Despite today's unsettled global economic climate, companies continue to send employees on international assignments, the thinking being that international assignments are expensive, but worth it. The problem is that it is difficult to determine how the benefits and costs compare, and thus establish what the return on investment is for organisations. And, without a clear understanding of the return, it is difficult for an organisation to determine how effective its expatriate programme is as part of its overall talent management strategy.
With this in mind, PwC's Saratoga Institute—in partnership with Cranfield School of Management in the UK—set about the task of developing an understanding of expatriate return on investment in greater detail. The result is Measuring the value of international assignments, a powerful tool both for internal strategic management and external benchmarking.
In addition to its key research findings, the study provides analysis in four key areas:
- Assignee selection and purpose of assignments
- Performance during the assignment
- Investment
- Repatriation, retention and career development
And, to provide greater insight, Cranfield has also included a number of mini case studies in the report, based upon the experience of the participant organisations.
