International Joint Venture

1. Introduction to Joint Venture

A joint venture (JV) is a key method used by foreign organizations for executing their market entry or expansion strategy. Joint ventures can prove to be helpful for companies for going beyond an agency or distribution arrangement, with the achievement of particular strategic goals. A joint venture is a favorite choice for organizations in UAE to expand their business. This business strategy is useful for developing the existing business operations. The JV agreement can be used by a firm for regulating the obligations and respective entitlement of JV partners. The joint ventures are quite common where there is impossibility for a single contracting entity for executing the project alone. A joint venture is a commonly made either contractually or with the help of forming a limited liability firm under Federal Law No. 2 of 2015 (Nippa and Reuer, 2019). In accordance with Commercial Companies Law, it is not possible for foreigners to own more than 49% of a limited liability in UAE. For making a joint venture, there is no need of a license. However, if JV is influenced through a limited liability company, then there is a need of licensing. Similar to this, there is no need of pushing the underlying JV agreement. The focus of foreign partner is on dealing with third parties as per name of local partner, who bears all liability. Practically, joint ventures are considered as appropriate structure for organizations that work together on particular projects (Hui et al, 2020). The selection of right partner for joint venture is important for ensuring success of a joint venture. The structures available for establishing a joint venture in UAE are Limited Liability Company, public and private joint stock firms and a limited partnership company. This report is about analysis of joint venture done by Siemens LLC which is a famous company in UAE. The report includes analysis of recruitment and selection practices as well as training and development practices of Siemens LLC. Moreover, the report also includes analysis of how the management of Siemens LLC overcomes challenges through following effective HR management practices.

2. Case Study of Siemens LLC

Siemens LLC was established in October 1999. The company manages all of its business activities in UAE. Currently, there are four companies which represent Siemens and these companies are based in UAE, Oman, Bahrain and Qatar and Yemen. The Siemens Company did joint venture with Easa Saleh Al Gurg Group in 1973 and since then, both companies are working as business partners. As the future of region is built through making investment in latest technology, Siemens holds the solutions of taking forward the aspirations of UAE that mainly focuses on developing infrastructure. The key focus of Siemens is on sustainability and it has been ranked as the most sustainable firm in UAE. After joint venture, it has become a largest environmental technologies and energy provider. The diversity of Siemens is depicted in different industries, like in energy sector to communication sector. In UAE, there is a visibility of Siemens’ solutions in the energy as well as healthcare sector. The company has a lot of expertise in information technology infrastructure, with having wide range of solutions which are at innovation’s forefront (Wong et al, 2018).  

In Siemens, the human resource managers use workforce planning approach for the purpose of determining the rate of influx as well as outflow of employee. The use of workforce planning approach proves to be helpful in providing following benefits;

• The managers are capable of checking whether there is a skill gap between needed skill and expertise for a specific job and the employees’ skills.
• The identification of new employees’ requirements and demands.

Currently, Siemens needs new employees, because they are about to focus on relocating its core plant in Lincoln. In addition to this, the management of Siemens has designed a plan for the purpose of identifying the skills as well as training which may be required for those employees.

3. Recruitment and Selection Practices of Siemens

In Siemens, the HR managers ask a potential employee to take part in one or more of following key activities;

3.1. Online Application

The potential candidates have to apply online; on the website of the company. They have to check for the available vacancy in Siemens’ website. In addition to this, the candidates can also apply from some website other than the company’s website. After submitting application through online website, there is a recruitment team in Siemens who gets involved in reviewing the application and checking whether there is a match between capabilities of a person and the requirement of the job. This helps in identifying the right candidate for the job (Brown et al, 2019).

3.2. Telephonic interview

When a potential candidate meets the selection criteria, then the HR team of Siemens contact that person for an initial interview.

3.3. Face to Face interview

The potential candidates are asked for face to face interview within the firm. The key objective for such type of interview is to do discussion related to the skills and competencies of the candidate.

3.4. References check

The HR managers of Siemens properly do the reference check after getting authorization from selected candidates.

3.5. Offer and Acceptance

After the success of a candidate at final stage of recruitment process, the HR team of Siemens makes an initial verbal offer of employment for the candidate and after its acceptance by the candidate, he or she is provided with the offer letter (Gardner et al, 2020).

