Solvay Group Case Study: Navigating International Mobility & Talent

This case study examines Solvay, a company founded by Ernest Solvay, and its journey from processing ammonia-soda to diversifying into pharmaceuticals and plastics. The company faces challenges in managing its international workforce, particularly expatriates, who are vital for its global operations. Despite a strong emphasis on internal talent development, Solvay struggles with placing senior executives into suitable roles. The case delves into Solvay's international business strategy, focusing on innovation and geographic expansion across its chemicals, plastics, and pharmaceuticals divisions. It highlights the importance of talent management, succession planning, and the implementation of talent roundtables to address these challenges. The case also presents specific scenarios involving expatriate assignments, such as Ponte's potential move to China and Marion's return from North America, illustrating the complexities of international mobility and the need for effective HR strategies. Desklib provides similar solved assignments and resources.

Running head: SOLVAY 1
Solvay
Student’s name
Institution Affiliation
Date

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Executive summary
Solvay, a company, named after its founder, Ernest Solvay began with processing
ammonia-soda that was used to manufacture sodium carbonate. However, the company was not
with issues as it faced bankruptcy on many occasions. It is after such issues that Solvay
experienced growth and stability. The company diversified its portfolio by specializing in other
areas such as pharmaceuticals and plastics. However, the company still encounters challenges
with managing expats who are crucial in facilitating the success of the company. The fact that
the company develops talents internally is shocking as many senior executives fail to be
absorbed in positions developed by the company.

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Introduction
Ernest Solvay, a Belgian chemist invented an ammonia-soda process in 1861 used for
producing sodium carbonate and it is later on in 1863 that he formed a Solvay group to conduct
the whole process. It is after several attempts of going bankrupt that the company enters the stage
of global expansion that saw the company establish processing facilities in countries such as
France, Germany and England. The company went on furthering its growth and development
through acquisition and product diversification.
Three sectors of Solvay
Solvay managed three of its industries namely the pharmaceuticals, chemicals and
plastics.
The chemicals
The chemicals have been termed as the oldest as Solvay’s business divisions and were
connected to the discovery of Soda ash by Ernest Solvay. The chemicals division began with
alkalis that later evolved to peroxygens.In. In 2007, the chemicals business generated revenues of
more than 3 billion in sales alone and saw more than 8000 people employed. The chemicals
division operated on a motto such as delivering high-value specialties for sophisticated
applications. The division also had 60 plants distributed around the world and recent investments
had been made in Thailand. In 2008, the chemicals business operated on four strategic priorities
such as focusing on its geographical expansion, advancing technological innovation and
specializing in fluorinated and organic products making it competitive.
Plastics
The plastics business had become the largest Solvay’s business with regards to the sales
made accounting for more than 4 billion euros focusing on two clusters the specialty products

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and the vinyl. The specialty products entailed specialty polymers and Inergy locomotive systems
which led to Solvay having a joint venture with Plastic Omnium. The vinyl segment on the other
hand involved the PVC and PVC compounds. Solvay went further and entered a joint venture
with Wienerberger. It is the Solvay specialties in plastics that strengthened the product
leadership. The Solvay plastics served global markets with manufacturing units in Europe, North
and South America and Asia. In 2007, Solvay surveyed Russian with plans of establishing a new
plant to increase their presence of vinyl in the region. The plastics gave priority to globalization,
research and development, innovation in technology and competitiveness.
Pharmaceuticals
Solvay was first involved in life sciences in the 1950’s when it acquired Kali-Chemi and
was part of the company’s plan to mitigate against the cyclical nature of fluctuating oil prices. It
is in 1980 that Solvay established its health sector department that was channeled its resources to
several therapeutic areas such as the neuroscience, influenza vaccines and cardiometabolic
among many more. The pharmaceutical business as at 2007 had several research and
development units and 14 manufacturing bases globally.
The emerging economies accounted for 20% of the sales. However, as of 2008, the
business concentrated on increasing its presence in the market and establishing Solvay drugs for
instance the pancreatic extract that treated cystic fibrosis was marketed in the U.S. market in
2008. Globalization remained the primary focus of the pharmaceutical division. The four
divisions were important in increasing revenues for Solvay.
International business strategy
It is at the end of 2007 that Solvay’s sales recorded more than $ 14 billion. The group
sales were spread in four primary markets, Europe accounted for 56%, America 32%, Asia-

