Global Talent Management: Key Elements, Strategies, and More

If your company has embraced remote work (or is considering it), you’re probably realizing that you’re no longer limited to a local talent pool. This is exciting, because it opens up a whole world of possibilities—but finding the right talent over such a vast area can feel daunting. If this sounds familiar, then you may need to develop a global talent management strategy.

What is global talent management?

Global talent management is your organization’s strategy for finding, utilizing the skills of, and retaining talent around the world. It’s an important step for any business—multinational corporation or otherwise—looking to improve how it sources international talent.

A good global talent management strategy can also deliver a sustained competitive advantage for businesses in industries that are experiencing localized talent shortages—or that are not yet fully embracing global talent.

Why is global talent management important?

Just as governments need different foreign affairs strategies for different countries, so do multinational corporations wanting to hire top talent. The recruiting, HR, and management strategies you use to acquire local high-performance talent may not be as effective when applied to a global workforce.

If you try to force it, you may find that you aren’t getting the right talent in different locations, or you’re having a hard time retaining workers. This can be due to a variety of factors, including:

• Lack of coordination between global recruiting teams
• Confusion about skills and attributes talent should have
• Different wants and needs of distributed remote workers vs. in-house, full-time teams
• Varied cultural norms and expectations around the world
• Difficulties in applying older, in-person training strategies to a newly remote workforce
• Loss of clarity around professional development and promotional paths

When you think about hiring and retaining talent from a global perspective, you can better address issues and craft policies that support the needs of varying teams and regions. As a result, you can find the right talent and retain them longer—no matter where they live.

How the global talent management process works

The global talent management process starts at the top, but should be adopted as a strategy by all key players in your organization. Ultimately, your global talent management strategy will look something like this:

1. Identify the type or volume of talent needed to support your overall business strategy or project goals.
2. Work with HR leaders in your organization to evaluate current processes and develop a new strategy for global recruiting and worker benefits.
3. Determine whether the process of sourcing and paying global talent is something your internal team is equipped to handle, or if you’d prefer to work with an outside partner. Be sure to also consider how you’ll support global team members’ growth.
4. If outside partners are preferred, vet possible options to find the best fit for your business needs.
5. Work with employment lawyers or employers of record to support compliance with local labor laws. Establish if there are any regions you cannot hire talent in, due to an inability to comply with specific regulations.
6. Begin recruiting high-potential human capital from the regions you’ve identified as viable hiring markets.
7. Train internal management teams on how they can best support the growth and development of global team members.
8. Place global talent in your existing teams, and remain in close contact with both managers and workers.
9. Use meetings and feedback surveys to establish if there are any weak points in your strategy that can be reinforced.
10. Continue to evolve and adapt your strategy using the six principles of global talent management, as explained below.

And don’t forget—if your company has subsidiaries, you may need to tweak your global talent management strategy to fit the unique needs of each individual corporation.

The 6 principles of a global talent management strategy

In 2012, researchers from the MIT Sloan Management Review detailed six key principles that make up an effective global talent management strategy.

While the world of work has changed considerably, with more people than ever working remotely, these six principles of global talent management still hold true:

1. Alignment with strategy
2. Internal consistency
3. Cultural embeddedness
4. Management involvement
5. Balance of global and local needs
6. Employer branding through differentiation

Let’s take a closer look at how those six timeless principles apply to today’s remote and independent workforce.

1. Alignment with strategy

Your global talent management practices should align with the broader company strategy. This way, planning business goals directly aligns with planning talent needs.

If your multinational enterprise’s business strategy involves expanding into new markets, you’ll want to assess your current and future talent needs in those regions. If your business plans to add a new service or increase its global profits by 10% over the next five years, you’ll need to develop a talent strategy that supports these goals.

2. Internal consistency

For a global talent management strategy to work, it needs to reach all areas of recruiting, hiring, and management. If you devote time to bringing on top-tier talent from around the world, but don’t also devote time to training, nurturing, and promoting this talent, they may not stick around.