The key aim behind following this recruitment process in Siemens is to ensure that the management of firm completely understands the career objectives, experience of potential clients and their aspirations, for the purpose of providing a chance of deciding that whether or not Siemens is a right place for them (Campion et al, 2019). A wide range of approaches are used in Siemens for assessing the clients. Through the use of such methods, they become capable of getting an understanding about strengths and development areas of employees that assists them in recruiting right individuals for. The key focus of HR management of Siemens while recruiting and selecting employees on assessing communication skills, time management skills, interpersonal and people management skills of employees. The use of face to face interviews proves to be helpful for checking the skills of employees practically (Kanagavalli et al, 2019).

4.  Training & Development

Training is considered as a planned effort which assists employees to learn job related behaviors, for the purpose of improving performance. Training is not only linked with teaching advanced skills to current employees, however, it is referred to as a continuous process, which makes the firm capable of keeping its employees ready for doing the job effectively and efficiently. There are two training methods which are generally followed in Siemens and these are on-the-job training and off the job training (Stewart and Brown, 2019).

4.1. On the job training

Shadowing

At Siemens, the HR team gets involved in providing a manager to the employee. The managers within the firm watch employees and help them in learning new skills.

Mentoring

The trainee gets involved in discussing with a tutor. The mentor focuses on hearing the issues of trainee and discussing them with regarding the solution.

Job rotation

The focus of HR managers of Siemens is on broadening the skills of employees through allowing them to work in various departments. With the help of this approach, employees get success in acquiring new skills.

4.2. Off the job training

With the help of induction training at Siemens, the new employees become capable of having basic information regarding the company. In addition to this, there is an implementation of three kinds of development program for employees. These development programs are implemented within the firm especially for entry level employees.

The adoption of apprenticeships programs in Siemens prove to be highly effective in developing stuff that could help the firm to grow in future. With the help of training and development programs in Siemens, the employees get higher positions within the firm. The employees in Siemens get assistance through on the job training, as their skill level gets enhanced (Clarke and Higgs, 2016).

5. Adoption of HRM Practices to Overcome Challenges of Cultural Diversity

In current highly globalised business world, it has become highly important for firms to focus highly on cultural diversity. With the help of effective recruitment and selection strategy, the focus of company’s management is on hiring employees from different cultural backgrounds in order to ensure proper cultural diversity. In addition to this, the employees within the firm are provided with trainings, so that their skills and expertise level can be enhanced. This is done irrespective of their background culture and they are provided with trainings for enhancing their skills, so that they can provide high output while working within the firm. In addition to this, the effective HR policies prove to be helpful in managing cultural diversity (Storey, 2016).

References

Brown, C., McManus, C., Davison, I., Gill, P. and Lilford, R., 2019. Using recruitment and selection to build a primary care workforce for the future. Education for Primary Care, 30(3), pp.128-132.

Campion, M.C., Campion, E.D. and Campion, M.A., 2019. Using practice employment tests to improve recruitment and personnel selection outcomes for organizations and job seekers. Journal of Applied Psychology.

Clarke, N. and Higgs, M., 2016. How strategic focus relates to the delivery of leadership training and development. Human Resource Management, 55(4), pp.541-565.

Gardner, H.R., Albarquoni, L., El Feky, A., Gillies, K. and Treweek, S., 2020. A systematic review of non-randomised evaluations of strategies to improve participant recruitment to randomised controlled trials. F1000Research, 9(86), p.86.

Hui, K.N., Hult, G.T.M. and Ketchen Jr, D.J., 2020. Causal attribution for peer performance and international joint venture divestment. Journal of International Management, p.100754.

Kanagavalli, G., Seethalakshmi, R. and Sowdamini, T., 2019. A systematic review of literature on recruitment and selection process. Humanities & Social Sciences Reviews, 7(2), pp.01-09.

Nippa, M. and Reuer, J.J., 2019. On the future of international joint venture research. Journal of International Business Studies, 50(4), pp.555-597.

Stewart, G.L. and Brown, K.G., 2019. Human resource management. John Wiley & Sons.

Storey, J., 2016. Human resource management. Edward Elgar Publishing Limited.

Wong, A., Wei, L., Wang, X. and Tjosvold, D., 2018. Collectivist values for constructive conflict management in international joint venture effectiveness. International Journal of Conflict Management.