09 Nov How Global Mobility Managers Can Manage through Difficult Times
What adjustments will global mobility managers and human resources professionals need for 2021 as COVID-19 still rages on? Undergoing Crisis Communications Training is a good fresh start that a company can do for their recruiting teams.
Established PR agencies provide this holistic training to the top companies in the world. It’s also called media training, not that global mobility professionals will be your face for the company but in the event that they are caught in the crossfire of controversies, they’ll need to be prepared to know how to respond accordingly. It’s not about being prepared to lie, but knowing how to respond with the best interest of everyone involved. Panic can cause conflicting accounts.
To cite an example, an employee or assignee who accidentally leaks a product before its launch date can prove to be disastrous. As the recruiter, how would you handle this if you’re going to speak for the employee? If the employee is the one who is going to be interviewed, how do you prepare him or her for such a nerve-racking situation?
Does the company have someone to face a media backlash? Training people not to panic when a dozen cameras are clicking away in front of them is imperative, especially in the world of judgmental social media.
90-day sprints as opposed to 90-day project plans
Beyond training them for worse-case scenarios, companies also have to make some adjustments or alterations in their HR policies. They need to be more nimble and consider if long-term 90-day project plans will need to be adhered to or if it can simply do a 90-day sprint.
Remote work may become the new normal for a vast majority of employees, but it’s still largely an experiment, a work in progress. HR companies will need to have instituted definitive guidelines for different scenarios. How would HR deal with an employee who is requesting the company to pay 30% of their electricity bills? What seems petty may not be so petty, after all.
Working from home may bring about a change in your assignee’s mood. Having more time alone may result in having less engaged employees, for instance.
Nothing is more important perhaps than making sure companies have employee wellness programs? The year 2019 was stressful for most employees who either had too much work or not much of it to worry about their future. This may be the companies’ priority for 2021. Ensuring mental health can only result in positive actions and productive work.
To avoid the latter, global mobility professionals must find a way to present the challenges of 2020 and what their assignees can look forward to in 2021. If companies and global mobility professionals can be transparent, they will need to be open to scrutiny.
Reviewing employee benefits
Reviewing employee benefits need to be on the table as well. Can they access these benefits from home, for instance? HR will need to know how to keep the morale and productivity of their employees.
Employees must be able to rely on their global mobility professional or HR to support them. Some talent recruiters may think their job is done after placing their hires, but the current crisis has many trying to figure out their place in the company or workplace, especially if they came from another country.
Companies need to sit down with their HR people to determine how to move forward with their assignees, especially talents from abroad who may be feeling uneasy, if they can stay in their job in what to them is still a foreign country with its own set of rules.
The year 2020 was all about putting out fires and that could take a toll on anyone. For those who need to check how they’ve done so far and what else they can do to cope in the pandemic era, here are some tips from SHRM:
- Embrace depersonalization. HR is experiencing some professional burnout, so it’s vital for employees to understand that they cannot rile up against people they recruit. Still, giving some private space for yourself in your own quiet time can help you cope with the times.
- Protect your psyche. Leaders are said to often strive to build up defense mechanisms against attacks, but barbs that come directly at you may prompt you to return them. Don’t do it. Let them offload their pain.
- Share vulnerabilities. Admitting to not knowing something too specific a problem can help HR bond with their assignees. It’s not easy to have or to pretend that talent managers have all the answers in the world.