Why global hiring needs local expertise
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International recruitment can be difficult. In fact, nearly half of international HR managers say they struggle to hire successful global candidates. Culture differences are one major challenge, impacting the entire recruitment process from job adverts to interviews, pre-hire compliance to onboarding.
It’s imperative that recruiters for global organisations arm themselves with local expertise, to understand these nuances and build a safe, successful hiring function.
Imagine you’re interviewing for one of your US offices. It’s going great. The candidate is making lots of eye contact, talks eloquently about their accomplishments, and directly discusses salary so you know you’re on the same page. They leave with a firm handshake, and you’re resolved to make them an offer.
Then imagine you’re interviewing for the same role in Japan. In Japanese culture, too much eye contact is often considered disrespectful. Humility is a cultural norm. An emphasis on patience, respect, and indirect communication means salary negotiations look extremely different. Bows are often favoured over handshakes.
Without a great understanding of cultural differences and norms, you might overlook or inadvertently offend this brilliant Japanese candidate — and your role would go unfilled.
Roll that same situation across your global hiring. How many opportunities would you miss, unless you have a deep cultural understanding of where you operate?
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Or imagine you hire the US candidate for the role in Japan.
Their interview was great, right? But then they struggle to fit into the team; their colleagues find them difficult to collaborate with, and their communication style causes more problems than it solves.
Engagement plummets and other team members start to leave. And now suddenly you have a much bigger problem. And through all this, you’re still dealing with Japanese customers, so the changing team dynamic has a real-term impact on customer satisfaction. Now your Japan office isn’t hitting its revenue targets, but there’s no real clarity on why.
Big business problems so often start with tiny sparks. That’s why it’s so critical for global organisations to arm themselves with local knowledge, to build a genuinely successful hiring function.
Five situations when local knowledge matters for global hiring
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- Job adverts
Think you can just translate your existing job adverts verbatim into the other languages you operate in? Not really. And what about pictures and videos? Candidates from different cultures might be put off by the same content other candidates find appealing.
Job descriptions and expectations can differ culturally, and missteps here can result in fewer applications or worse, actively damage your employer brand and reputation.
- Candidate communications
How do you handle an automated rejection email in France compared to India? Does a candidate from the Philippines expect personalised interview feedback versus the UK? How can you convince that brilliant applicant to attend an interview in Poland versus Mexico?
Not understanding local norms when you communicate with candidates can hurt your chances of positive outcomes, damage the candidate experience, and spiral into brand damage.
- Resumes/CVs
Post a role in the US, and you might be inundated with snappy one-to-two page resumes summarising pertinent info. Post the same role in Europe and you’re more likely inundated with comprehensive tomes with extensive detail about personal info, education, qualifications and career history.
You probably have a good idea what a “good” resume looks like. But “good” is a relative term. If you don’t fully appreciate cultural norms, you might disregard excellent applicants that could’ve been great.
- Background screening
Pre-hire checks and background screening is essential for safe, compliant recruitment.
But what checks do you need in the UK versus the US, for example? Or Australia versus New Zealand? Singapore or the Philippines? Where does Right to Work matter? What do you need to know about GDPR? Does Singapore’s MoM process impact you?
If you don’t understand the local rules around global background screening, you risk falling foul of local regulations. And worse, you risk hiring people who aren’t safe or suitable, which can be extremely costly.
(Discover the four biggest costs of hiring mistakes in banking and finance).
- Onboarding
Onboarding is the lever that makes recruitment pay off — so it’s pretty crucial, to say the least.
Get onboarding right, and you’ll have happier, more productive new hires, faster. But get onboarding wrong, and you’ll likely struggle with high time-lost to training, low productivity, and high early turnover.
But “right” and “wrong” are culturally relative. What does a Filipino new hire need to feel valued and supported to thrive compared to Spaniard or a Canadian? Good global onboarding isn’t one-country-fits-all.
Make life easier with the right ‘local global’ partners
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Most global recruitment teams are spinning lots of plates, so localising your end-to-end recruitment process can feel like a pipe dream. And it’s true there’s no single answer (apart from “more recruitment budget, please!” 👀).
Big business problems so often start with tiny sparks. That’s why it’s so critical for global organisations to arm themselves with local knowledge, to build a genuinely successful hiring function.
