Word Count: 5710
Transnational Terrain:
“Ortsinn” and Global Career Development as a Driver of Emergent Strategies of Globalization
by
Allen D. Engle, Sr.
011 BTC
Eastern Kentucky University
521 Lancaster Avenue
Richmond, Kentucky 40475 USA
Mark E. Mendenhall
University of Tennessee, Chattanooga
615 McCallie Avenue
Chattanooga, Tennessee, 37405 USA
Richard L. Powers
011 BTC
Eastern Kentucky University
521 Lancaster Avenue
Richmond, Kentucky 40475 USA
Word count: 5710
Transnational Terrain:
“Ortsinn” and Global Career Development as a Driver of Emergent Strategies of Globalization
Introduction – Strategic International Human Resource Management (SIHRM) in Search of a Strategic Role
Researchers have been enthralled over the past decade with the promise of “strategic” international human resource management (SIHRM) (Wright, Snell & Dyer, 2005). Some authors argue that a direct link connecting corporate strategy with human resource management (HRM) models, processes and practices, is one of the major factors that distinguishes HRM from the field of personnel management (Brewster & Larsen, 2000: Chapter 1, Chapter 5; Jackson, 2002: Chapter 11). Yet, scholars have found that postulating prescriptive paths between strategy and patterns of HRM practices remains problematic. Beyond generalizations such as, “SIHRM must ‘fit’ or match corporate strategy,” or “generic strategies of defender, analyzer or prospector must be accommodated by bundles of SHRM practices,” or that “SHRM varies systematically with specific corporate level strategic control practices,” much remains to be understood regarding the complex relationship between strategy and HR practices in a global context (Brewster, Sparrow & Harris, 2005; Budhwar & Sparrow, 2002; Martin-Alcazar, et al., 2005: Scullion & Starkey, 2000).
In contrast, a wide range of scholars in the international strategy field have abandoned the strategic paradigms and assumptions of the last 30 years and are developing new models, perspectives and imagery to capture the complexities of consolidated global firms reacting to hypercompetitive environments (Bowman, Ward & Kakabadse, 2002: Hafsi & Thomas, 2005: Lamberg & Parvinen, 2003: Mintzberg, 1994; Rugman & Hodgetts, 2001). Research in this compelling yet dynamic field may be characterized as a veritable “Tower of Babel populated by strategic researchers” (Hafsi & Thomas, 2005: 511).
Some recent conceptualizations in the domain of global strategy may have useful implications for SHRM practice. Transnational approaches emphasize integrated differentiation and the tightly coordinated roles of global culture guru, regional mentor and local entrepreneur acting in concert to identify and disseminated innovations while balancing the dual perspectives of global standardization and local differentiation (Bartlett, Ghoshal & Beamish, 2008: 775-793; Ghoshal & Bartlett, 1997: 210-242). The actions of these actors produces “strategic movement” such that local entrepreneurs and regional mentors are as likely to initiate significant changes (innovations) in products, markets, functions and processes as are the global culture gurus operating out of corporate headquarters. Centralized command and control is thus replaced by integrated interdependence and reliance on a combination of “hard” (policies, procedures, job structures) and “soft” (cultural, role-based and normative) controls (Ghoshal & Bartlett, 1997: 299-318; Nohria & Ghoshal, 1997: 113-170). Interpersonal networks, social capital, competencies, and low and high tech shared integrative techniques are the decentralized control processes practiced in these types of firms.
Metanational firms go even farther in decentralizing and decomposing strategic decision processes in pursuit of global innovative opportunities (Doz, Santos & Williamson, 2001). Roaming “sensing units” act as “explorers” seeking out unpredictably embedded knowledge sources from around the world (Doz, Santos & Williamson, 2001: 77). Once identified, these customer or locally created innovative processes and products are passed on the second group of “magnet” units charged with “mobilizing” innovations and converting these innovative resources into viable production process, products and services (Doz, Santos & Williamson, 2001: 78-81). These global account teams then coordinate with a third and final group of “farmer” units responsible for ramping up these processes and making those modifications necessary to “be adapted and used by any customer for a wide variety of . . . applications”(Doz, Santos & Williamson, 2001: 61-63). This emergent, opportunistic approach to strategy requires local units to constantly be sensitive to the potential for locally uncovered innovations and resources with potential for global application and to be motivated to pass on these resources to the business processing and globalizing units.
