FAMILY SUPPORT
Family support firmly on relocation agenda
W
ith family issues still the major cause for failed assignments, the Global Mobility, A Family Affair session at Worldwide ERC’s Global Workforce
Symposium in Chicago proved to be popular. As Andrew Walker, director, global mobility leader at Ernst
& Young, pointed out, now people are moving earlier and are dependent on dual incomes, there is a general resistance to move because they can’t afford to do it. EY has the services in place to help the partner get a job. On the issue of support for same-sex couples, sometimes
companies have to be creative in offering more home leave and use this for a family visit to get over immigration barriers, for example. Education is still a big challenge, and there is often strong competition for international school places. With the rise of
single parents, it is worth providing more space allowance. This is a simple thing that can make a big difference. EY’s approach is to try and add value to the assignee
experience. Previously, they were seeing more short trips where the employee would go out for a month, come back and then go again for six weeks. This obviously changes the family dynamic. Project workers wanted their families to go along. However, the firm discovered families appearing at the overseas location that they didn’t know about. Obviously, this is a big issue in terms of duty of care and is something to be watched out for. When asked where do we go next with regards to families,
Andrew Walker felt that from the corporate programme operator perspective, it was about creating more value to the family who want a human experience. While each organisation has to figure out its return on
investment (ROI) for their company, it is often about intentional outcomes such as acquired skills. Successful relocation of families, for example employee, partner and children, enables the employee to work productively from day one and supports the retention of the employee because the family are also happily settled. Service supplier, Dwellworks, for example, recently appointed an Experience Manager. Family support is set to remain firmly at the top of the
mobility agenda.
See the latest Relocate Global Mobility Toolkit fact sheet Dual Careers and Spouse/Partner Support, on
relocateglobal.com
40 | Re:locate | January 2018
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