Although expatriates may comprise only a small percentage of total employees in a large corporation, the majority are chosen because of their technical expertise or leadership qualities, according to a recent survey by Mercer Human Resource Consulting.

Oftentimes, expatriates have a specific project, which usually includes transferring skills to local employees. Most employers also see the expatriate assignment as a career development move.

But how do companies go from identifying a possible expatriate to actually sending that person to another country? Here are three views on the selection process from Canon Europe, Mattel Europe and Reuters.

Canon Europe

Canon, a Japan-based multinational, says that many of its expatriate staff are based at the company’s headquarters in Amsterdam and number around 200 in total for the whole of Europe. Apart from Japan these employees tend come from Italy, Spain and the UK. Other expats are employed in offices based in Eastern Europe, the Middle East or South Africa. They either run a specific technical operation or are sent to imbue the local division with the company’s specific culture.

“Most of the expats are sent here to build up company interrelations,” said Patricia Panke, a HR specialist with Canon Europe, based in Amsterdam. “Most of them are on contracts of between three to five years and after that period most of them return to their home country where they will continue to work for the company.”

Panke added that because of the current economic downturn, some employees discovered that they could not get a position back home and have been found a role within the head office.

What usually qualifies such people for working abroad is first their technical knowledge, second their ability to explain the corporate culture to other people and thirdly the likelihood that they would be able to cope with living abroad. This is usually done through a rigorous interview process.

Mattel Europe

US-based toy manufacturer Mattel tends to employ expats in senior managerial positions who will run major departments at the European headquarters based in the Netherlands or in other offices throughout Europe, observes Monique Gort, HR specialist with the company. Throughout the continent, Mattel employs over 1,000 people, with 150 of them at the head office; only 20 to 25 of these employees are expatriates.

As these are senior people, the company already knows quite a lot about their personality and their ability to survive in a foreign environment, although they must first go through a tough interview process.

The company will help new staff with language training and assistance for the costs of the move for the employee and their family. Mattel also needs to sort out work permits, as most expats come from the US, when they are employed in Europe.

Most expats have contracts that last between two and three years, although Gort says about half will decide to stay longer. The longest stays in the Netherlands are between eight and nine years.

Reuters

The expatriates that Reuters, the UK-based financial news and information company, employs in the Benelux region generally come from the UK. Their numbers are quite small compared to the total number of employees based in offices in Brussels and Amsterdam: 15 out of a 100 in the Belgian capital and 10 to15 out of 180 in the Netherlands office.

They tend to be journalists or business managers with a specific technical skill or expertise that is useful to Reuters consultancy work. A significant amount of a manager’s time will be spent training up local employees to take on expert roles within the company.

Candidates go through a series of interviews and tests in London before being appointed. Reuters also looks for employees who have a “global view” and are mentally mature, says Carl Michel, HR manager for Reuters in the Benelux region. “We also use questionnaires to find the right people for the expat jobs,” he says.

The average length of a contract is three years, but that can be extended if both parties are happy with each other. “In our assignment letters we usually stipulate three years,” he adds.

October 2002

Jeremy Slater is a freelance business writer based in Brussels.