These models, by implication, create a new strategic context for SIHRM. Rather than being a passive recipient of a centrally planned strategy, a wide range of managers must be able to develop and maintain a perspective that combines an in depth understanding of local events – as these events may relate to opportunities for competitive innovations – in a more sweeping global context – understanding the roles, expectations and activities of other local employees, regional functional or product coordinators, and global executives at corporate headquarters (Black & Gregersen, 2000). Emergent, opportunistic, decentralized strategies of globalization create a strategic need for knowledge networks that initiate change and control processes in unpredictable, chaotic conditions (Brown, 2003).
This paper addresses the implications of the emerging views from the international strategy literature on an important variable of SHRM: international assignments and careers. We will argue that global career development and international assignments must be reconceptualized – or, more accurately – our existing conceptualizations must be clarified and made more precise in order to serve the context of decentralized, opportunistic strategies (Morley & Heraty, 2004).
In the traditional approach to conceptualizing SHRM, strategy drove career planning activities in a simplistic cause (strategic plan) and effect (career assignment) manner (Joinson, 1998). We propose that career activities that not only seek to implement today’s strategic intentions but also that continually seek out resources and material for new strategic innovations are critical to a more robust understanding of SHRM. Applying strands from expatriation, competence, and knowledge management literature we will next present a model of international assignments congruent with these emergent strategies of globalization.
Expatriation and Strategic Intent
Expatriation literature has long presented the need to: 1) develop a global mindset (Harzing, 2001: Osland, Bird, Mendenhall & Osland, 2006; Paul, 2000; Stroh, et al., 2005: 4-7), 2) facilitate developing high potentials (Caligiuri, 2006), 3) act in an integrating capacity (Au & Fukuda, 2002; Bonache, et al., 2001: 5-6); Stroh, et al., 2005: 7-9), as well as 4) facilitate innovation and learning transfers (Bonache & Brewster, 2001; Boncahe, et al., 2001: 6-7; Minbaeva & Michailova, 2004; Riusala & Suutari, 2004; Stroh, et al., 2005: 9-12) as critical reasons for utilizing international assignments. Additionally, the nature of international assignments is increasingly being recognized as being of a protean form as short term assignments are increasingly being measured in days or weeks, and international commuting (particularly within Europe and Asia) and rotating assignments are seen as being strategically critical forms of international assignments (Forester, 2000; Harris & Holden, 2001; Oddou, Mendenhall & Ritcher, 2000; Tahvanainen, Welch & Worm, 2005). The potential impact of expatriates on local employees (DeNisi, Toh & Connelly, 2006), the strategic criticality of repatriation processes (Blakeney, Oddou & Osland, 2006), self initiated assignments as part of a discussion of “boundaryless” careers (Stahl & Chua, 2006), and the “inpatriation” of host and third country nationals to corporate headquarters (Harvey & Novicevic, 2006a; 2006b) have all added to the complexity of the heretofore simplistic construct of “international assignment”.
Those competencies related to success in international assignments have also been the subject of some considerable research and discussion (Engle, et al., 2001; Hechanova, Beehr, & Christiansen, 2003; Mendenhall, Kuhlmann, Stahl, & Osland, 2002; Mendenhall & Oddou, 1985; Thomas, 1998). In the global leadership field, the competencies of inquisitiveness, personal character, flexibility of thought, business savvy, empathy, openmindedness, behavioral flexibility, tolerance for ambiguity, curiosity, cognitive complexity, reflectiveness, and learning capabilities have been found to be critical for working well globally (Mendenhall, Kuhlmann & Stahl, 2001; Mendenhall & Osland, 2002; Osland, Bird, Mendenhall, & Osland, 2006). A review of global leadership competencies by Jokinen (2005) concludes with a tri-level model consisting of 1) “core” qualities (self awareness, engagement in personal transformation, entrepreneurial spirit, inquisitiveness); 2) “desired mental characteristics” (optimism, self regulation, social judgment skills, empathy, motivation to work in an international environment); and 3) concrete “behavioral” competencies ( social skills, networking skills, technical knowledge, knowledge of people and cultural differences, and – germane to our subsequent presentation – the knowledge of organization and the knowledge of business). Knowledge of organization is “knowledge of worldwide organization (Black, et al., 1999), total organization astuteness, recognizing the key . . . processes, systems, procedures and methods , , , linking activities . . . [and] . . . an awareness of . . . strategic roles of different business units and competitive advantage world wide . . . “ (Jokinen, 2005: 210). Knowledge of business is described as “knowledge of international business issues . . , coping with the interdependence of business activity around the world . . . understanding business systems . . . , recognizing business opportunities around the world (Black, et al., 1999), . . . staying abreast of world standards of competition and knowing what it takes to match and beat those standards . . . understanding the global nature of one’s business and being able to analyze current trends/market conditions . . . “ (Jokinen, 2005: 210). The author concludes the review with a discussion of the critical importance of direct experiences in a wide range of international assignments in order to develop these competencies.
