International Human Resource Management For WII Pty. Ltd.

Organizational structure

Discuss about the International Human Resource Management for WII Pty. Ltd.

The current assignment focuses on the concept of human resources management within international organizations. Human resources are concerned with the recruitment, training and retention of employees within a business organization. From advertisement to recruitment to hiring and induction of the right employees, the human resources management (HRM) is responsible for maintaining the productivity of an organization. They are also responsible for managing the expansion status of an organization by hiring the right managers who would execute the process.

In the current study, Australia based WII Pty. Ltd has been taken into consideration.  It started out as a light manufacturing industry which aimed at producing inexpensive and efficient hand powered winches for facilitating recreational boating for fisherman during the Second World War. The rise in recreational boating from the 1960s up until the present day has led to expansion of the WII Pty. Ltd. However, very recently the company has been looming in an uncertainty regarding its expansion prospects. The current report presents an overview of the various factors which could act as a hindrance in the expansions of the WII Pty. Ltd in the overseas market.

The structure of an organization is crucial to achieving the objectives of a business firm.  As mentioned by Tung (2016), the organizational structure defines the arrangement of responsibilities, roles and relationships within the organization. It is further dependent upon the type of hierarchies functional within an organization. The hierarchies could be further divided into centralized and decentralized forms. In centralized hierarchies, the decisions are made by top level management. It reduces the risk of making wrong judgements at the lower level. The WII Pty. Ltd had been following the centralized hierarchical structure for management of the organization.

With the advent of globalization, there has been a rise in following a decentralized form of organizational management. As mentioned by Brewster et al. (2016), it gives more freedom to the employees to use their own thinking and decision making skills. Thus, using a decentralized form of management encourages the employees to exercise initiative. Additionally, there are four different types of organizational structure which are- functional, geographic, international division and matrix. The multinational companies which have functional structure often face issues in coordinating activities as all operations are based in home countries and individual employees possess responsibilities towards different national target markets.

As mentioned by Brewster (2017), in a geographic structure the organizations work through subsidiaries, which are spread out in different nations as well as within the same nation. Under this, the head quarters often send expatriate managers abroad to settle the situations of unrest in the subsidiaries. Therefore, a mutual relationship is maintained between the different subsidiaries of the host company. There is often exchange of human resources as well as physical resources between the subsidiaries. As suggested by Brewster et al. (2016), a geographic structure helps in removing the bridges between the national and international market.

Cross-cultural management

One of the most suited methods, which could be adopted by a large scale organization, is having an international division structure. An independent international division handles all the international operations of a country. The fourth structural model which could be discussed over here is the ‘global functional division structure’. This divides the entire functions of an organization into different disciplines such as –operations, finance, marketing and human resources.  Under this framework, each and every structural domain of a company is responsible for conducting countrywide operations. As mentioned by Kramar (2014), the global functional division structure uses the expertise of each functional division.  Therefore, in order to expand the business of WII Pty. Ltd overseas the organisation would need to develop an international division structure, where the operations could be divided into subsidiaries and international divisional head. In this regard, a chain is followed within the WII Pty. Ltd where the subsidiaries report regarding the organisational functions of the international divisional head, who in turn reports to the chief executive officer.  This could help in modification of the geographical structure of the Pty. Ltd. whereby sync is be maintained between subsidiaries spread across different countries through effective communication and information exchange (Alfes et al. 2013).

The cross-cultural management is one of the important aspects of international human resource management.  The cross-cultural management is dependent upon a number of organisational skills and tactics. An effective cross-cultural management is dependent upon a number of communication skills. Some of these could be related to a business organisation, such as high context communication and low context communication. In high context communication, there is little scope for the dissemination of expanded knowledge as the receiver of the message has already developed sufficient knowledge regarding a particular aspect (Brewster et al. 2016). On the other hand, in low context communication, the end receiver of the message has little or no information about the subject matter being talked about (Alfes et al. 2013).  Hence, the transmitter of the message has sufficient opportunity to educate the receiver over the subject matter.

In order to set up a cross-cultural environment the human resource manager of the WII Pty. Ltd uses low context communication to bond with the employees as it provides him with sufficient opportunity to educate the employees regarding any recent changes which are to be implemented within the organisation. Some of the factors which are crucial for effective cross-cultural human resource management are – Cognition and cultural intelligence. As mentioned by Jackson et al. (2014), the cultural intelligence is the ability of an individual to realise the differences between the norms or the behavioural attitude of people belonging to different geographical regions. Some of these are further influenced by the type of culture within which one is brought up or the kind of behavioural education imparted, which further modifies the approaches undertaken by an individual within a business organisation. On the other hand, the cognition refers to the ability of an individual to adapt to the organisational changes.  

