What's the future of relocation?

What were your first thoughts in answering the question of "what is the future of relocation?" Bleak? Murky? More expensive? More challenging? Better than ever? Tech based? Have no idea? 

Well, despite the pandemic raging on, many people are relocating, heading off on an assignment, or taking an internship. "On hold" moves are well past their peak and continuing to change their status to "active." Companies are continuing to need talent in specific locations and maybe now more than ever, talent is requesting to move to locations where they want to work from as companies are more open to this idea/reality. With people being motivated to "move to" or "move away" — or some combination of the two — this been an extremely busy summer (peak) season, especially due to those people who had been "on hold" that joined the summer rush volume. As more and more countries leverage vaccines and we all get more comfortable traveling in this environment, we anticipate seeing business travel continue to slowly pick up, along with international mobility activity.

But what exactly does the future of relocation look like? The answer to that question might look different depending on whether you are considering the near-term versus the more distant (dare we say, "post-pandemic") future. In the short-term, mobility teams are being challenged to manage and solve for:

• increased fears and concerns related to risk where there is an even higher level of concern for program compliance and duty of care for mobile employees;
• elevated costs for providing the same set of benefits, (think real estate, rental costs, supply chain challenges due to pandemic, etc.);
• the need for new technologies that allow for better experiences and greater flexibility;
• employee, stakeholder, shareholder and consumer demands for addressing ESG-related topics like sustainability, social and racial equity, gender imbalances and a gamut of DEI initiatives;
• adjusting to shifting priorities within the company and HR 

To answer the question, it might also be helpful to look around to see what people are saying about the future of HR. Recently, Ben Heller, CEO of PricePoint, shared via LinkedIn his learnings from the recent SHRM Conference. Ben mentions that, "There’s data that shows between 40 and 55% of employees are thinking of leaving their jobs this year. SHRM members have seen the war on talent shift to favor the employees. That increases the stress on HR, and makes having a strategic HR department that helps you attract and retain top talent more important." Talent mobility then becomes a strategic tool to leverage when recruiting, securing, managing, developing and retaining critical employees. This has been a strategic goal for a long time, so while this is not new, what is new is that employee demographics have changed. The entire work environment is in the midst of huge change, meaning new solutions are needed to come from talent mobility programs. We spoke to this in a recent post: Three ways global mobility can help to attract and retain key talent in the midst of the "Great Resignation."

For considering the long-term outlook for relocation, the value of asking the right questions has probably never been more important than it is today. Often referred to as the "outside/in approach," mobility needs to gather insights from customers, clients, employees, partners and even competitors to properly identify what is and will be needed further into the future. Many of the items listed above as current challenges are not likely to get solved completely in the near term, so staged solutions that build toward longer-term visions will lay the foundation for the future world of relocation.

If you are interested in the topic and are looking for more food for thought, consider that the IAM Conference (virtual and in person) is coming between October 13-16 and Susan Benevides, CEO of Plus Relocation, will join a live panel on stage for the session “Global Mobility Leaders Discuss The Future of Relocation!” That session will be on October 14, from 12:30-2 p.m. CST. The session will be moderated by Ben Cross, host of LOVE + RELO and CEO of GLOMO. Topics will include how the future of work and business travel will shape relocation requirements and what strategies we need to implement to win in the future.