【正文】 administration have also been simplified to encourage the inflow of foreign professionals in selected fields, Sun told.China Daily, 20080102, page 5.3. The internationalization of Human Resource Management Defination of IHRMThe above paragraphs make the point that business is global. All aspects of the enterprise are affected. This course is about one specific function of business, the international nature and implications of the management function termed human resource management (HRM). Thus the focus of this text is International HRM (IHRM). The more broadly defined field of IHRM, is about understanding, researching, applying and revising all human resource activities in their internal and external contexts as they impact the process of managing human resources in enterprises throughout the global environment to enhance the experience of multiple stakeholders。 including investors, customers, employees, partners, suppliers, environment and society.廣義的國際人力資源管理是指：理解、研究、應用與改善全球環(huán)境下影響企業(yè)人力資源管理過程的內、外部情景中所有人力資源活動，以提高投資者、顧客、員工、合作者、供應商、環(huán)境與社會等多種利益相關者的體驗。As the global economy expands, as more products and services pete on a global basis and as more and more firms operate outside their countries of origin, the impact on various business functions bees more pronounced. Practitioners in all business functions must develop the knowledge, skills, and experience in the international arena which will enable them and their firms to succeed in this new environment. This new reality is just as true (as this course will demonstrate) for the HRM function as it is for other business disciplines, such as finance or marketing, which often get more attention. The purpose of this course is to describe the knowledge, skills, and experiences necessary for the successful management of the IHR function, a function that is increasingly performed by all employees in panies, including HR professionals (in the HR department), managers and nonmanagers. Forms of International HRMIn the case of HRM, internationalization can take many forms. For practical purposes, HR managers in most types of firms can or will confront at least some aspects of internationalization. This is to say, the globalization and technology factors that have led to there being no place to hide for business, in general, have also led to there being no place to hide for the HR professional. Human resource professionals can find themselves involved in and therefore must understand IHRM issues in any of the following possible situations (which include HRM positions in all types of firms, not just international HR positions within the types of firms usually focused on, ., working at the headquarters of an MNE or in the parentcountry operations).In all cases, the international aspects of the situation increase the exposure and liabilities for HR managers and place on them everincreasing demands for new, internationally focused petencies. This text is dedicated to helping develop the understanding and petencies necessary for HR managers to succeed (personally and professionally as business contributors) in the international arena. The operation of parentcountry firms overseasThis situation involves working as a parentcountry HR professional in the main or regional headquarters of the traditional multinational enterprise (MNE). Increasingly, this could also mean working as an expatriate HR manager in a foreign subsidiary of an MNE. This is the bestknown of the international business situations and includes, for example, a parentcountry HR manager working in the headquarters or parentcountry operations of firms like CocaCola, Ford, Motorola, and Citibank from the US, orShell, Ericsson, and Unilever from Europe, or sony, and Acer from Asia, all firms that have extensive foreign business activity. Typical headquarters IHRM responsibilities include selecting and preparing employees for and transferring them between the various country locations of the firm, determining and administering pensation and benefit packages for these international assignees, and establishing HRM policies and practices for the firm39。s foreign operations. Usually the parent firm either applies its parentcountry HRM practices directly toits foreign subsidiaries, or it tries to merge its personnel practices with those that are mon in the host countries. In terms of HR management in the foreign subsidiaries of MNEs, as a matter of practice and probably necessity, local HR managers are almost always hostcountry nationals (HCNs). That is, these positions do not tend to be filled with HR managers from the parent firm (although these subsidiaries are usually established through the efforts of parentcountry managers and HR managers). The use of local HR managers as part of the subsidiary management team makes sense because the hostcountry workforce is normally hired locally and work rules and practices must fit local laws and customs. Hostcountry nationals are more likely to be effective in the subsidiary HR position than are expatriate HR managers from the parent firm, even though HR policy is often dictated from the parentpany headquarters. (However, HR policy is typically though not always adapted to fit local law and Custom.) This centralization of HR policy can create problems with interface for hostcountry (subsidiary) managers including local HR managers who will differ in their orientations from the parentcountry (HQ) HR managers.An additional plexity, however, for IHRM, involves the increasingly mon headquarters strategy in global firms that wants as many managers as possible to acquire international experience. This often also includes HR managers. So MNEs are beginning to send HR managers on foreign assignments as well as other types of managers. The result of this is that increasingly it may be possible to find HR managers serving in HR positions outside their countries of origin which could involve an HR manager either f