Bella Rody-Wright, Eleni Kaloidis, Ethan Freedman, Hanqiao Zhang Columbia University School of Social Work, New York
Author Note
Submitted in partial fulfillment of the HR Challenges Assignment, within the requirements for Columbia's School for Social Work program and Prof. Desiree Bunch's Human Resource Management class.
Disclosures and Acknowledgment
We would like to acknowledge Dr. Desiree Bunch and their facilitation of SOCWT7123. With Dr. Bunch's lectures, recommended readings, and my additional thoughts, this group's writing piece took form. Moreover, all our peers in class contributed to discussions and built ideas that related to the present topic of our work. With these acknowledgements, we present my following work.
Talent Management in a Fragmented Global Workforce: Strategies for Equity and Access
Introduction
What used to be a proximity-based workforce evolved into a globalized working world with a fragmented ecosystem of in-person, remote, and hybrid work modalities. This shift renders traditional management strategies rooted in proximity ineffective (Buckingham, M., & Goodall, A., 2015; Cappelli & Tavis, 2016). The challenges of achieving consistent workforce alignment, fostering organizational resonance, and delivering equitable development is profoundly more complicated when operating across a globally diverse legal and cultural landscape (Ketemaw et al., 2024). This complexity is critically amplified for individuals with disabilities who face a disproportionately adverse impact as globalization removes the geographic and structural safeguards that mitigate workplace discrimination (Lamichhane, 2015). In the current global workforce environment, a differentiated talent management strategy is a competitive advantage and an operational necessity, as organizations must move beyond standardized models to design distinct training systems per modality, communication, and performance management. Regardless of location and the modality of in-person, remote, and hybrid, embedding principles of Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) at the core of global organizations ensures all employees have an equitable opportunity to connect with the organization's mission, develop skills, and truly belong (Al Ariss et al., 2014).
Managing Work Across Global Modalities
The traditional in-person model relies on physical presence and direct oversight to ensure cohesion, with organizational culture built organically through daily interactions and shared space. In a global context, this model faces significant hurdles. Standardized training programs developed by a central headquarters often fail to resonate when exported without significant cultural modification (Han et al., 2022). Ensuring DEIA in this modality extends beyond basic legal compliance and requires creating usable and accessible physical environments for employees with disabilities (Sundar et al., 2018). A major barrier that is overlooked is reliance on global travel, a landscape with largely inaccessible transportation infrastructures such as commercial airlines that cannot safely accommodate essential mobility devices, thereby excluding or endangering employees with disabilities (Geisen, 2018).
The remote model unlocks a global talent pool, while introducing challenges related to alignment, engagement, and isolation. Workforce alignment must be actively constructed through clear objectives, intentional trust-based communication practices, and asynchronous workflows (Badrinarayanan, 2024). Remote employees are at high risk of feeling disconnected and isolated, so fostering a sense of belonging requires deliberate and sustained effort to create community-building rituals and a safe culture (Handke et al., 2024). From a DEIA perspective, the focus shifts from physical to digital accessibility. All platforms used for communication, training, and performance management must be fully accessible to employees with disabilities, who face significant barriers to employment at national levels that compound when global (Sundar et al., 2018). While the remote model powerfully eliminates physical and geographical barriers, it also necessitates a commitment to global equity in compensation, benefits, and advancement opportunities to prevent the creation of geographically stratified workforces (Lamichhane, 2015).
The hybrid model is the most difficult to manage globally, as it combines the risks of in-person and remote work, including inequity and fragmentation. While offering flexibility, this model is highly susceptible to "proximity bias," as managers can unconsciously favor employees who are physically present, leading to significant inequities in promotions, development opportunities, and access (Lane et al., 2022). This creates a us-versus-them dynamic, undermining team cohesion and organizational resonance. Addressing this broadly requires a dual focus on both physical and digital inclusion. Organizations must design and enforce inclusive meeting protocols that give remote participants an equal voice and ensure that all employees have equitable access to high-quality training and development, regardless of their physical location. Without such intentional interventions, the hybrid model is likely to fail.