This stream of research clearly reflects the criticality of an individual’s global skills or “global mindset” as being prerequisite to both creating valid global strategies and as being part of the implementation of a global strategy. Given that these competencies are related to organization knowledge and business knowledge, and given the newfound role of career assignments in dually implementing strategy while uncovering opportunistic emergent strategies visualized by transnational and metanational theorists, we frame the competencies derived from studies in the expatriate and global leadership fields by utilizing von Clausewitz’s concept of “Ortsinn.”
Ortsinn: A Proposed Model
Von Clausewitz, the legendary Prussian military strategist, defined Ortsinn as: “a sense of locality” – “the power of quickly forming a correct geometrical idea of any portion of country, and consequently of being able to find one’s place in it exactly at any time” (1968: 153). At the risk of overemphasizing the military origins of the term, selected examples from military history may illuminate the construct in its global context. In an analysis of British naval performance in the Napoleonic wars, Adam Nicolson attributes British fleet successes during the period to “a cultural and not a technical advantage . . . [built upon the] . . . power of the individual ‘emulation to excel’ with which the 18th century had coloured the English heart” (2005: 184). Aggressive actions by officers, tempered by fierce coordinative discipline, were culturally and economically rewarded (honor, zeal, an institutionally accepted propensity to apply violence and discipline, as well as prize money) while a lack of aggressive coordination in the fleet was systematically punished (dishonor, forced retirement, execution for mutiny or cowardice in the face of the enemy). Sir R.S.S. Baden-Powell created the Scouts in 1906 – with the interesting motto “be prepared” – as an outcome of his firsthand assessment of the shortcomings of the British expeditionary forces when opposed by the Boer guerrillas during the Boer war. In his assessment a lack of “woodcraft” and outdoor skills by the largely urban British soldiers led to a competitive disadvantage when fighting the Boer farmers (Manchester, 1983; Pakenham, 1979). What experiences, or competencies related to a predisposition for “global competitive-mindedness” exist, that can be likened to those “woodcraft” skills that were applied to a particular military strategy? Global managers must see local terrain not as a tourist sees a region or nation, but rather as an opportunistic “hunter” might reconnaissance the terrain. Given individuals identified with this general predisposition to a globally competitive mind set, the global firm must
Carefully design international experiences to hone those skills to the specific cultural, functional and product/industry need unique to the particular firm.
Ortsinn applied to SHRM issues may be seen as the “global mind set” custom yoked to a firm-specific transnational or metanational context (Aycan, 2001; Pucik & Saba, 1998). Ortsinn thus is a balanced cultural, functional and product competency set (Engle, et al., 2001) that allows the local manager to be sensitive to the global strategic potential or implications inherent in a local location, relationship, process or resource. It is a combined cognitive, attitudinal and affective perceptual model-in-use attuned to a global firm’s specific strategic template. Beyond a global awareness, the construct also stresses the competitive mentality as the global perspective is focused on strategic advantage. Competitive-minded, globally aware individuals must be identified and then socialized into the global firm’s organizational and business knowledge.
Please see Figure 1 for an illustration of selected issues related to developing a capacity for “global ortsinn” amongst global managers.
Recruitment and Selection
In addition to recruitment based on those global competencies described in our review of the literature above, “ortsinn” stresses competencies related to “strategic thought”, “business and organization knowledge and competitive mindset. In combination with an externally focused competitive mind set, likely recruits should have a firm focused systems mentality – sensitivity to interdependencies within the far flung and differentiated network of part making up the “requisite complexity” of the global firm (Nohria & Ghoshal, 1997: 181-187). We relate this quality to a capacity to abstract complex competitive scenarios in “case studies” and a comfort with case study processes. Potential labor pools for competitive mindedness may be found in marketing or sales personnel while a systems mentality may be found in units related to distributions and logistics -at the heart of the firm’s value chain (Porter, 2008: 308-321) or even in decision support systems personnel (Peppard & Rylander, 2001). We are aware of no extant research on this intriguing issue in transnational recruitment and selection.