Why is Employee Global Mobility Important?

Key takeaways

Global mobility has evolved from relocating employees to different countries to serve company objectives to a company’s ability to support a global workforce with personal travel and relocation wants and needs.
Embracing global mobility keeps employees engaged and invested, fosters inclusivity and diversity, and enables companies to tap into emerging talent hotspots.
Working with an international team comes with challenges; immigration, legal and tax compliance. Fortunately, the right technology can simplify mobility by providing global payroll and tax, visa procurement, compliance support, and global HR management all on one platform.

The future of work is changing from companies just offering remote work initiatives in their local country to companies now reaping the benefits of global hiring. In this article, you will learn the benefits, challenges, and opportunities of embracing global mobility.

What is global mobility?

Global mobility is a company’s ability to mobilize a global workforce. Global mobility helps to widen talent pools even further, allows for international expansion, and caters to employee needs and desires.

In the past, global mobility meant relocating employees or international assignees to different countries as an expatriate or prioritizing short-term business travel to meet company goals. It’s time to rethink ex-pat employees as global mobility has evolved and now means supporting an employee’s move around the world and using a global workforce.

A worker might consider moving:

To be closer to friends and family
Experience a new country or new location that inspires them
Explore new opportunities for personal growth
Benefit from the freedom of remote work

Remote work is a desirable benefit because of the freedom it allows. Global mobility offers the same freedom but on an international scale.

Why is global mobility important?

The future of work is changing quickly, and it is essential to ask:

For companies to be successful in the war on talent, they need to embrace borderless hiring and be human-centric in their approach to talent management. Global mobility allows companies to connect with the global talent pool and change the misconception that the best professionals come from certain countries. Global mobility allows company stakeholders to create a world where ability alone determines opportunity.

Companies are now working with their mobile workforce to understand the right, flexible solution for both parties rather than simply applying a one size fits all approach to international assignments. The question is no longer what the business needs are but how a company can lead the field in a competitive marketplace.

With more and more employees expecting mobility as part of their personal and professional development at some point in their careers, competitive global mobility strategies are essential to the recruitment drive.

Where you find a portion of the workforce who want to embrace global mobility, you may also find those for whom it is not a priority or who have barriers. When considering your global mobility policies, be sure to ask, is mobility an opportunity for all employees, and how can a relocation package help?

As with any benefit, there can be challenges. We’ll use this article to take you through both so you can make the most informed decision.

Benefits of global mobility

Companies should implement a global mobility strategy to reap the following benefits.

Global Mobility Benefits

Let’s look at the benefits of embracing global mobility in more detail.

Tap into emerging talent hotspots

Gone are the days of believing the best talent lives in the world’s major cities or within commuting distance of your HQ. Global hiring is becoming a priority for companies as finding talent hubs in untapped markets and encouraging your workforce to work from anywhere significantly expands your talent pool.

Our State of Global Hiring Report illustrates that the rate of global hiring is increasing across all regions.

Given the trend of hiring remote workers, recruiters can now target locations globally where there is a higher supply of talent and less competition. The average salary is often lower than it would be to hire someone in a major metropolitan city so this results in financial savings for the company.

Damon Berkhaug, Head of Talent Acquisition, Deel

Unlock global markets

Global mobility enables companies to quickly and efficiently expand into cross-border markets. Establishing a physical presence supports intercultural knowledge exchange and global alignment and helps to build credibility and brand trust.

Discover how Deel is helping E-Bikes solutions provider Zoomo increase its speed to market.

Improve workforce agility

Addressing global market developments requires adaptability and the ability to pivot. Global and mobile workforces can enter new markets to generate alternative revenue streams and reduce dependence on a single market.

Upskilling your workforce will establish a future-fit workforce and drive economic growth and innovation.

A clearly defined relocation process and assistance will help mobile employees settle into their new homes and be up and running in no time. To help, we’ve put together an employee relocation policy template.

In a very connected world, especially in this post-pandemic world, there is no room anymore not to think globally or at least be directly influenced by global trends. This also means that talents are everywhere and embracing global mobility means embracing the potential of the world, the opportunity to work from different countries, hire employees everywhere, and not be limited to physical locations anymore.

Masha Sutherlin, Director of Global Corporate Legal and Mobility, Deel

Attract and retain top talent

The last few years have forced millions of workers to reevaluate their relationship with work. Millennials and Gen Z are both purpose-driven generations that fundamentally think about jobs as opportunities to learn and grow. This mindset has delivered results, thanks to the broad adoption of flexible and remote working due to the pandemic.

Companies that offer their future and current employees the opportunity to work wherever they choose see increased employee retention, with wanting to live as a digital nomad becoming the aspiration of a generation searching for a life without borders.

Flexibility and life experience are now top priorities in career growth, and if a particular employer doesn’t meet these needs, then talent is simply finding a company that can. Companies need to adapt and offer a workplace experience that embraces global mobility.

