COVID-19 has, for the first time, highlighted the importance of remote cross-border work. It is shaping the future of the hiring process and every business big or small is finding innovative approaches to talent acquisition. 

Wouldn't it make sense to have access to a larger talent pool to find the right fit for the role you seek to fill? Why not consider hiring a candidate from outside the country? This can help you reduce costs and find the best person for the job.

Imagine how great it would be if you could include cross-border working and recruitment in your talent strategy and benefit from it. In addition, you have the potential to meet diversity and inclusion targets.

‍

Benefits of cross-border working:

With the number of remote workers rising, you may consider taking advantage of the benefits of hiring a remote worker yourself. Let us look at the key benefits of hiring remotely:

1. Higher Productivity: Although it sounds counterintuitive, research suggests that remote workers are more productive than employees working in offices.

A study by Global Workplace Analytics shows that remote workers are 20-25% more productive than office-based employees.

Here are the top reasons why people who work from home get more done:

• No Commutes: One can use the time saved from not commuting to engage in activities that improve their overall well-being, such as spending time with family, exercising, meditating, and sleeping.
• Lesser distractions. It's easier to focus on work and get more done when someone isn't distracted by co-workers stopping by their desk, or by loud background conversations.

2. Higher Employee Retention: Replacing employees is costly and time-consuming. Recruiting, training, and retaining new staff costs a lot of time and money, but to do this you need to ensure that new employees are happy and feel at home in their new jobs. A great way to retain talent is by introducing flexible working conditions.

‍3. Access to a wider talent pool: When you’re hiring from a set location, you limit your talent pool. However, remote work lets you access the very best talent across the globe—especially when flexibility in the workplace is becoming expected by employees. Many businesses are adopting remote, cross-border working in their talent strategy.

‍4. Better employee engagement: You know how it’s easier to be happy when you’re with people you like? When your employees work remotely, they feel that way all the time. And here’s why: they like being able to set their schedules, they like being around the people they care about, and they like being able to take breaks whenever they want. All of those things can lead to an emotionally and mentally healthier person. So when your team members log in to work, they’re more engaged, enthusiastic, energetic, and positive.

‍5. Remote teams are cost-effective: Companies have discovered that they can save big by hiring remote workers. For example, IBM saved $50 million and Sun Microsystems saved $68 million in real estate costs by hiring remote workers. And even if you don’t own real estate, you can still save on rent and utilities, cleaning services, food & taxes.

Remote teams are also more cost-effective in other ways:

• You can hire people from all over the world. This is a boon for employers located in pricey or competitive cities. Have look at the salaries of developers around the world.
• You can save money by avoiding the costs associated with relocating employees.

‍6. Better for the environment: Employees want their companies to walk the talk about environmental protection. In fact, 70% of them feel more favorably toward their company when it takes steps to reduce carbon emissions.

Remote hiring supports the environment in the following ways:

• Every 1% reduction in vehicles reduces road congestion by 3x.
• Nearly three billion gallons of gas are wasted in traffic jams, which accounts for 26 million extra tons of greenhouse gasses.
• Working remotely just part-time would save more than 1,600 lives, prevent almost 99,000 injuries, and save over $12 billion a year in direct and indirect costs associated with traffic accidents.

‍7. Diversity & Inclusion: Remote cross-border working can help you to collaborate with people from different countries, teams, and cultures. This means that you have access to a wider range of ideas and experiences than ever before, which in turn can lead to more innovative solutions for your business.

‍

‍How to build a cross-border talent strategy?

It's no secret that cross-border remote work has its benefits for both employees and organizations. But making this strategy work is a major challenge for modern firms—time to think and react. Executing the remote work strategy can be imagined as changing the tires on Formula 1 racing cars.

Cross-border workers can be divided into two groups—people who are hired outside of their country and existing workers who want to work temporarily in another country. HR departments must address many issues, such as HR governance, payroll administration, team structures, and procedures for working from another country.

First, create a strategy and policy structure to take into account legal aspects, compliance, risk management, and employee experience. Next, redesign your HR and payroll policies so they will lead to a robust governance framework that minimizes compliance risks for your organization.

A well-crafted compensation structure can have a big impact on the success of your cross-border talent strategy. That's why, as a second step in making such a strategy work, HR teams should examine an appropriate reward structure, seamless but compliant recruitment, and an onboarding and performance management system. At the same time, they need to continuously focus on the well-being of their employees, maintaining and monitoring their productivity.

If you’re interested in finding out more about how RemoteStar can help you expand your cross-border hiring and working program, please get in touch. We’d be happy to share with you our experience and expertise on this topic.

‍