HRM Challenges in the Age of Globalisation

S A R I P A T I Vol. 10 | No. 2 ISSN: 2089-6271 | e-ISSN: 2338-4565 | https://doi.org/10.21632/irjbs

Globalization has caused blurred international boundaries.On one hand, there is an open market for companies to seek talent on the other hand for employees a wide array of choices to work with, all because of globalization.But such types of open and globalized market exposes the firms to the challenges occurring in the prominent field of human resource.This paper is an attempt in understanding and analyzing the challenges existing and affecting the functioning of HRM while a company operates on global platform.The major encounters and worries of HR team, and the responses that HR managers need to make to such challenges with their increasing responsibilities in the globalized environment, have also been discussed in this paper.This is a communication and cross sectional study based on descriptive arguments and analytical logic developed through the responses received from HR teams of companies belonging to different sectors.Effective leadership, managing diverse workforce, role of technology in HR functions like recruitment and selection, legal and political aspects, skill management, global mindset are some of the jostling issues encountered by human resource function in the retro of globalization.

INTRODUCTION
HR strategies can pay more influential roles in global organizations than they have in the past.
Due to globalization, many organizations are moving towards HR strategies and practices that are global in nature.Global companies face a lot of differences in management style due to the differences in cultures across the globe.Global HRM is not a simple bundle of conventional functions like recruitment, promotion dovetailing work force responsibilities or ensuring satisfactory levels of wages and compensation.It calls for astute, psychological gambits and maneuvers.
Managers with cross cultural skills are essential for the effective management of global organizations.
Learning to manage cultural differences will help managers have a global outlook, which is the key factor for survival and growth of organizations in the global village (Kanna, 2013).

Research problem:
With an advent of globalization, it is observed that organizations are becoming increasingly global

Review of literature:
The full force of globalization has hit today's organizations, and it is clear that there are many cultural and human problems.International human resource management (IHRM) is being asked to better understand and develop multinational organizational leaders to meet the challenges.
A prominent solution that is receiving increased attention is the construct of global mindset (Story, Barbuto Jr.,Luthans & Bovaird, 2014).
Let us now define the globalization term, "if a firm or an organization expands its sales or production beyond the national boundaries, then its globalization," but it does not cover the real meaning of the term.It is much more than just crossing the boundaries of two regions.It is crossing the borders and accepting the local religion, tradition, values along with retaining own.Today we live in a global village, and this means that our activities have crossed the national boundaries to become the globalized country (Kapoor, 2011).where there are lists of benefits which can be provided by the companies, and employees need to selected particular number of benefits as per their wish (Kapoor, 2011).
Human Resource Management is undoubtedly the most crucial aspect of a business.A proper understanding of human resources practices is a vital prerequisite for the success of a business organization.In the ultimate any technology adopted by an organization will yield positive results only if and when human resources are efficiently and effectively utilized.Clearly, the prime challenge before HR managers lies in enhancing the skills and competency of the people in an organization so that they are equipped to ensure the efficient and productive utilization of the technology available to them (Harshwardhan, 2008).
The company is facing issues to balance between the employments laws of the home country and host country.Moreover, the culture and traditions must be maintained and followed in such a way which would respect different country laws.organizations (Friedman, 2007).

Objectives of the Study:
This

Analysis and Interpretation:
Based on the primary data collection, the summarized result of all the responses is given Table 1.Areas where HR faces challenges in the Age of Globalisatuon

RESULTS AND DISCUSSIONS
The overall analysis exhibits that the companies face skill management and managing diversity as two of the major challenges due to globalization where 25 to 30% are agreed with the fact, and 5 to 10% does not agree with it completely.Furthermore, the team finds it difficult to allocate the diversified resources at the right place.There are on an average 25% of the team members who agrees with the fact and rest 15% do not agree with it.They feel that if the companies have appropriate processes since the beginning, it won't affect them to the extent.

