International human resource management refers to the overall direction the organization wishes to pursue in achieving its objective through people.
During the course students are expected to complete a team project. The Team project will involve researching below important aspects of Strategic Human Resource Management:
1. Gather relevant information about strategic human resource management in an international company
a. Firm vision and goals
b. Performance management
c. Organizational change
d. Ethics
e. International practices and diversity
f. Recruitment and selections
g. Learning & Development
h. Rewards
i. Relations and regulations
2. Provide recommendations to the current Human Resource Management strategy. Recommendations will help improve the firm’s results and the achievement of the firm’s vision and goals
e. International practices and diversity: Please expand this section and add more concepts from the book. Massage the diversity section and further address the international practices.
Siample
International Practices and Diversity
Uber has international offices in London, Sao Paulo, Mexico City, Amsterdam, and Singapore, and operates in roughly 77 countries including 616 cities worldwide. Uber is known globally to be a part of the “gig economy.” The gig economy, as defined by Cambridge dictionary, is “a way of working… based on people having temporary jobs or doing separate pieces of work, each paid separately, rather than working for an employer.” Uber’s international strategy is parallel with their business plan in the United States.
According to Sarah Kessler, Uber has adopted “algorithmic management” since its start in 2009 (Fast Company). Algorithmic management allows independent drivers to be paired with passengers that are nearby in a matter of minutes. As well, prices/rates change based on where the demand surges. Uber drivers can conveniently partake in this so long as they have reliable internet speed on their mobile phones. Drivers are evaluated by passengers as soon as their ride is complete. Drivers are rated based on a 5-star rating system and are evaluated on their driving skills and behavior. Algorithmic management allows for relatively few managers in each major city to watch over hundreds/thousands of drivers (Carnegie Mellon University). Regardless of using this type of management, however, Uber has earned itself a negative reputation as perceived by the public and many of its own employees. To combat this, Uber should consider implementing global diversity training as is mentioned in the text. Uber drivers/employees can gain meaningful skills through such training and steer away from the negative reputation.
Uber uses an aggressive process strategy for its international expansion. According to Adam Henshall, “the car hire app engages in ruthless guerrilla marketing, setting up in new locations at any cost” (Process St.). This process is unethical in addition to all of those issues mentioned in the previous Ethics section. In response to Uber’s aggressive process strategy, the company has been banned in many countries around the world. If Uber would like to continue as the number one ride sharing company in the years to come, it ought to reconsider many of its business practices.
Our best recommendation for this issue would be that Uber develop a global diversity management (Crawshaw, 210). Uber can use this type of management to understand the policies and practices that a certain country operates with.
Uber has received a lot of criticism over the years for not releasing its diversity numbers since its inception in 2009. According to Polina Marinova from Fortune.com, Uber finally released its diversity numbers on March 28, 2017. The results for the gender aspect provide the following results: men 63.9%, and women, 36.1% of the global Uber workforce. For race and ethnicity, 49.8% are White, 30.9% are Asian, 8.8% are Black, 5.6% are Hispanic, and 4.3% are multiracial. To gain a better image, Uber’s Human Resource Management needs to “reflect the growing interest in the concept of inclusion, rather than just focusing on diversity statistics” (Crawshaw, 203).