Whether you work for a small business or a large enterprise, there’s a good chance your business is connected to a global network. For HR professionals, that can come with some big challenges, from needing to understand how labor laws apply across borders to developing cross-cultural communication competencies.
If that sounds familiar, you’re definitely not alone.
Deloitte found in a study that 81 percent of respondents thought global HR and talent management was “urgent,” and an “important” trend for large businesses.
Here’s how to make sure your skills are ready to keep pace.
Develop Your Cross-Cultural Communication Skills
When your company is going global, being able to communicate with people from other backgrounds and cultures is paramount. How we interact with one another is so driven by cultural understandings that it’s important to know how to do it well.
Cross-cultural communication means understanding perspectives, implications and even
body language from a different culture. The communication aspect is about letting go of an ethnocentric way of thinking and shifting to understand that people are raised in different ways, in different contexts. In a global setting, you’ll need to be an expert in this skill.
One way to do this is to educate yourself, explains
Matt Burns, the founder and CEO of
Global HR Collective in Vancouver, Canada. He says empathy goes a long way when it comes to understanding people from different backgrounds and from different regions.
“I regularly book conversations with other HR professionals around the world,” Burns says. He uses platforms like LinkedIn to get connected. “I try to get different perspectives on different topics all the time.”
These conversations allow him to understand local ways of doing business that help him improve how he works on a global level with a variety of people. “We all have common problems,” he says, but through learning how different cultures deal with them, we can “learn new tricks and tips” for dealing with these issues.
Brush Up on Legal Differences
When developing these global skills, HR professionals have to know the labor laws in the countries they operate. As a department (and a company) you have to be sure you are complying with local standards. Of course, you’re not going to be able to learn every labor law on the books if your company is operating in several countries, but you have to build a network of people who do know the local laws.
It can, of course, be overwhelming, especially if your company is scaling. One way to minimize the stress of having to know everything about HR in every country is focusing on one region or location and going from there.
“You must have local alignment,” says
Maryanne Spotala, SPHR, founder and CEO of C3 Talent Strategies in New Jersey, “especially in HR for regulatory issues around compensation, engagement, and culture. You have to allow for and adapt to the local pieces.”
You need to have people, Spotala explains, that know the local laws that can then feed your HR strategy. Your need to understand that your HR strategy needs to have what Spotala says is a “boots-on-the-ground” approach. “Having [local] people involved in the process from the beginning … is absolutely a necessity.”
Think Locally, Work Locally
Deloitte’s global HR trends study indicates that to really build a robust global HR strategy, you’ll need to localize HR so “it can be customized for local markets.” In a way, this is just an offshoot of both cross-cultural communication and knowing labor laws: You have to align your HR strategy to the local context.
One way of doing this is to lean into that new network you’ve developed, something both Spotala and Burns recommend.
To get this local element to your global HR development, Deloitte recommends using HR tech that provides a global element to standards and frameworks. The research found that companies need empowerment that would lead to innovation in HR teams. Finally, make sure your organization is pushing HR’s “ability to drive business performance and growth.
Today, being part of a globalized world means that your HR strategy needs to have a global component. And that doesn’t have to be scary. In fact, it can be unifying.
“When people feel they belong and specifically to a large, global organization, even though you are in one part of the world,” Spotala says, “you want to believe that you belong to the broader community.”
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