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Summarize your thoughts on the problems at hand, alternative solutions and your strategy on how to proceed at the forthcoming meeting In this case, we are facing different problems. The biggest problem here is the expatriate’s expectation. In our case, Fred illustrates this problem. Fred is a reliable and Old employee of Texmark, he is a brilliant engineer. He is always ready and agrees to travel for his job (Scotland, Mexico, and India).
But “today Fred was angry and disappointed that an eighteen-month assignment in India had urned into a three-year assignment, and that a research position in Durham “promised” to him by a previous VP was filled by a younger Durham resident employee”. How far the training creative by Eric make effective (How to encourage employees to take course more seriously). The second problem in this case is the repatriation issue which is affecting the long-term strategy development of the companies’ expatriate issue.
In consequence the company is facing a hard time when it’s needed to be established and to be made as a global company. As the main part of the trategy is dependent upon repatriation policy, where the growing numbers of repatriates are not meaning fully responding the debriefing and career counseling sessions. The third problem in our case study is the issue of the cost and effectiveness of using repatriation. This issue should be approached in the future meeting. Juanita Roberton the Vice President for HR wanted costs cut and her delegates on the team would be pushing for streamlined (Eric had mentally translated that as cheaper) training programs, shorter expatriate assignments and a faster appointment of HCNs whenever is possible. Since the company is spending a significant figure in the expatriate training therefore the solution to this is essential. Moreover, we can find another issue, the development of Chinese operation.
Texmark need to expend his company in Asia but the expatriates are confronted by difficulty in the pre departure activity to the county. We are facing to an urgent need. We can resolve these different issues by solutions. To resolve the issue of expatriate’s expectation with Fred. The major problem in this situation is that Fred is extremely resistant to participate on training program and transfer his esponsibility to local egineers and his inability to work with the regulator. He can’t see the opportunities of the expatriate preparation for pre departure that Eric support.
But this program would be a good solution for reducing the problems occurred bythe departure. In this training employees can follow language courses, the company supports the families of the expatriate and they also offer cultural programs for the candidates. ) “From these pre- departure training programs, the employee and the family members would be exposed to factual information, such as the historical, political, and eligious factors and major cultural differences which can help them to have a better understanding of the destination country.
However, numerous studies indicate that lack of time prior to departure impedes the effectiveness of pre departure training and that training programs upon arrival are more effective. ” (Hyouane Min, Vincent P. Magnini, Manisha Singal, International Journal of Contemporay Hospitality Management : Perceived corporate training in investment as a driver of expatriate adjustment. : Emerald Group Publishing Limited. 201 3. Because of this situation it could be better that Eric ersonally supervising Fred and assigning him task with a limited dead line to each task. To solve the problem of the repatriation the company must care of his employees , for example each repatriate can be given a daily questionnaire that when the employee is at the assignment can fill it up further could write the daily difficulties faced in the assignment and suggestions to improve it.
Hence probably by this the company can overcome the loopholes in its policy and address the issue of expatriate for a fast global expansion of the company. Furthermore here the company uses the ethnocentric approach which suits or an international strategy, it creates global culture, and the transfer of core competencies are advantages of this strategy but this kind of strategy still expensive. As the company would like to reduce the costs of training and shorter the assignment, we think that polycentric staffing philosophy would suit better to the organization.
Polycentric management ‘ts an approach found in international firms where host-country nationals manage the subsidiaries. Decision-making is devolved to the subsidiaries, although head office in the parent country controls the overall business strategy. From this erspective, host-country nationals are considered important because they can bring local knowledge and understanding to the day-to-day operations of the subsidiary businesses. “(Heery, Edmund, and Mike Noon. “polycentric management. ” OxfordReference. 1 7 Nov. 2014. ).
This strategy means that the key positions re staffed by local managers, then the company could reduce its costs, and it also avoids the adjustment problems of expatriate managers and their families. Employing host country nationals eliminates language barrier and this strategy avoids the turnover of key managers that results from the thnocentric approach. The solution that can be suggested to the issue of Chinese Operation is to develop a regional center in Asia Pacific region as the main issue as can be understood is the cultural difficulties the expatriates are facing.
Hence the regional center can train the HCN for their respective countries and relocate them to China as well as India to carter the faster demand of the professionals in Asia as the companies main focal point for expansion is in Asia and through this the cultural difficulties can be overcome and Pre Departure Activity that are difficult for the TCN can be possible be handled ell by the regional center.
We enumerated the various problems which Eric is facing; we proposed our solutions and now we are going to explain our strategy for how to proceed at the forthcoming meeting. Firstly Eric can explain the counterparts the companies on going progress as of his current problems faced and the planning of the international assignments. Secondly Eric should ask the director and 4 members of executive career development for their concerns, requirement and Grievances.