Compensation

The cross-cultural communication within the WII Pty. Ltd. follows a centralised form where the information is disseminated from the top-notch management to the employees at the lower level through a systematic chain. This form of communication generally reduces the risk of wrong decision making within the organisation.

 However,  adaptation of a decentralized form of communication can provide each and every employee of the WII Pty. Ltd an equal opportunity to become a part of the decision-making process, as well as interact freely with the management regarding the changes implemented (Stone and Deadrick 2015). 

The compensation packages are extremely important for planning the scope of overseas expansion. This is because settling overseas is often associated with higher burden of tax, cost of living, housing and medical expenses. Most of the expatriate assignments are provided monetary benefits which is much higher than their basic pay as per the Foreign Service premium (Vahlne and Johanson 2017). Therefore, the additional pay package helps in providing sufficient stability to the employees as well as their families. The WII Pty. Ltd Can provides its Employees with mobile communications alliances.  This will help the employees settled overseas to remain in contact with their offices as well as homes. The WII Pty Ltd. The company also ensures that it provides its employees with flexible insurance coverage, as it often becomes problematic for the employees to pay more than one premium for a single health insurance policy as per the different coverage schemes offered by different nations.

The global competencies can be developed through effective International training and development programs. The three broad types of international training programs are as follows- Preparatory training for expatriates, Post arrival training for expatriates, Training for host country nationals (Manuti et al. 2015). The preparatory training refers to the pre-departure training which is provided to the employees to ensure that they have acquired sufficient skills to enact their concerned roles or responsibilities. The WII Pty. Ltd takes the preparatory stage of training very seriously as based upon this phase of the training future success is guaranteed. Hence, the HRM of the WII Pty. Ltd. needs to ensure that sufficient employee training programs are implemented within the course for curriculum of the organisation. The post-arrival training refers to the onsite training which is provided to the Employees to help them acclimatize with the local culture as well as the working procedures (Tung 2016). The third stage of training is provided to the employees to educate them regarding the corporate world and policies of the host country.  This form of training is mainly provided by the host country itself by corporate leaders. It is at the end of the induction process that an employee is fit to serve overseas or help with the expansion of the companies in its overseas endeavours.

Conclusion 

There are always a number of barriers or hindrances associated with overseas expansion. This is because working as part of a multinational organization one has to undergo major shift with respect to the infrastructural setup as well as the manner of working within the organization. A multinational organization consists of a multilingual and a multicultural approach, which further offers resistance to the process of change initiated within an organization. Hence, sufficient support and training by the HRM can help in the implementation of successful overseas business.

References 

Alfes, K., Shantz, A.D., Truss, C. and Soane, E.C. 2013, ‘The link between perceived human resource management practices, engagement and employee behaviour: a moderated mediation model’, The international journal of human resource management, vol. 24, no. 2, pp.330-351.

Brewster, C. 2017, ‘The integration of human resource management and corporate strategy’, In Policy and practice in European human resource management, Abingdon: Routledge, pp. 22-35.

Brewster, C., Chung, C. and Sparrow, P. 2016, ‘ Globalizing human resource management’, Abingdon: Routledge, pp.151-216.

Brewster, C., Houldsworth, E., Sparrow, P. and Vernon, G., 2016, ‘ International human resource management’, London: Kogan Page Publishers, pp.105-222.

Jackson, S.E., Schuler, R.S. and Jiang, K. 2014, ‘An aspirational framework for strategic human resource management’, The Academy of Management Annals, vol. 8, no. 1, pp.1-56.

Kramar, R. 2014, ‘Beyond strategic human resource management: is sustainable human resource management the next approach?’, The International Journal of Human Resource Management, vol.  25, no. 8, pp.1069-1089.

Manuti, A., Pastore, S., Scardigno, A.F., Giancaspro, M.L. and Morciano, D. 2015, ‘ Formal and informal learning in the workplace: a research review’, International journal of training and development, vol. 19, no. 1, pp.1-17.

Stone, D.L. and Deadrick, D.L. 2015, ‘ Challenges and opportunities affecting the future of human resource management’, Human Resource Management Review, vol. 25, no. 2, pp.139-145.

Tung, R.L. 2016, ‘New perspectives on human resource management in a global context’, Journal of World Business, vol. 51, no. 1,  pp.142-152.

Vahlne, J.E. and Johanson, J. 2017, ‘The internationalization process of the firm—a model of knowledge development and increasing foreign market commitments’, In International Business (pp. 145-154), Abingdon: Routledge.