This piece was originally featured on Re:Locate Magazine.
If someone asked you what an employee relocating abroad for work twenty years ago looked like – what would you visualize?Maybe a transnational company sending a long-time employee overseas with a lavish relocation package to live abroad for a year or more. This particular employee was granted a tough-to-come-by career opportunity and they were chosen for their special knowledge and needed expertise.
Much has changed since then and the professional expat no longer operates within one framework. Today, opportunities for professionals across all levels to gain “expat” status are in an upsurge. PwC reported in 2015 that 89 per cent of organizations plan to increase the number of mobile employees in the next two years.
Transformations in the workplace such as new employee demographics, technology innovation, the consumerization of HR, globalization and increased compliance, tax and immigration risk, have all contributed to the changing face of global mobility.
Today, the modern mobile employee looks more like a millennial professional moving from the US to Europe for a six-month assignment as a part of their company’s key strategy to attract, develop and retain top talent. The employee has a cost-effective package and also prefers a self-service approach to coordinating all logistics of their professional life on a mobile device, just like they do for their personal life.
On the other hand, what hasn’t transformed with the changing workplace is the way that companies and their talent mobility teams manage and engage with their mobile employees.
Companies today struggle to offer a great employee experience, while managing the costs, complexities and risks associated with an increasing level of mobility, especially as 56 per cent of companies are increasing their use of short-term assignments (Mercer).
According to our recent survey of mobility professionals, only 18 per cent stated that their current mobility program meets expectations. A dramatic increase in moves with more tax and immigration regulations puts all stakeholders at risk for a failed assignment and avoidable compliance costs.
This isn’t surprising considering that this is an area of HR that hasn’t evolved with the technology and software as a service (SaaS) revolution.
As companies scale globally, and relocating employees grows more common, it is certainly not less complicated. Managing mobility without technology is no longer sustainable and talent mobility professionals couldn’t agree more. Approximately, 80 per cent of mobility professionals indicate they need robust technology for better insights into global mobility (EY).
At MOVE Guides, we are the first cloud-technology platform for the talent mobility market and we see from our customers how mobility is at a tipping point for incredible transformation and we are excited to work alongside industry leaders to make this a reality.
Just this month, we announced a game-changing collaboration with Big Four consulting firm PwC, to integrate our Talent Mobility Cloud solution and services with PwC’s global mobility tax, immigration, consulting and compliance offerings
MOVE Guides will collaborate with PwC’s Global Mobility practice to provide customers with an end-to-end global mobility solution to support their mobile employee population. With our cost estimation tool and data analytics capabilities, companies can now bring talent mobility into mainstream HR strategy.
The integrated offering gives customers immigration, tax, consulting and relocation services underpinned by a single cloud based technology for the first time.
By integrating MOVE Guides’ technology platform with PwC’s data and best practices around tax and immigration, our combined solution can simplify and enhance global mobility management, services, and finances, while delivering a dramatically better experience to employees who are moving.
This is exactly the type of agile, connected and innovative approach to mobility that the 21st century organization needs for global success.
Now, when we visualize the new face of talent mobility, we know that companies and their employees are empowered with the software and consulting resources available for an excellent relocation experience.
Interested in learning more about how MOVE Guides and PwC can improve your talent mobility program? Feel free to reach out and visit our website for more information: www.moveguides.com.