ABSTRACT
The design and maintenance of an enterprise’s total reward system is always a critical responsibility for HR managers. International business makes this responsibility more difficult and requires additional HR competencies in global remuneration and international assignment (IA) compensation, and even closer collaboration with business partners in the accounting, finance, tax, and legal divisions, as well as with the line managers of the MNE. The determination of compensation and benefits (C&B) on an international basis requires new considerations, including for subsidiary workforces in multiple countries, employees from many different countries (such as inpatriates, host-country nationals, and third-country nationals), varying country approaches to and levels of pay and benefits, international assignees who move across borders for differing periods of time, and problems such as dealing with differing standards and costs of living, multiple currencies, exchange rates,
inflation rates, tax systems, and tax rates. One of the most time-consuming aspects of these new responsibilities for international HR managers includes creating and managing compensation, benefit, and tax packages for expatriates.1 When development of compensation systems for subsidiaries and determining pay and benefits for a global workforce is added to these IHRM responsibilities, it is easy to see why this area of concern is so important.2
