Any global business needs to make a policy decision on the approach and management of its global employment documents. This often involves balancing the extent to which it can usefully harmonise its documentation and HR processes against the constraints and benefits of local law and custom. Although harmonisation can help to achieve consistency and greater efficiency for Human Resources, this may be at the cost of some local risk management or the granting of enhanced rights to employees beyond the local legal requirements.
We understand the issues here and the need to balance these competing interests. We are experienced in managing the implementation of many employment documents projects. In particular we take care to establish from the outset the key objectives of Human Resources and/or in-house counsel. We provide clear advise to clients on which policies and practices can or cannot be harmonised in most jurisdictions but equally we are always able to find a commercial and practical solution in order to achieve the client’s objectives and its preferred approach to employment practice and documents. Our expertise is based on our long track record of advising on and project managing document harmonisation projects across many jurisdictions.
Services
We provide clients with advice on global employment document review and implementation:
- initial project management proposals and cost estimates
- audits and risk assessments of employment documents and practice
- harmonising and/or reviewing all types of employment documents and practice, from a single issue (such as restrictive covenants or mobility) to a full scale harmonisation of contracts of employment and handbooks in multiple jurisdictions
-
reviewing and updating country specific employment documents, policies or legal issues
- reviewing, updating and implementing global and country specific data protection and privacy policies
- reviewing global corporate policy documentation for instance on bribery, ethics, business conduct and equity plans
- advising on strategy and process for implementing new documents
- advising on risk management processes in particular, in relation to employee resistance to the implementation of the new documents