Talent & Tech Asia Summit 2024
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The most common reasons why mobility assignments fail

One in three (33%) of 163 global mobility leaders from organisations such as AbbVie, Bayer, and Cipla, say mobility assignments fail because of family-related issues.

Poor candidate selection (18%) and inability to adapt to the host location (18%) were the next two factors most commonly responsible for assignments not going as planned.

However, among Asia Pacific based respondents, the second most common barrier to assignment success was, in fact, compensation-related dissatisfaction (18%).

The new 2016 trends survey by Brookfield Global Relocation Services also points to job expectations not being met (10%) and security as safety concerns (10%) as other reasons cited for assignment failure among APAC respondents.

The report uncovered another possible reason for assignment failure - more than two in three APAC respondents don't document the objectives expected from a mobility assignment (67%), similar to a global average of 62%.

The reasons for this? No process in place, admitted the mobility managers (67%), while 33% simply didn't consider this step important enough.

The report delved into the kind of family-related issues that derail mobility assignments, to identify countries with the greatest challenges for assignees (globally):

  1. China - 19%
  2. Brazil - 7%
  3. India - 7%
  4. Russia - 6%
  5. Saudi Arabia - 5%
  6. United States - 5%
  7. Mexico - 4%
  8. Indonesia - 3%
  9. Singapore - 3%
  10. United Arab Emirates - 3%
Some of the verbatim comments shared around assignments in these locations:
  1. China: "Tier 3 cities do not have international education available… Quality of living issues… Airquality, access to healthcare… Cultural and environment adaptation… Costs… Air pollutionconcerns for family… Language and access to international schools."
  2. India: "Location issues; we offer more home trips than normal for this location… Culture… Lack of spouse work options and cultural adapting… Cultural differences, local living standards… Operating in everyday life is difficult due to general hardship levels of the country."
  3. Indonesia: "Immigration… Work visa, not accepting same-sex marriages, high crime rate… Security, culture… Cost and infrastructure… Emerging country, safety, remoteness of area."
Closer home in Asia Pacific, the hardest location to send assignees to was Indonesia (16%).

APAC mobility managers also voted equally for Brazil, China, Japan, Papua New Guinea, and Sweden as the second hardest location to relocation employees to (at 9% each).

Mobility programme details

Image: Shutterstock

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