Asbjørn Vollmer Jeppesen
Head of Legal
Table of Contents
What is global mobility?
Global mobility, often referred to as employee relocation, is an essential HR solution that enables companies to transfer employees across borders for various purposes. These transfers, can be short-term, long-term, or even permanent, depending on the organization’s needs.
Global mobility allows businesses to strategically relocate talent to achieve goals such as skill development, market expansion, and leadership growth.
Beyond simple relocation, global mobility is about navigating complex immigration, tax, and compliance regulations. It plays a critical role in for businesses wishing to expand globally, talent development, ensuring continuity across borders, and equipping businesses to thrive in the global market in general.
- Short-term assignments: Typically three to six months. Designed to address immediate needs such as filling temporary roles
- Long-term assignments: Typically from six to 36 months are often used for larger projects, leadership development, or opening new facilities.
- Permanent assignments: Involve a one-way relocation where the employee moves to a new country indefinitely to support long-term business goals.
An example of a Global Mobility solution
Let’s take a look at a real-world solution with one of our longstanding clients. Our client, a renowned danish equipment manufacturer in the wind industry, secured a contract to deliver and install their equipment on a wind farm in Canada. As their global mobility partner, we were tasked with deploying their engineer for two year period in full compliance.
The task consisted of:
- Obtaining correct work visa
- Complete access to project site
- Travel and accomodations
- Payroll administration
- Personal taxation on behalf of employee
- Company taxation on behalft of client
Each deployment comes with their own specific mobility challenges, but the above is often what a deployment task entails.
The challenges of global mobility
Global Mobility is complex and time consuming and a lot of companies might not have the right resources in-house to meet the issues:
Navigating each countries immigration laws requires time and the ability to understand the intricacies of obtaining visas, paying fees and completing application processes. If you are under a tight schedule the margin for error might be small and getting a rejection on your visa application means a time-consuming revamp of the entire application process.
Each country has its own labor laws regarding minimum wage, working hours, leave entitlements, termination procedures, and more. These must be carefully followed to avoid legal penalties.
Managing payroll in multiple countries requires adhering to local tax rates, deadlines, and reporting requirements, all of which can vary considerably. An employee working abroad might be subject to double taxation (in both home and host countries) unless treaties or tax equalization policies are in place.
Global mobility can quickly turn into bureaucratic challenge with a sea of red tape. However, it’s crucial not to lose sight of the human aspect amidst the paperwork. At its core, global mobility is about ensuring the well-being of employees as they transition into new environments. Providing support for their acclimation, both personally and professionally, is key to a successful relocation.
This is a task that lasts throughout the deployment and can be a more time-consuming process than you think. Maybe the assigned living quarters is not up to standard, maybe the rental car breaks down, maybe the employee can’t settle in with the new colleagues. This is real scenarios that you need to be ready to solve.
We assist our clients in achieving their project goals on time and within budget, by supplying them with specialized personnel
The importance of a global mobility framework
A well defined global mobility strategy is vital for companies looking to expand beyond borders.
Because of each country’s unique laws and requirements, you can never create a one size fits all strategy. However, you can create a general framework that contain the general logistical, legal and cultural challenges that come with employee relocation.
A clear and concise project description that contains the following info:
- Duration of assignment (short-term, long-term or permanent)?
- Country or countries in question
- Number of employeess
- Identify the key stakeholders (HR, management, legal, finance etc.)
Simplify global mobility with Plant Supervision
Deploying employees and navigating the intricate laws and regulations such as payroll, immigration, taxation, and logistics is a time-consuming process that takes time and ressources away from your primary business tasks. Partnering with us means alleviating you from the stress of the global mobility tasks.
At Plant Supervision, we have more than 30 years combined experience in global mobility, having deployed our own personnel as well as client employees to more than 60 countries worldwide. We offer flexibility in complex projects, meaning that we can tailor our solutions to fit your exact needs.
If you need a full-service partner to handle alle mobility tasks we have the resources and know how. If there are only parts of the deployment assignment you need assistance with, we can offer the exact service you need.
