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Sourcing the latter two, it chose to initially scope down to just two countries and focus on indirect employees (white collar) only. The choice to commence with data and organisational management is widely accepted. Data and organisational structure are the foundation under global processes. The choice for indirect employees is also endorsed by several other interviewees and session participants. They state that it is important to start with influential figures, in order to create a positive buzz around the transformation. multicountry and global HR, it is important to monitor performance and create a feedback loop to ensure the organisation does not become inert. The organisation must still be able to adjust its position on the continuum to changing circumstances. Next, it is important to be careful for the "hydrocephalus risk," i.e., organisations have the tendency to force centralisation towards a point at which local operation is tied too much to global directions. It takes away the agility and creates a feeling that corporate HR is ruling from an ivory tower. Therefore, the HR director from the bulk liquid storage company advocated for local involvement/review of global initiatives. The FMCG director of international HR operations advocated for HR officers with business acumen. Figure 7: Parameters for Prioritisation Other factors that have been mentioned as important when designing a roadmap are provided below: • The strategic importance of the processes. • Fragmentation of the business; a highly fragmented landscape needs redesign of processes and time to accomplish the transition. An important lesson mentioned by the healthcare executive: "Never underestimate time required for process re-design". • IT legacy; an organisation should look for systems that could be used as the default system; or, when looking to replace legacy one should look at expiration dates of contracts. Moreover, they should investigate whether there are already best-practice processes in place, and they should investigate the policy burden of historically built policies. • Level of culture shock that one is willing to accept. • The business case should be solid. The speed and stringency of the roadmap depends upon key management support, culture, and the degree of maturity (e.g., legacy). An important factor during implementation is to install good program management. This is done to keep the transformation on track and within budget, but also to communicate and emphasise mutual benefits. Emphasising mutual benefits was indicated as one of the strategic lessons during the session. Providing answers to questions such as, "What do you deliver to management?" and, "What is the value for a country or OpCo?" turned out to be important during the transformation process. Monitoring Results After the vision has been implemented and the HR organisation has arrived at its optimum between Gino van Puijenbroek is HR consultant for Kirkman Company. and Floor van der Horst is a consultant YSE, powered by Kirkman Company. In his opinion, these people are better equipped to reason from both an HR perspective and a business perspective. Another important lesson is to install process KPIs. These KPIs can help give a feel for adaptation. Additionally, it is important to work with people who have business acumen. During the session, it also became evident that no alternative HR-IT systems should be allowed, otherwise the results are too hard to control and monitor. Finally, always be sensitive for input and signals from local HR. Conclusion Through a number of developments, HR organisations are increasingly confronted with the question of what to organise locally and what to organise globally. This is a question that holds for processes as well as for customer interaction, IT, and vendor management. The discussion is often triggered by the same drivers. The answer to the question depends on various factors. Therefore, each organisation might find a different equilibrium. However, although the equilibrium might be different, a clear trend towards a global approach is observed. For processes, this implies that those processes that are heavily influenced by local law, regulation, and customs (e.g., benefits), remain local, while other processes will become increasingly global. For customer interaction, the front runners are moving towards regional models for their HR SSCs, whereas the business partner role remains predominantly local. IT is being organised globally. Vendor management is an untapped reservoir. Moving from a multicountry to a global approach is a process that has to be managed carefully and requires a staged approach in which data, organisational structure, and key influencers play an important role. Once implementation has been successful, control and a feedback mechanism are essential to keep the HR organisation in the sweet spot—and this is not necessarily a static position. FALL 2011 | www.hroglobal.com [19]

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