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Pacific commanded 9%, and the rest of the world accounted for only 3% (Groysberg, Nohria, &
Herman, Solvay Group:Internatioanal Mobility and Managing Expatriates, 2011). Solvay had
two major priority areas in 2008, innovation and geographic expansion. Solvay group is of the
view that innovation is crucial for the growth of all its businesses and also necessary for
increasing Solvay’s competitiveness.
Every Solvay’s sectors have a unique operating model. For instance, the chemicals divisi
required substantial initial investments, however, as time went by, optimization of the
manufacturing activities determined profits (Groysberg, Nohria, & Herman, Solvay
Group:Internatioanal Mobility and Managing Expatriates, 2011). In the plastics effective
management and production relied on fast reaction times and flexibility to match the needs and
wants of customers. In the plastics, for instance, the company is required to develop a new
product for a customer in less than six weeks. However, in the chemicals, it would be impossible
as asserted by Lorent. The pharmaceuticals, on the other hand, require more extended time
frameworks and different research expertise.
Talent at Solvay
Solvay is accustomed to grow and develop its talent internally. However, the company
sources people externally, particularly for pharmaceutical and marketing departments. However,
the main problem with sourcing employees externally as per Lorent is that such people fail to fit
Solvay’s culture. One of the reasons behind Solvay expat assignments was to ensure the
acculturation of contemporary acquisitions to the company’s values.
It is the constant exchanges for engineers to and from new ventures that were responsible
for expat paperwork. For instance, it is following the joint venture between Solvay and Sibur that
saw Solvay hire 19 engineers of Russian origin that had just graduated from the university

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(Groysberg, Nohria, & Herman, Solvay Group:Internatioanal Mobility and Managing
Expatriates, 2011). The engineers were placed on learning contracts for two years as they worked
in factories situated in Belgium, France, and Germany. Concurrently, a team of 20 vinyl
specialists belonging to Solvay factories from countries such as Belgium and Germany were
joined by a group of French engineers and sent to Russia where they were tasked with building a
plant. After two years they would go back to Russia where they would use their expertise.
However, in the past, the business heads of Solvay have had opposing views over talent.
For instance, one had two bosses, the division head stationed at headquarters and a regional head
close to home. Thus, a candidate was expected to converse with one boss leading to a discussion.
If the candidate did not want to move, it is the boss that would be tasked with making a case for
the candidate. Though it felt nice to be valued; the candidates had to be cautious enough to make
sure that their bosses were not withholding them from advancing and gaining the significant
experience needed in developing their career (Harzing & Pinnington, 2015).
Also, countries considered large and had Solvay businesses were reported to outweigh
smaller countries that were new to the Solvay fold sophisticating development coordination,
succession planning, and international strategies. This was because small states were
insignificant to lobby for the needed talent (Zhu, De Cieri, Di Fan, & Zhang, 2017). Lorent
reveals how at Solvay there is low turnover. The senior manager was tasked with ensuring that
the company has a retention rate of 90%. Thus, this led to talent-management issues as there
were not enough opportunities for young managers.
The robust consensus-driven, relation-oriented culture led to most of Solvay’s activities
lacking transparency and looked somehow ad hoc (Groysberg, Nohria, & Herman, Solvay
Group:Internatioanal Mobility and Managing Expatriates, 2011). However, since 2006, the

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management strived to be more consistent and transparent. Broens was to serve as the HR
general manager aiming to strengthen such initiatives.
Managing talent
The HR head of each business was responsible for monitoring the group’s succession
planning and identifying the next suitable candidate when a position became vacant. Also, the
HR head put recommendations for promotion. The selection was thus determined by the
performance and development appraisal (PDA) process, and each employee underwent the
procedure annually. According to the PDA, the candidates that had ++ meant that they
performed exemplary and were good for promotion.
Any additional intel from employee’s PDA such as the desire to change the country,
personal circumstances and interests were all stored in the Solvay’s HR database and would be
made available during the talent roundtables (Fournet & Paula, 2015). Such data could be
provided to other divisions and made open over the Solvay’s intranet. It is thus evident that the
Solvay was focused on using in-career management (Groysberg, Nohria, & Herman, Solvay
Group:Internatioanal Mobility and Managing Expatriates, 2011). The company sought to hire
young people and very junior and would then develop them into the organization rather than
recruiting in the middle of career ad hoc. The leadership of Solvay was involved in developing
the company’s talent.
However, promotional and succession planning faced some hurdles (Tao, Lui, Gao, &
Xia, 2017). The lack of a programmed recruiting system has made the company suffer from
middle-management drought. The company recognizes the fact that it has not recruited for ages
and has to hire at middle and senior management levels. However, the underlying assumption is
that the company has to develop talent internally. The problem with this strategy is that it leads

