International Human Resource Management

Running head: INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT
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INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT1
As opined by Jackson, Schuler and Jiang (2014), “a critical challenge for
organizations from both the public and private sectors in the twenty-first century is the need
to operate across national boundaries”. This operation of the companies across the national
boundaries is called Internationalisation and the processes that are involved in the successful
management of people in these international organisations is called IHRM (International
Human Resource Management). However, it is to note that successful management of such
enterprises needs a global mind-set that collaborates openness to the awareness about
diversity all over the markets and the cultures with an ability and propensity of synthesizing
across such diversity. Internationalisation of the companies maximizes the challenges that are
faced by the HR manager and the way he complies with diverse religious, cultural and social
beliefs. There are several studies that have proved that- “nationality of people affects the
ways in which they conduct, organize and operate their work.” This paper shall elaborate on
discussing about the roles that are played by the International Human Resource managers in
managing such situations and would also discuss about the changes in their duties that, in this
21st century, are triggered by the internationalisation or globalisation of the companies. The
main aim of this paper is to identify the role of cultural factors in shaping contemporary
IHRM practices.
International Human Resource Management (IHRM)
According to Dordevic (2016), IHRM refers to the process of management of people
across the international boundaries by the multinational enterprises. It includes a worldwide
management of the people and not only that of the expatriates. It is to mention that the
companies that function in global boundaries comprise of the multinational and international
firms. On one hand, the multinational companies are the firms in which different businesses
in different nations are managed as a whole, right from the centre and there is difference in
the level of autonomy that they have. On the other hand, the international firms are the firms

INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT2
in which the operations take place in the subsidiaries that are present overseas and that
depend on the capacity of manufacturing and business expertise of the parent company.
According to Nielsen, Asmussen and Weatherall (2017), the main difference in between the
national and global HR practice is the requirement of seeing the bigger picture. As per him
“the difference is the higher complexity and the need for sensitivity to different cultures and
different business environments.”
Contemporary IHRM practices managers need to know
The department of Human Resource today operates differently from that of the same a
decade ago. The change in the job market, the compliance issues and the regulatory demand
issues have compelled the HR managers worldwide to become agile partners in the strategic
development of the businesses. The managers need to know and understand the contemporary
issues and trends that they might face during and after the expansion of the businesses
internationally in order to understand the ways of utilising the valuable resource to the best
advantage. The first significant contemporary trend for IHRM practices is the changing
landscape of the international business. It can be explained in the part by the changing
contours of the FDI (Foreign Direct Investment) location in the global economy (Nielsen,
Asmussen and Weatherall 2017). Traditionally, the FDI flows have been focused in the
developed nations. But now, the recent years “have heralded a shift in FDI location towards
new destinations such as the EU accession countries, particularly those in Central and Eastern
European, while countries such India and China have also become ‘hot spots’ for inward
FDI.” For instance, China have recorded the record inflows of 79 billion dollars in the year
2005 that made it the key recipient of the FDI in the developing nations. Notwithstanding this
fact, the most significant single global shift of recent times “has been the emergence of East
Asia as a dynamic growth region, reflecting the spectacular recent growth rates achieved by