If the cost cutting measures are emphasized by the meeting team and there by saving cost solution as suggested above could e suggested and hope fully convincing the meeting team. Beside the cost cutting measure the issue of repatriation that is a ‘problem’ as signaled by the management that can possible be resolved by the solution as suggested above can be discussed in the meeting. Thirdly Eric can brief the meeting team with Fred’s condition and the possible solution that could be resulted out in the meeting earlier that day. How will your proposal solve the problems you have defined? Firstly the problems such as dealing with Fred can be addressed as suggested above by Eric personally supervising Fred and assigning him task with a limited dead ine to each task. Hence this would allow Fred to be more accountable for each of tasks. The mistakes as done by Fred till now could be avoided as Fred was possibly unable to plan is objectives hence this would be a great beneficiary for him.
Secondly as the issue of global expansion of the company needs to be resolved for training of expatriates the policies dealing with the issue needs to be changed hence to get this in place Eric must solve the repatriation Issue that can be done by giving a daily questionnaire that when the employee is at the assignment can fill it up further could write the daily difficulties faced in he assignment and suggestions to improve it An expatriate needs attention and motivation of his company and his boss. Motivation is likely to be higher if the person has an interest in the specific host country culture as well as in an overseas experience. To be successful the expatriate must be willing to acquire new behavior patterns and attitudes. The most successful expatriates enjoy the challenge of forging their way through new situations and are comfortable networking and initiating new social contacts. These are also critical for the families of expatriates. Training for expatriates and their amilies is therefore as important as proper selection. ” ( Waggoner, Dena, and Betty Jane Punnett. Expatriates. ” Encyclopedia of Management. Ed. Marilyn M. Helms. 5th ed. Detroit: Gale, 2006. 274-276. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 1 7 Nov. 2014. ) Hence this would give the policy maker (Eric) greater knowledge of ongoing situation on ground and as policy can be designed more accurately to cut cost and possibly involving more TCN movements. Thirdly the issue of the Chinese operations where the language courses are a greater problem hence could be addressed by setting up an regional center an train the HCN for their respective countries and relocate them to China.
This would help better understanding in work culture and would resolve the issue as faced now by Eric. Fourthly the issue of cost cutting as a possible demand by Juanita Roberto can be addressed by removing the ‘Interviews and conversation’ from the pre departure activity as from the feedback its not providing any essential benefits to the expatriates and hence the cost can be cutted. “Regular feedback is essential in managing performance, but might be more difficult to provide when headquarters and subsidiaries are separated by time and istance.
Assigning a mentor at headquarters for each individual expatriate might go some way towards alleviating this problem. This mentor should preferably be someone who has international experience himself, so that he has an appreciation of the challenges involved in working in a different cultural context. Regular feedback would allow the organization to signal problems in the expatriate’s performance at an early stage and provide opportunities to improve this performance, hence preventing a potential expatriate failure.
Although more and more organizations realize that ross-cultural adjustment is crucial to effective performance and provide some predeparture cross-cultural training, training during the assignment is still relatively rare. ” (Anne-Wil Harzing, Claus Christensen. Expatriate failure: time to abandon the concept? Career Development International. : Emerald Group Publishing Limited. 20D4. ) 3) How can you defend your solution from budgetary concerns? In what way is your approach both a solution to the problems of expatriates at Tex-Mark and a good economic investment?
As the solution suggested to the problems above the issue of budget is addressed in the solution as the issue of Fred an be seen the solution suggested is to supervise Fred rather than replace him with an another professional because training a new professional would raise the budget secondly the issue of repatriation can be addressed by better feedback from the expatriates there by setting up policy for efficient training and ultimately cost cutting.
Thirdly the Chinese operation can be handled by setting up an regional center and there by sending an expatriate from Texas and training them with pre departure activities can be avoided there by again leading to lower budget. Fourthly the removal of ‘Interviews nd conversation’ can be a further budgetary measure. The approach as above can be justified as good solution to the problem of expatriates and a good economic investment in terms as it cuts cost and the approach in the case of Fred as can be seen is not to replace someone with him but rather it is to guide him.
The reason is for this approach is that the Fred is Old in the company and had a great experience in handling the situation as his first assignment to Scotland can be seen there for it’s a cost cutting measure by avoiding replacement and solving the problem of arranging a new expatriate. Further the solution of handling the Chinese peration can be seen the solution as to set up a regional operation center for training of HCN for that operation rather than sending the expats from San Antonio there by avoiding extra expenditure on training.
While the regional center can cater in better understanding of the culture unlike the culture clash before further the training in the region is feasible as family of the employ can stay at home and due to close proximity the employee can travel occasionally till the training ends there by saving cost for relocation.
Hence as seen above the solution suggested is the solution to the problems f expatriates at the Tex mark and a good economic investment. To conclude, we will say that: “expatriates and their partners are very positive towards formal training for expatriation. They believe that it helps them to make the adjustment to living and working in the host country.
Their belief is not significantly affected by the age at which they received the training, previous expatriate experience, the point at which they are asked for their responses, the destination (Other than a difference between underdeveloped and developed societies), or the type of organization for hich the expatriate works. The data captured by this survey suggests that the degree of influence exercised by the expatriate community may affect the difficulty with which expatriates and (possibly to a greater extent) their spouses adjust to the host environment.