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to having many senior managers considered eligible not corresponding to the number of suitable
positions to move into.
Talent roundtables
The talent roundtables initiated in 2007 aimed at formalizing the discussion regarding
talent, career progress and succession plans for strategic positions. The talent roundtable was
conducted at both the vertical and transversal level or country or inter-sector levels (Meyer &
Xin, 2017). The HR representatives and managers of concerned divisions participate in
roundtables. The roundtables served the purpose of identifying a small group of successors for
every central position and following their career progress.
The international human resource strategy
The survey by Lorent on his notes about the suitability of Ponte makes him think that
Ponte is a good one as he possessed the tremendous ability to impact Solvay’s growth in China.
Based on the company’s expat policies, it covered the relocation of direct family members with
the inclusion of Ponte’s three children though Lorent seemed worried. As per Ponte, he had a
mother considered elderly who lived with Ponte’s family in Italy and Ponte wanted to move her
to China with him. Unfortunately, there were no provisions to cover her care in Brussels should
he leave.
On the second folder, there was the case of Marion who according to the file had worked
for Solvay in divisions such as automotive in places such as Detroit and Mexico among others.
However, the division had been sold off to another company and with such divestment, it was
expected that Marion would return home for him to continue working with his firm. Marion had
spent more than a decade in North America and had been given several extensions before his
engagements.

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However as per Marion’s fear, he stated that coming back home was not easy for him.
As per Marion’s perceptions, he asserted that the North American team would see him as a
product of the European organization and was of the opinion that Europe was the perfect place to
manage his career (Baumann, 2009). However, the Europeans, on the other hand, would see
Marion as being part of the North American group and was thus considering North America as
his next move.
Though Lorent had not been involved in Marion’s initial move, the conversations with Marion in
the past few months made Lorent understand the Marion expected to be promoted once he
returned.
Unfortunately, there were no positions that would match Marion’s competencies and
Lorent, on the other hand, is unsure when relevant positions would be available. Also, due to
time passing, most of the people at the headquarters were unfamiliar with Marion. This is
indicated in his conversation where he said that he had been away for 13 years and the fact that
he was far from Brussels he had lost touch.
The third file contains information about Ribeiro, an expat who originated from Brazil
and had moved to Brussels with his two sons and wife (Groysberg, Nohria, & Herman, The
Expat Dilemma, 2011). Ribeiro had immense years of experience in Solvay’s plants dealing with
PVC in both South and Central America. The plastic division had sourced Ribeiro as an engineer
to the headquarters to facilitate the use of his expertise as Solvay was considering expanding its
PVC enterprises into Russia and Eastern Europe.
On the other hand, Ribeiro’s wife being a doctor was facing regulatory impositions
barring her from practicing medicine in Europe without retraining, and this meant that she had to
enroll for the program and start afresh. Ribeiro had made initiatives by talking to Lorent on the

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available options for her wife to get papers allowing her to work in Europe now that the
company had strong ties with leaders in Europe. Ribeiro feared that his wife would take his two
sons to Brazil and this would make him commute from Brussels to Brazil to visit his family after
a couple of months.
Conclusion
Solvay’s human resource team has to develop a framework to deal with expats issues as
many seem to be complex requiring consultation to arrive at final decisions. The use of innate
talents that are later developed to fill future positions that may arise is risky as the company
produces many senior managers yet there are not enough positions to be filled by such managers.

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References
Baumann, C. (2009). Workforce Mobility using the example of the Solvay Group. Munich: GRIN
Verlag.
Fournet, C., & Paula, M. (2015). How Human Resource Professionals Use Electronic Channels
to Communicate CSR. Retrieved from diva-portal:
http://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:822637/FULLTEXT01.pdf
Groysberg, B., Nohria, N., & Herman, K. (2011). Solvay Group:Internatioanal Mobility and
Managing Expatriates. Harvard Business School, 1(1), 1-42.
Groysberg, B., Nohria, N., & Herman, K. (2011). The Expat Dilemma. Harvard Business
Review, 21(17), 1154-1157.
Harzing, A.-W., & Pinnington, A. H. (2015). International Human Resource Management. Los
Angeles: SAGE .
Meyer, K. E., & Xin, K. R. (2017). Managing talent in emerging economy
multinationals:Integrating Strategic management and huma resource management. The
International Journal of Human Resource Management, 29(11), 1827-1855.
Tao, F., Lui, X., Gao, L., & Xia, E. (2017). Expatriates,Subsidiary autonomy and the Overseas
subsidiary performance of MNEs from an emerging economy. Internal Journal of
Human Resource Management, 29(9), 1799-1826.
Zhu, C. J., De Cieri, H., Di Fan, & Zhang, M. M. (2017). Expatriate management in emerging
market multinational enterprises:Reflection and future research agenda. International

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Journal of Human Resource Management, 29(11), 1787-1798.