When you’re tasked with hiring the best talent in a highly competitive marketplace, the pressure is on. Throw in overseas recruitment to the mix and the challenge intensifies!
However, there are strategies you can take to greatly improve your results – in terms of time to hire, cost to hire and quality outcomes. The experts at Seamless always recommend these steps to our clients:
1. Do your research
Do you know local labour laws, cultural practices and working practices in your target overseas market? Every country will have its own regulatory and cultural framework for hiring and these will have a significant impact on your approach and processes. Attention to compliance and local laws is your absolute starting point to avoid getting into legal disputes. Attention to cultural factors and customs is your next focus point to ensure you are operating in a way that is acceptable within your target market, and likely to attract local talent to your roles. Many businesses will work with a global services provider to get this initial insight right before beginning to implement an overseas recruitment strategy.
2. Embrace flexibility
Every forward-thinking business – profit and non-profit making – wants the best talent in the market. And those high-performers are particularly choosy about who they work for, and why. So offer mobility-friendly working solutions where necessary, such as short-term overseas placements, flexible and remote working and commuter-friendly policies. The more freedom you can offer with regards to the working environment, the broader and more diverse your talent pool will become (and the better your employer brand in the marketplace too.)
3. Be agile
When expanding overseas there will invariably be different routes and legal structures to consider. Many firms will test the market before they make a permanent commitment, ensuring that they can operate profitably and successfully before creating a foreign subsidiary. Depending on your country of operation and the nature of your business, there might be alternative solutions (for example, setting up an International Professional Employer Organisation that slashes expansion costs and reduces time to hire.) The Seamless team can offer advice and practical support to help you ascertain and set up the right approach for your objectives.
4. Consider partnerships
In-country expertise is vital before accessing a new market. Look to form local boards, work with experienced global services providers or partner with a local organisation to gain traction, build your reputation fast and target the right recruitment hubs and networks. Partnership arrangements give your business access to expertise and local knowledge and can help you to save time, reduce errors, gain rapid insight into the local operating environment and obtain fast credibility in a new market. It’s much easier to navigate an unfamiliar market with the right partner to help you.
5. Remember tax and compliance
You must have a tax advisor to cover your tax obligations fully and to structure your business in the best possible way. Equally, you must ensure you are compliant either all other employment-related laws and regulations – such as benefits, bonuses, taxes, employment agreements, disputes, termination and so forth. A global services / International PEO provider such as Seamless can ensure you are always on the right side of the law in your country of operation and take care of the services you need, such as payroll management, work permits and visas, remote recruitment and selection, onboarding, employee development and more.
6. Invest in the tech – and the process
You’ll need a good base of hardware and software before you begin overseas recruitment, especially if you need decision-makers at home to meet remotely with potential hires. Invest in this tech and provide the right experience to your candidates – who will be representing your employer brand and acting as advocates for you in the new market (local talent tends to network with another talent after all.) Invest too in the optimisation of your recruitment process and make it as seamless and slick as possible, with regular communication at every stage, the removal of any pinch-points and a highly digitised, efficient process which can be accessed via a smartphone (particularly important in Asian markets for example, where people are used to carrying out a far broader array of activities on their smartphones than individuals in the West).
Get the help you need
Seamless works with organisations of all sizes to help their expansion into global markets. With services that span strategy, insight and consultancy, delivery and support, governance and control and structure and planning, our trusted experts offer high-value, proven services that place our clients at the heart of everything we do.