When companies begin the process of expanding to different countries, one of the first things they must consider is how to staff the new roles in a way that is seamless, efficient and, most importantly, compliant. Staying up to date on the variances in employment laws, at both the federal and local level, can take a considerable amount of time and resources. Consider how different employment laws can be from state to state and then imagine how that is compounded on a global scale. For example, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), an initiative aimed to protect the data of individuals and businesses in the European Union (EU), will go into effect in May 2018. U.S. businesses with overseas operations must comply with the new regulation as well or face serious penalties—which could include fines up to 4 percent of the organizations’ global revenues.
In order to mitigate these challenges and to avoid legal and financial penalties, an organization’s general counsel/in-house legal team should keep the following suggestions in mind in order to make your global expansion as simple and efficient as possible:
