Eric Christopher, Associate Director of Global Human Resources Development at Tex-Mark, was sitting in his car in

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Eric Christopher, Associate Director of Global Human Resources Development at Tex-Mark, was sitting in his car in an early morning traffic jam. He had thought that if he left his house at 7:00 am, he would have beaten the heavy commuter traffic into downtown San Antonio. The explanation for the long queue was announced by the radio traffic service. A large portable crane, used to place concrete barriers around roadworks, had overturned and incoming and outgoing traffic would be paralyzed for at least an hour. Eric had ended up at Tex-Mark, a manufacturer and supplier of computer inputs and outputs, through an indirect career route. Raised in the Hill Country Village district of San Antonio, Eric graduated from Churchill High School and Baylor University in Waco, Texas, with a major in History and a minor in Spanish. His maternal grandmother lived in Tennessee, but she was born and raised in Edinburgh, Scotland, and Eric had spent several summers while he was in high school and college backpacking through Europe. His facility with languages was impressive and he had excellent working use of Spanish, French, Italian and German. He could converse in Cantonese, a result of working at a noodle restaurant during college, and had started a Mandarin tutoring course last fall. Upon graduation, Eric backpacked through Europe and South America until he ran out of money. Upon returning to Dallas, he took a ticketing job at Southwest Airlines and was quickly transferred to the training unit. After four successful years at Southwest, he was contacted by a headhunter for a position as a global development assistant at Tex-Mark. The promised combination of global travel, more money, and a return to San Antonio proved irresistible, and Eric had been with Tex-Mark for five years. His career progress to date has been outstanding, despite the additional workload he imposed on himself by pursuing master's studies at UT, San Antonio, as a part-time student. Tex-Mark had begun as a spin-off company of IME Computers in the late 1970s. Patents combined with engineering excellence, an outstanding institutional sales staff, cost-sensitive production and pricing, all combined to make Tex -Mark a major force in the optical printer and scanner industry. Tex-Mark inherited a production facility in San Antonio from IME, but the company also had international production facilities operating in three countries: Monterrey, Mexico, Leith, Scotland and, most recently, Jaipur, India. A major new facility was planned to begin production in Wuhu, China, late next year. New product research and development activities were divided between headquarters in San Antonio, a printing center in Durham, North Carolina, and an optical research "center of excellence" in Edinburgh, Scotland. The main sales, distribution and customer service centers have recently expanded into Asia and are now located in Reims, France; in Memphis, Tennessee; in Sydney, Australia; in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil; in Hong Kong and in Tel Aviv, Israel. Faced with the long delay, Eric lowered the volume on the radio, turned up the air conditioning, and called his office with the car's hands-free phone to inform them of his situation. Fortunately, his personal assistant was already at work, so Eric was able to rearrange his schedule. He asked that the 10:30 meeting with Fred Banks, a plant engineer recently repatriated from Jaipur, be delayed by an hour. His biggest concern was a 2:00 teleconference meeting with his director, who was visiting the sales center in Memphis, and the other four members of the executive career development team in San Antonio. The overall theme was a review and evaluation of training and development strategies for expatriate professionals and managers as a result of Tex-Mark's growth and the new shift of production to Asia. Eric had indirectly heard that Juanita Roberto, the vice president of human resources, wanted to reduce costs and that her delegates on the team would push for simplified training programs (Eric had translated this in his head as cheaper), shorter expatriate assignments, and a faster HCN whenever possible. . Although Eric had prepared for this crucial meeting, he needed to incorporate some information from the files in his office. The radio announcer broke into Eric's thoughts, commenting that overextending or carrying too much weight probably caused the crane to tip over. 'I can relate to that,' Eric thought to himself. Eric's meeting with Fred Banks had not gone well. Fred was one of the last 'IME legacies', an IME engineer who stayed at Tex-Mark after the split in 1978. Fred had been a bright and promising young engineer back then and was one of the first people elected to go to Scotland in 1983. He was so successful in getting that facility up and running in an eleven-month assignment that he was named principal engineer of the team that went to Mexico in 1989. The three-year Mexican project was not so easy. Certainly, there were many unavoidable economic uncertainties during that period. Reviewing the files, Eric felt that a big part of the problem was that Fred's team did not relate well to his Mexican counterparts. Besides, The Tex-Mark team did not treat local and national government agencies with sufficient respect and sensitivity. Eric noted that permits and authorizations that should have taken weeks instead took six months or more. After the Mexican project, Fred stayed in San Antonio with occasional trips to Durham, North Carolina. His assignment to India in 1999 was purely by chance, as a last-minute replacement for another engineer whose father was diagnosed with a serious cancer about two weeks before the family left for the mission. Eric had helped design the pre-departure training program for the original candidate and had even included a week-long visit for the candidate and his wife. Today, Fred was angry and disappointed that an 18-month assignment in India had turned into a 3-year assignment, and that a research position at Durham 'promised' by a previous VP (two VPs ago) was taken by a Younger Durham. resident employee. Eric bluntly responded that the 18-month assignment had become a 3-year assignment largely due to Fred's unwillingness to train and transfer responsibilities to local engineers and his inability to work constructively with federal regulators. and district in India. The conversation took a hostile turn and although Eric did not lose his temper, he was concerned by Fred's final comment: "If this is how you treat people willing to go abroad, you will never get your best engineers to leave San Antonio." . . As he prepared for the 2:00 pm meeting, Eric reviewed the unofficial, but “standard,” expatriate training program that he had been instrumental in developing over the past three years (see Exhibit A 6 ). It was not mandatory. With the Chinese operation increasing the number of expatriate assignments, Eric realized that Tex-Mark should have a more formal policy regarding international assignments. Feedback from interviews and conversations with Tex-Mark employees with experiences in the country was mixed. Some had converted to longer-term mentoring arrangements, but other expats had not found it useful. Still, it was a cheap way to provide information. The language courses were problematic. On too many occasions, there was no time: employees left the country. Halfway through his language courses, he remembered the idea of more "extensive" assignments that required more "comprehensive" and "rigorous" preparation from an MBA course he took last year. China is obviously a more challenging and difficult task than France, but can we differentiate treatment based on cultural difficulty? More importantly, Eric wondered, How can I suggest we make our training more rigorous given Juanita Roberto's focus on cost? Even if I win on this point, how will I answer when asked what methods or activities constitute more 'rigorous' training? Finally, what is the role of language training? Eric knew that not everyone adapted to languages the way he did, and that Mandarin is not Spanish. Finally, has the time come to raise the question of repatriation? The meeting with Fred had been disturbing. Eric knew that today's briefing and advisory sessions had a reputation for being more "tell and sell" than a meaningful exchange of ideas and views. Senior management had recently noted that this was a growing "problem." Eric had planned to collect data on returnee turnover. Perhaps this should be given higher priority. After all, how could Tex-Mark decide to plan international assignments, involving more TCN moves and the transfer of HCN to its US operations for training and development, without considering repatriation?