Your strategy also needs to be consistent between departments. This way, you can maintain balanced hiring (and retention) across teams. Your team members can then move between teams if needed without experiencing an internal culture shock.

3. Cultural embeddedness

Cultural embeddedness is about making sure your global talent management strategy helps find, cultivate, retain, and mentor talent that is a great corporate culture fit. At the same time, it’s also about being willing to adjust corporate culture to meet the needs of your workforce.  

Some companies look for cultural fit by including different assessments (that may address work styles and technical skills) in the hiring process. Others choose to select new hires strictly on skill and train their team members on soft skills and elements of company culture.

You’ll want to decide what management practices your company will employ when creating a global talent management strategy. This will in turn influence the way you hire and train new team members.

Regardless of the path you choose, it’s important to focus on things that are important to the job at hand, remain aware of potential unconscious bases, and get feedback from your team members regarding their feelings on company culture.

4. Management involvement

While a global talent management strategy may be originally directed from the top down, it can’t stop at HR or the executive suite. Everyone involved in the hiring process needs to be actively committed to the strategy, including managers at all levels of leadership.

Managers need to keep global talent management strategy in mind when considering their hiring needs, developing training plans, and succession planning for key roles. After all, what good is having access to an entire world of talent if you aren’t leveraging it in every way possible?

5. Balance of global and local needs

When you work with teams of professionals around the world, you’ll need to have a solid understanding of what clusters of talent need based on their location.

For example, if your company is headquartered in Germany, your teams in Argentina may have different needs based on time zone, working hours, regional labor laws, local economies, and more. You’ll also still need to balance this with the requirements of your country and any others that you do business in.

6. Employer branding through differentiation

As more companies begin to hire global talent, you may find yourself in the war for talent with competitors. You can make your opportunities stand out from the rest by building global brand awareness as a quality employer.

To do this, you may want to focus on initiatives that are important to your ideal candidates, contribute directly to the communities in emerging markets, and build messaging around how your organization supports its workers.

The main challenges of global talent management

All six principles of global talent management are influenced and shaped by shared challenges.

You might not have every challenge perfectly solved by the time you’re ready to hire your first global team member. If you’re committed to solving these challenges over time, though—with the help of trusted partners and listening to the needs of the people you work with—you’ll be able to cultivate a strong and reliable talent management strategy.

Recruitment and selection

Finding top talent in a new region can be difficult. You don’t know the market yet, and you may be up against competitors who also want the same talent for themselves.

Working with a recruiter who is familiar with the regions you’re hiring in is helpful. These professionals can educate you on the hiring market in specific cities and countries, help you connect with the right talent, and build out a staffing pipeline.

Training and career development

You’ll need to come up with an approach to training and professional development that works for global teams. This can involve:

• Creating training modules and performance management guidelines in more than one language
• Adapting the content in training modules to fit the work practices and responsibilities of team members in specific regions
• Identifying possible top performers and finding ways to nurture their growth remotely
• Remaining selective so you aren’t nurturing more team members than you can actually promote down the line
• Finding ways to create ongoing connections with team members who work asynchronously

Compensation and benefits

You’ll want to have a clear handle on how you’ll compensate your team members in different locations based on currencies, exchange rates, and available benefits.

Let’s say you’re running a company based in London and plan to expand into the U.S. Your company offers tuition reimbursement, paid time off, and flexible work hours to all of your team members in the U.K. You don’t offer any private health insurance benefit as your team members receive healthcare through the National Health Service.

Because workers in the U.S. often receive their health insurance through employers, you may need to adapt your strategy to include healthcare benefits based on a team member’s location. This can make your positions more attractive to talent in the U.S.

You’ll also need to give similar consideration to salary compensation. What is a livable wage in your country or city may not be livable in other locations around the world. It’s absolutely possible to work all of these details out—and taking the time to do so before launching a new global hiring push can help you attract the best talent.