Area where HR faces challenges in the age of Globalization
Furthermore, the teams confirm that they need to cultivate new kind of leadership to imbibe the multicultural at the workplace without any regional clashes.There are more than 50% of the respondents who feel that traditional leadership won't work in the age of globalization.One of the major challenges for the HR is to prepare policies which abide by the culture and norms of all the nations.However, we can't completely change the policies, but we can be a little bit flexible about its implementation and execution.Whenever the HR team goes to the different nation for recruitment or selects any foreigner, it needs to check on the visa procedures at the macro level and also the overall scenario of the international relationship between the nations must be studied and keep in mind before taking any decision.
When asked whether the different country laws affect the organizational HR processes, they replied in positive agreement.In the international human resource recruitment and selection, the HR team needs to consider the respective country laws.However, the introduction of strategic

MANAGERIAL IMPLICATIONS
This study is conducted using qualitative and quantitative approaches as the researcher found it essential to use both approaches to achieve research objectives successfully.This study was conducted in the context of HR and globalization.
Globalization touches on many of the key assumptions about the term, the importance of the international flow of ideas and knowledge, the closer economic integration of countries through the increased flow of goods, services, capital and labour, and the cross-border movement of people (Tierney & Findlay, 2010).By taking into account the people this aspect of globalization paves a way to interlink the two terms HRM and Globalization or to assess the interdependence of both the terms.
The study intended to contribute to the existing research done on the topic or related topics and fill the academic gap that prevails towards recognizing the significant contribution of human The new practices must be innovative which would override the challenges prevailing in the field of HR.
figure:1) gives a quick over view of the recent forces that have increased expansion of firms into international markets, and the need for organizations to effectively manage human resources in order to and innovative.There are chances where HR managers would face few challenges while trying to build productive, cohesive workforces at the workplace.Now gathering diversified workforce at the single place would arise a question of culture, religions, traditions, norms and values.As a result, it is essential to address such challenges to sustain one's position in the industry and to remain competitive.It's the effective HR strategy that entails screening, training, pay and other human resource policies and practices, by using technology and other resources to encounter the challenges ascend due to globalization and its increasing pace.

