Case study. What are the issues with Yalia’s expat mobility approach?

CASE STUDY: YALIA
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Case Study: Yalia
1 What are the issues with Yalia’s expat mobility approach? What measures should they introduce to improve their program?
Issues
Jian faces a crisis in the overseas operations as a human resource director. A senior level employee is threatening to leave if the company does not raise his compensation plan. This problem arises when Kewen (an employee based in Dubai) visits Ryan’s home. Yalia acquired Cloudies and there are inconsistencies in the companies’ package policies. Cloudies has a more transparent and comprehensive compensation plan while Yalia has an unpdated one. This causes problems. When Kewen demands for an increase in his housing money, it is evident that there is no proper policy which guides such cases. Another problem arises when Kewen is informed about a new assignment which he had no expertise making him to question the role of HR in supporting overseas employees. This gives Kewen a leverage to negotiate for his compensation package. However, the major issue with Yalia’s case revolves around the company’s ineffective international human resource strategy. Although, the key issue is with the compensation package, there are other issues such as the procedure of sending experts to overseas assignments. There are major issues with job design, recruitment and selection, training and development as well as appraisals of overseas assignees.
First, there is a mismatch in Kewen’s abilities and the nature of the new responsibilities. The company does not consider whether an employee’s expertise match with the new assignments and determine if they need to be trained. There is also the issue of adapting to the new culture. The company does not train or prepare their overseas assignees towards the new culture. This demonstrates a flaw in the company’s training program. Finally, the management is a problem since it is not ready to review its mobility compensation policy. Hong Liu, holds that overseas assignees should be given what they want and does not want to listen to Jing’s insights and advice.
Measures
The first measure Yalia should take is to rewrite its mobility compensation policy where it should introduce more incentives such as education, transportation, hardship allowances as well as mobility premiums. The current program does not clearly define the duration of overseas assignments; therefore, the new policy should define this to provide guidelines for compensations. For instance, if the duration of the assignment is longer, the assignees should be provided with more generous assignments. The new policy should also provide for training of the expatriates before they are assigned to foreign assignments. Additionally, the policy should provide a clear process of recruitment and selection before assigning employees foreign responsibilities.
Another measure is to standardise the compensation packages between the two companies (Hu, 2018). Yalia should adopt Cloudies’ policy due to its comprehensiveness and has proved to be effective in years. This will help Yalia develop a detailed policy that will clearly define the responsibilities of everyone to enable the company retain the necessary talent for achieving its strategic objectives. The policy should provide a clear decision making process to avoid misunderstandings between the management.
Additionally, the human resource team should revise its HR strategies to accommodate overseas expatriates. Revising the HR strategies will enable the department to fully address the needs of their expatriates especially in mobility and training packages. With the revision of the HR strategies, the company will demonstrate its concern about overseas employees.
2 In light of the information provided by Cloudies and AIRINC, what should Jing do to improve Kewen’s package and why?
There is more to overseas assignees’ compensation plan than just addressing the relocation expenses and adding few incentives to baseline salaries as Kewen demands. In the management of a mobile global workforce, to fully address the complexity of the compensation landscape requires the HR directors to consider all the compensation approaches and revising the mobility policies (Nazir, Shah and Zaman, 2014). In itself, it is a daunting task.
To fully address Kewen’s concern without facing any legal issues, Jing needs to educate Kewen on the basis used to develop the compensation plan. Secondly, since Kewen is comparing his compensation plan against that of Ryan, Jing should explain to him the reasons behind Ryan getting a better compensation plan. This will enable Kewen make informed decisions when demanding for an increased compensation. However, in order to improve Kewen’s package, Jing should consider the following:
Cost-of-living allowances
First, Jing should talk to Kewen about moving his family to stay with him in Dubai. However to do this, Kewen has to convince his wife to resign from her teaching job and move to Dubai. Kewen has been complaining about his family staying a...