An opportunity for internal recruiters
An opportunity for internal recruiters
During the global pandemic which started in 2020, businesses learnt that they could operate remotely. Where the business type allowed, there was no real choice but to allow staff to work from home. Then, when it was possible for us to all go back to the office, employers found that not everyone wanted to. According to the UK’s Office for National Statistics “In February 2022, 84% of workers who had to work from home because of the coronavirus pandemic said they planned to carry out a mix of working at home and in their place of work in the future”. In order to retain their employees, companies had to become more flexible in where they allowed their teams to work.
For many in HR, this was problematic. For recruiters, there was a whole new opportunity.
Successful businesses did what they always have done to survive and adapted to a new way of working. Technology leapt forward to enable effective communication at a distance, HR policies changed to accommodate homeworking and we all developed a new understanding of what flexible working means.
The next realisation was that if an employee is able to work from their home office 50 miles away from HQ, it might not really matter if they were to work 500 miles away from HQ. And so another adaptation saw businesses find ways to continue to employ their workforce, even under a foreign jurisdiction.
Of course, this posed challenges for payroll and HR professionals alike as they had to understand new rules in unfamiliar countries. Many chose to outsource to Employer of Record companies.
Once business leaders had been forced to recognise that their employees would need to work away from the office, and that that could sometimes mean overseas, a new realisation dawned. This time altogether more positive. If they could let their existing employees work from anywhere, they could hire new employees who are based anywhere!
That change has been a huge positive for internal recruiters. In countries, industries and economic conditions where skilled labour is hard to come by, being able to cast the net wider presents a world of opportunity. Recruiters are now fishing in a much bigger pond. From an employment perspective, it no longer matters where the candidate is based, they can be compliantly engaged via an Employer of Record solution, or directly with the right know how and resources.
If you’re a recruiter keen to cast your net wider, speak to Agility EOR about how we help you prepare to make an offer of employment in a foreign country.
Sam Barnes
Sales Director