Figure 1 .
Figure 1.Factors effecting HRM in international Markets (Source: Noe, R., Gerhart, B., Wright, P., & Eligh, L. (2016).Strategic human resource management: gaining a competitive Advantage.(2nd Canadian ed.).McGraw-Hill Ryerson Limited) Moreover, the corporate social responsibility is one of the tools for influencing the national public towards the brand.With adopting globalization and new technology, it was found out that company faces major issues in managing the change at the workplace (Employer strategies for responding to an aging workforce, 2012)."Globalization is a process that is drawing people together from all nations of the world into a single community linked by the vast network of communication technologies."Now, HR managers are having the worldwide market to find their required talent and there are number of employees in the queue.The social media and professional networking online have made the recruitment take easier than earlier.The company must ensure that the proper mix of personnel is recruited and maintained in the private space (Bradley, 2017).In the face of intense globalization, firms have a need to carve out sustainable competitive advantage for themselves, and SHRM is one of the ways.Globalization and Strategic Human Resource Management (SHRM) are worldwide phenomena that have shaped the faces of the corporate world predominantly.The global environment is indeed changing at an unprecedented pace and companies, headed by competent CEOs, must embark and embrace relevant strategies to achieve stalwart success (Soo, Halim & Keng-Howe, 2010).In the light of competition and the search for sources of competitive advantage, developing and managing human resources has increasingly become the focus of attention in some countries.The importance of human assets for success has been recognized and stressed in developed, as well as developing, countries (Quang, Heijden & Rowley, 2010).Globalization influences organizations that compete for customers with high expectations for performance, quality, and cost.Globalization also exerts pressure on the Human Resource Management (HRM) function to adapt to changing organizational needs and add greater value.As organizations globalize, cultural sensitivity and understanding is vital for HR managers to add value.Globalization increases the mix of cultures, languages, perspectives, as well as the number of expatriates.Effective HR managers must also develop business knowledge, HR content expertise, influence skills, and personal credibility (Brockbank and Ulrich 2003; Meisinger 2003; Ulrich et al. 1995).These skill and knowledge requirements become more salient in global article aims at developing the understanding of HRM challenges taking place in the present globalized business world.The primary objective of the research is to assess the several challenges existed in the field of HR due to globalization.With the help of primary and secondary data, different concerns of the HR team of five different companies could be analyzed.The secondary objective of the research is to recommend few actions as a part of conclusion which would help the company to face the challenges.The present study attempts to throw light on how different challenges are interlinked and contribute to operational efficiency of human resource function of companies belonging to different segments.This fact cannot be ignored that HRM faces more challenges due to increased responsibilities in the globalized environment to cater to international parameters of concerns like cultural differences, political and legal aspects etc.Therefore, the present study intends to analyze various such factors affecting the functioning of HRM while a company seeks to operate in the globalized environment.METHODS The research methodology is based on descriptive arguments, statistical data, and analytical logic developed through the understandings constructed on the responses received through questionnaire based survey and various research papers, reports, books, journals, newspapers, business magazines and online data bases.For this study a mix of qualitative and quantitative research methodology is used.To achieve the objective of the study the descriptive research design is adopted as it provides the sketch of the current situation and emphasis is on reporting what has been perceived.As far as method of data collection is considered it is an interrogation/ communication study where an attempt is made to collect the responses of the subjects through survey-questionnaire.A structured questionnaire was used to gather the primary data.The question set includes the list of predefined areas where most of the companies face difficulty to deal with.These pre-defined areas are taken into account built on the experience of researchers and pilot discussions with the HR teams of some companies.Along with primary data collection, secondary data driven information is also widely used.It is a cross-sectional study as it is carried out once and represents a snapshot of one point in time.The study occurred under actual environmental conditions i.e. the field settings which confirm that the responses of the respondents were gathered in their usual environment.The sample size of the study constitutes HR teams of five companies belonging to different segments like Banking, Oil and Gas, FMCG & Hotel industry in order to get opinion of diverse industries existing in the corporate world.The sample was chosen based on the convenience of the researcher to get access to HR teams of different companies and convince them to contribute to the undertaken study.The domain of the research was UAE as both the researchers currently belong to the same region of the world.To analyze the collected data, statistical tools like graphs, tables and frequency distribution are used.
below.The question includes the list of predefined areas where most of the companies face difficult to deal with.The feedbacks are taken from five HR teams on the given questionnaire and data are represented in form of tables and charts.It was observed that more than 70% of the teams find it difficult to deal with diversified cultural values and norms of the employees.It is more than impossible to consider each countries norm and design the policy.Hence, they have to study the core values and tradition in order to give maximum justice to the individuals.Then it comes to the political influence, where each and every country is having different political background and laws related to the international recruitment and visa processes.HR team has to go through the detail of each process before going for final recruitment or selection, which is again a daunting task.Furthermore, recruiting the number of employees from diversified culture bring changes in the management practices.The HR needs to entitle the new practices to equalize the interest of each employee in the company.It may bring a change in the existing operation, to manage that change is also a difficult task.It takes time in the initial stage to convince the existing employees.Moreover, it can be seen that the Human Resource team needs to provide extensive training to accept the change and implementing the new practices.It takes extra time other than actual productive work of an organization.The team needs to prepare an ideal retention strategy which would work with all employees.Because every individual would not concern only with the money, many of them would like to be with the organization for the profile, working environment and respect & recognition they get from their colleagues.Based on the given graph, it was found out that most of the companies find it difficult to manage the diverse work force with the existing leadership and policies.The HR team needs to show extra ordinary expertise to showcase the collaboration skills and manage the diversified talents.Effective leadership must be cultivated in order to manage the pool of employees effectively.
human resource management would consider all the aspects and analyze the picture at the macro level.As a result, HR would take an appropriate action which would serve the interest of overall organizational goals.Other than that, as per the findings "Priority of money and job in different countries, Recruitment via different portal and social media, Change Management, Compensation and Retention technique" also creates trouble for the HR processes of companies.

Figure 2 .
Figure 2. Areas where HR faces challenges due to Globalisatuon