Out of office and into another

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Last year Helene Bevilacqua, a senior associate at consultancy PwC, swapped her role in London for four months working in the Polish capital, Warsaw.

The change of scene was enabled by one of the company’s secondment programmes, which assigns staff to short-term placements with overseas teams. “One of the things that drew me here was PwC’s global presence and the opportunity to move around,” Bevilacqua says.

Her experience is part of a fresh push by some employers to expand flexible working offers adopted during the pandemic, drawing up policies that enable, or even encourage, staff to work from overseas for periods of several weeks or more a year.

Staff at holiday rental platform Airbnb, for example, are now able to work from different countries either remotely or from a company office, for up to 90 days annually. Spotify, the audio streaming service, goes further. On being hired staff can choose where they work all-year-round, if there is a Spotify base in the country selected.

Since introducing its work from anywhere policy in 2022 Airbnb has reaped the rewards. “In the first year after announcing it, people visited our career page nearly 10mn times — more than double the year before,” says Iain Roberts, Airbnb’s head of employee experience. “Flexibility fuels creativity, attracts talent and keeps our teams around the world engaged.”

Spotify said attrition had dropped by 50 per cent since it introduced its own policy in 2021. The company’s time to hire has also fallen. “As a global company, we leverage our multinational presence to tap into diverse talent pools . . . adapting to employee motivations,” says Katarina Berg, Spotify’s chief HR officer.

According to a survey by HR software company Jobbatical, more than half of all UK staff want to work overseas and say the chance to do so would encourage them to stay with their employer for longer. More than two-thirds of workers aged 18 to 34 would choose a company that lets them work abroad over one that doesn’t.

The appetite among employees makes offering such opportunities a “no-brainer” for multinational employers, argues workplace consultant Lucy Kemp. “If you’ve already got the infrastructure in place, you should use it to your advantage,” she says. “It’s a smart retention strategy.”

But offering flexibility on location is not without complexity. Asma Bashir, founder of multinational expansion platform Centuro Global, says companies must adhere to legal and regulatory requirements and consider salary adjustments, depending on the “length of the stay, the purpose of the assignment and location”.

Shorter postings can sidestep such challenges and make it easier for firms to feel the benefits. Law firm Reed Smith operates an inter-office secondment scheme that allows early to mid-career employees to spend two weeks working at any of its 31 global offices. Jeni Taylor, Emea HR director, says participants “bring a wealth of knowledge” when they return home, “which helps in fielding the best teams to support our clients on their most complex cross-border needs”.

During her secondment, Bevilacqua spent weekends travelling solo around Europe, which she says boosted her confidence, and helped her career skills. “Experiencing different working styles has given me a better understanding of global business practices,” she reflects. “Living in Warsaw allowed me to immerse myself in a new culture.”

Lorna Hughes, managing director of PR agency Harvard, another employer that encourages staff to take stints at offices around the world, believes demand for career-linked mobility is unlikely to fade, particularly among younger employees.

“Many of the people who are now two to three years into their career grew up during various Covid lockdowns,” she says. “I understand where that hunger [to travel] comes from.”

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