Dear All
I have given this feedback to Mary and to Denis already but I wanted to make this a little more widely known.
I thought that we were doing a good job in assessing employee and family readiness for relocation, based on the facts that we had very few "failures" on assignments (i.e. people requesting to come back early).
Recently we have had two corporate HiPo`s that were being considered for an offer of a long-term assignment, and after listening to Dennis, I decided to test the SRI system with the two candidates. Both candidates had been previously spoken to in EDP discussion about potential for international assignments, and both had committed very strongly that they were ready to go, and that their family was also ready to go.
Both employees completed the online tool and as a follow-up were interviewed by SRI (employee and spouse done separately). The feedback that I have got from the employees is great. They are so appreciative that the support was given, and as a result both will be offered assignments, BUT neither one will go to the location that we were originally considering. One quote came back that it allowed the employee and spouse to talk very openly, and they came to an understanding of what was negotiable in relocation and what was a non-negotiable factor for the family. It was very important to get those things clarified in advance of the "pressure" of the new job offer.
Both appreciated having conversations with an external partner (SRI), as they felt that this was not compromising their career or their privacy (difficult to talk about some of these things with HR and leaders as they are the "company"). In both cases the spouses really appreciated the one-to-one conversation with SRI, and they felt that they had really been part of the decision as a result of this. Both employees’ commitment to the Company has increased as a result of this experience.
This has been a very positive experience for me, and I think that it is an important step to take when we consider the huge costs of getting an international assignment wrong … cost to the business, cost to relationships, and potential loss of employees to the Company as a result of this. I think that this service is additive to all the other things that we were previously doing in terms of expat selection / succession planning, but very worth it at 2,000 USD per employee.
Regards,
Nick …
HR Business Partner
London Office