But choosing the right partners can go a long way, giving local expertise to help you navigate global hiring safely and successfully. For example:
- In-country recruitment agencies
- Native localisation for job adverts and comms
- Local background screening providers
Here’s where economies of global scale matter though. Working with local partners for every country you operate in is probably unsustainable, unless you have endless spare hours for vendor management.
You’ll typically find it more practical to choose partners with global coverage, offering local expertise but from one place.
That’s one of the things we consistently hear customers love most about working with Veremark for background screening.
- Headquartered in the UK, we have regional teams across the globe so we can provide local expertise and timely support.
- Conducting checks in over 180 countries, we’re culturally and legally attuned to everywhere you hire.
- We have a deep understanding of local and industry regulations and often-changing global sanctions.
- We work closely with government bodies and banks locally and globally, which means we can process checks much faster.
Veremark gives you one modern platform for total global screening compliance, wherever you hire, in whatever industry, and for whichever roles. One vendor relationship; one contract; consistent, clear costs. Lots of safe, successful new hires.
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FAQs
Yes, employers can check a candidate's credit history, particularly for positions that entail financial responsibilities, provided they have the candidate's consent.
In most cases, an employer is required to inquire about a job applicant's criminal history. However, employers must get a candidate's permission before conducting a police check.
According to the Privacy Act, a person's criminal history is deemed sensitive information. Therefore, firms must get permission from candidates before doing a police criminal record check or gathering information about a candidate’s criminal history.
Yes, background checks are legal in Singapore, but employers must comply with the Personal Data Protection Act (PDPA) and obtain consent from the applicant before conducting checks.
The Philippines requires employers to pay a 13th-month to all rank-and-file employees by December 24th each year, equal to one-twelfth of the employee's annual basic salary.
Yes, Veremark specialises in providing comprehensive and compliant background checks that meet all UK legal requirements. Our processes are designed to be thorough, ensuring that your business adheres to regulatory standards efficiently.
Yes, conducting background checks helps employers ensure that they adhere to employment laws by verifying the qualifications and legal work status of their employees. Background checks also reduce the risk of hiring someone who might later commit a crime or gross misconduct that can lead to legal problems.
To ensure compliance with local privacy laws, companies in the Philippines should obtain written consent from candidates before conducting background checks. They should also limit the scope of the check to information relevant to the job role and ensure secure handling and storage of personal data. Consulting with legal experts on the Data Privacy Act of 2012 and adhering to its provisions is advisable to maintain privacy compliance.
Carrying out a background check in Australia and New Zealand can be a complicated and lengthy process, but with Veremark's automated platform this can be achieved quicker, with less risk and is next to no work for your team.
Veremark offers comprehensive, scalable background checks with fast results and legal compliance, helping you make informed hiring decisions quickly.
FAQs
This depends on the industry and type of role you are recruiting for. To determine whether you need reference checks, identity checks, bankruptcy checks, civil background checks, credit checks for employment or any of the other background checks we offer, chat to our team of dedicated account managers.
Many industries have compliance-related employment check requirements. And even if your industry doesn’t, remember that your staff have access to assets and data that must be protected. When you employ a new staff member you need to be certain that they have the best interests of your business at heart. Carrying out comprehensive background checking helps mitigate risk and ensures a safer hiring decision.
Again, this depends on the type of checks you need. Simple identity checks can be carried out in as little as a few hours but a worldwide criminal background check for instance might take several weeks. A simple pre-employment check package takes around a week. Our account managers are specialists and can provide detailed information into which checks you need and how long they will take.
All Veremark checks are carried out online and digitally. This eliminates the need to collect, store and manage paper documents and information making the process faster, more efficient and ensures complete safety of candidate data and documents.
In a competitive marketplace, making the right hiring decisions is key to the success of your company. Employment background checks enables you to understand more about your candidates before making crucial decisions which can have either beneficial or catastrophic effects on your business.
Background checks not only provide useful insights into a candidate’s work history, skills and education, but they can also offer richer detail into someone’s personality and character traits. This gives you a huge advantage when considering who to hire. Background checking also ensures that candidates are legally allowed to carry out certain roles, failed criminal and credit checks could prevent them from working with vulnerable people or in a financial function.
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