I believe companies that hire globally have a higher level of retention overall. Remote workers typically do not want to return to a physical office full time so that eliminates a number of companies still requiring this arrangement.

Damon Berkhaug, Head of Talent Acquisition, Deel

Foster inclusivity and diversity

Without borders, opportunities open up to the best person rather than the best person in a specific location. Companies can then cultivate diversity in the workplace by employing people of different ages, genders, ethnicities, sexual orientations, and cultural backgrounds.

The benefits of an inclusive and diverse global workforce are:

Reaching untapped customer demographics
Creating more significant opportunities for professional growth
Promoting gender equality
Reducing the gender pay gap
Closing skill gaps

The opportunity to learn from a diverse international workforce is unbeaten in terms of personal and professional development.

Understanding how your people feel matters; celebrating your diverse and remote workforce will directly impact your retention metrics.

happy scale

Global mobility challenges and solutions

Whether you run a small business or head a multinational corporation, working with an international team comes with challenges; immigration, legal and tax compliance, and benefits are particularly complex on a global scale.

Fortunately, technology serves as a global mobility solution, removing internal HR teams’ many burdens. We’ll take you through these challenges and the opportunities to overcome them.

Payroll compliance

When hiring from a foreign country or relocating an employee, you must understand the global payroll solutions you can use to overcome the most common challenges. International payroll processing is a challenge for companies hiring in different countries for the first time. Key considerations are:

Local laws and regulations
Employee compensation across other countries
International tax laws
Employee benefits
Bank charges and exchange rates
Data protection
Pressure on the human resources department

Paying your international workforce shouldn’t be an obstacle to global hiring. Trying to make sense of all the different elements can put a lot of pressure on internal HR professionals, which is why the best solution for most companies is a service like Deel.

Deel makes paying your team simple. A single click pays your entire team in their local currency or through their preferred payment methods. Deel also offers various local payouts to simplify your international payroll process.

Thanks to Deel, I just need to go to the payments section, press the pay button, and that’s it. It gives me the peace of mind that everyone is getting paid, on time, all over the world

Daniel Aksioutine, COO, divbrands

Visas

Using visa mobility support services, you can increase workplace mobility within your multinational organization. Some countries that suffered due to the absence of tourism during the pandemic developed visa programs to stimulate the economy. We’ve compiled a list of countries offering remote working visas to help every digital nomad fulfill their dream!

At Deel, our mobility team handles the entire visa process in-house. We assess your employee’s eligibility, employ them through our employer of record (EOR) solution, and start the visa application process for you, taking the burden off your human resources team.

Our efforts in mobility unite people across the world. By offering visas we are creating opportunities and advancement that wouldn't be possible. We bring people together for a better understanding of our different cultures and traditions.

Elia Torres, Global Mobility Operations Manager, Deel

Legal compliance

Moving employees internationally and hiring team members from abroad come with complexities. Ensure your global mobility program is compliant to mitigate risk and avoid misclassification. Seek advice to navigate international employment laws before considering talent mobility.

Alternatively, if you have identified a country where you don’t already have a legal entity or permanent establishment, use an EOR provider such as Deel. Deel employs the worker on your behalf, ensures compliance with local employment laws and labor regulations, and runs payroll.

Using an EOR can improve your international employee experience in so many ways.

International taxes

Your global workforce will come to you with a limitless amount of questions, and at the forefront of these should be how do they pay taxes in their host country when they aren’t living in their home country?

We’ve put together a tax guide for international workers to introduce five remote worker types and their income tax responsibilities that cover the main factors at play:

The country they’re working from
Where the company is based
Their citizenship
Their tax residency status

Outsourcing this can save your human resources team valuable time and worry over misclassification.

Deel Shield gave us peace of mind when hiring people as contractors in any part of the world. I don’t have to worry anymore about compliance. It feels much safer.

Chloe Riesenberg, People Specialist, Project44

International recruitment and hiring

Recruiting remote teams comes with challenges, which become even more complex when doing so internationally.

The following articles will help you understand the opportunities, benefits, and how to address these challenges:

Manage global mobility compliantly with Deel

Deel is compliant global hiring, payroll, and HR for remote teams. That means anyone, anywhere, can get hired, paid, and managed with Deel.

Using a tech-enabled self-serve platform, companies can instantly hire and onboard full-time employees or independent contractors across the world legally in minutes, provide visa and immigration support, and pay their entire global team with one click.

Deel enabled us to achieve our mission to reach and expand new markets in a faster turnaround time. I would say it saved us at least 12 to 24 months of effort. I’d recommend Deel to anyone who would like to expand globally and has limited time and resources to build the capability internally.

Nupur Mehta, VP of Human Resources, NIUM

Sounds like the solution you’re looking for? Request a demo to see Deel in action today.