Tex-Mark Corporation Policy for Expatriate Preparation and Support During Assignment Pre-departure Activities: A. AS 'Country Briefings'. Outsourced to a consulting firm in San Antonio that had experience dealing with the countries in which Tex-Mark operated. Tex-Mark was willing to pay for four sessions, each one hour long. B. 'Reading tasks'. Three to four books (depending on region of assignment) on national or regional culture and/or business in the focal region. Spouses/accompanying partners had access to a similar library. C. Interviews and conversations with Tex-Mark employees with experiences in the country. D. Language courses. Attendance at elective "survival level" language classes. These courses last 8 to 12 weeks, with 3 course sessions per week. Tex-Mark will also pay for spouses/partners. In-Country Training and Development: Upon arrival, Tex-Mark staff at the local operation will assist the accompanying spouse/partner with job search activities. They will help find acceptable school situations for children. Wherever possible, Tex-Mark staff will endeavor to provide a social support network. Repatriation: Upon return, all expatriates must undergo a professional briefing and counseling session with human resources staff. This must be carried out within two months after the person re-enters the place of residence.

Questions: Answer all 5 questions (12 points each). As Eric:

Questions

1. Summarize your thoughts on the issues at hand, alternative solutions, and your strategy for how to proceed in the next meeting.

2. How will your proposal solve the problems you have defined?

3. How can you defend your solution from budget concerns? How is your approach both a solution to expatriate problems at Tex-Mark and a good economic investment? Exit the role and answer the following:

4. Does Eric's personal background help you in your evaluation of the problems he faces? 5. Would you have approached this situation differently? If so, what benefits would his different approach provide for Tex-Mark?