Local regulations

Every region has its own laws related to employment protections and how remote work relates to taxation. Taking these variants into consideration is an important part of a global talent management strategy. You’ll want to consider:

• Whether or not hiring team members in a specific municipality or country will change how you are taxed
• What your responsibilities are under employment laws in different locations
• How you should classify new hires (i.e. employee or independent contractor)

Working with an employer of record service or employment lawyer familiar with the region you’d like to expand into can help mitigate possible complications.

Cultural differences

As you begin to work with more team members from around the world, you’ll be exposed to different cultural norms. While some companies can feel that this is a difficulty and hard to navigate, it’s actually a great positive!

By working with team members from around the world, you can leverage their individual skill sets and knowledge of local cultures to create stronger relationships with international customers. You may also find that elements of workplace culture in one region translate well when applied across your entire company. This can be a great help in developing the right kind of corporate culture for all of your team members.

General global talent management strategies to adopt

Whether you’re already part of a multinational company or are simply ready to tap into the remote workforce for the first time, start building your global talent management plan with a focus on these do’s and don’ts:

• Do remember that great talent doesn’t stop at acquisition—build worker support and retention into your overall plan.
• Do evaluate your benefit and compensation packages to come up with options that are attractive to top talent in different regions.
• Do consider different hiring options, including freelance and contract-to-full-time hires.
• Don’t overlook remote talent for promotion and advancement opportunities. Figure out how to create equitable opportunities for all team members, whether they are in-office or around the world.
• Don’t keep your global talent management strategy isolated to HR professionals. Train hiring managers and leaders to implement the strategy for all new and current team members around the world.
• Don’t write off talent from another region of the world because you aren’t sure how you’ll hire them. Lawyers, employers of record, and platforms like Upwork can help with this.

Global talent management case studies and examples

While a global talent management strategy will look different for every company, these three businesses are great examples of how rethinking the hiring approach to suit a global workforce supports company growth.

Zendesk

Because Zendesk serves customers all around the world, they knew they needed to build a global team that understood the unique challenges faced by customers in different markets.

The Zendesk team started by identifying a country they’d like to hire talent in. Next, they reached out to partners (in this case, Upwork) to help them get to know the talent in the region and build a recruiting pipeline.

The company also had to rethink how they assessed competencies and hired talent—for example, relying on someone’s portfolio and Upwork profile rather than having them sit down and do in-person skills tests. While developing this process required thinking in new ways, in the long run, it supported Zendesk’s ongoing success.

Amway

Amway is a unique example of how an international business can rethink its hiring strategy to better leverage global talent. While the direct-sales company has had independent Amway Business Owners representing its products around the world for many years, most of Amway’s corporate operations are headquartered in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

When the Amway team needed to create marketing materials that resonated with different global audiences, they turned to independent professionals in each region. By doing this, Amway was able to leverage their talent’s skills and knowledge of different cultures to create effective messaging.

Thumbtack

Thumbtack is an app- and web-based service that connects individuals with contractors and other skilled professionals in their area. Because many of Thumbtack’s users have an immediate need they need help with, such as a home repair, providing strong customer service is essential.

Thumbtack leveraged global, remote talent to create a chat-based customer service help option that is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Because Thumbtack uses Upwork to pay remote team members, they don’t have to worry about coordinating payroll across multiple countries. Instead, they can focus on building their distributed teams and creating a company culture of customer-focused support.

Understanding the global trends in talent management strategies

If you’re beginning to develop your own global talent management strategy, it’s helpful to work with a pro. Independent talent management experts can help you:

• Understand how changing global trends impact your talent management
• Develop recruitment processes that work across borders
• Identify the best ways to build a talent pipeline

Log into your Upwork account now (or create one!) to begin viewing the profiles of talent management professionals, or create a job post to receive proposals from qualified experts.