshorer focus on the core business activities.

Access to Talented human resource:

An efficient software application development needs financial resources as well as a skilled workforce. Indian outsourcee companies could afford these talented pools of professionals who are well equipped and highly trained for any given project.

Timely Delivery:

Indian outsourcing companies are renowned for having a congruous plan for the project even before they start it. Hence, it is delivered on time as per the planning. The agile process plays a role in the timely delivery of the project.

Clear communication:

Indian IT outsourcing companies have gained the reputation to remain in constant communication with the outsourcer. The progress of the project would be regularly updated to the outsourcer through the phone calls or Skype or emails. This would offer the outsourcer as well as outsourcee absolute contentment and peace of mind.

Other Advantages:

• Regardless of the succession of government coalitions, the focus of Indian government continues to be on liberalizing certain markets which are beneficial to outsourcers.
• Availability of young and highly qualified technical professionals.
• India is a land of almost 400 universities and 1500 research institutes. The country produces 200,000 engineer graduates and 9000 doctoral graduates every year.
• Excellent knowledge and command on the English language.