Disability, Equity, and the Globalized Workforce
Workforce globalization, if unmanaged, poses a severe and disproportionate threat to individuals with disabilities (Lamichhane, 2015). The creation of an international talent pool risks creating an ability premium, in which employers can preferentially select able-bodied candidates to avoid the costs of accommodation. This dynamic is exacerbated in global contexts where the legal protections of national laws, such as the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) in the United States, do not apply universally, leaving employers vulnerable and organizations without a clear ethical or legal direction (Geisen, 2018; Lamichhane, 2015). Global recruitment platforms erode local job markets that once provided reliable opportunities, and qualified candidates with disabilities face a shrinking landscape of viable employment options and a diminished incentive for companies to hire based on talent alone (Lamichhane, 2015). This challenge is not without a countering opportunity. The rise of remote work, accelerated by globalization, holds the potential to create unprecedented access for individuals who are homebound or require complex, non-mobile assistive technology setups. By removing long-standing barriers related to transportation and physical office spaces, remote work can dramatically increase disability representation in the global workforce, fostering a more diverse and inclusive talent management ecosystem (Lamichhane, 2015).
Recommend Strategies for an Inclusive Global Workforce
Organizations within this complex global landscape should consider adopting a dynamic strategy tailored to each work mode. In-person teams can balance corporate identity with local relevance by following a "global principles, local implementation" model that establishes core, nonnegotiable global DEIA values, while empowering regional leaders to adapt HR policies and cultural practices to local norms and legal requirements (Ketemaw et al., 2024). Remote teams can create strategies around digital infrastructure that support asynchronous communication and community-building rituals to foster trust (Badrinarayanan, 2024) while establishing clear performance metrics that promote autonomy and effective workplace practices (Allen et al., 2015). Hybrid teams require proactive work against inequity through mandated training for all managers on recognizing and mitigating proximity bias, ensuring accessible information, and digitalizing workflows so physical location has no inherent advantage (Lane et al., 2022).
Bridging strategies can create a global DEIA framework that emphasizes centralized, confidential, and efficient processes for reasonable accommodation requests across all modalities in a fragmented global context (Sundar et al., 2018). Similarly, restricting training and development opportunities to a physical headquarters creates an accessibility barrier for all to career growth for global and remote workforces, critically undermining long-term sustainability and talent pipelines. The proliferating adoption of AI and standardized technologies for performance management poses significant ethical threats, as these systems risk codifying and amplifying cultural and ableist biases present in their training data, leading to discriminatory outcomes and severe legal or reputational damage (Chen, 2023; Qin et al., 2023). Ultimately, organizations must use the DEIA framework to develop strategies for all types of teams, avoid rudimentary approaches to leadership and HRM, and achieve accurate workforce alignment in an increasingly globalized workforce.
References
Al Ariss, A., Cascio, W. F., & Paauwe, J. (2014). Talent management: Current theories and future research directions. Journal of World Business, 49(2), 173–179. 26
Allen, T. D., Golden, T. D., & Shockley, K. M. (2015). How effective is telecommuting? Assessing the status of our scientific findings. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 16(2), 40–68. 27
Buckingham, M., & Goodall, A. (2015). Reinventing performance management. Harvard Business Review, 93(4), 40–50.
Cappelli, P., & Tavis, A. (2016). The performance management revolution. Harvard Business Review, 94(10), 58–67. 28
Chen, Z. (2023). Ethics and discrimination in artificial intelligence-enabled recruitment practices. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, 10, Article 567. 29
Geisen, T. (2018). Workplace disability management as an instrument for human resources and organizational development. In Disability Management and workplace integration (pp. 13–26). Routledge.
Houtenville, A. J., O'Neill, J., Sundar, V., et al. (2018). Striving to work and overcoming: Employment strategies and successes of people with disabilities. Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation. 2018;48(1), 93-109. doi:10.3233/JVR-170918
Lamichhane, K. (2015). Disability and the global employment situation. In Disability, education and employment in developing countries (pp. 20–37). Cambridge University Press. 30
Littrell, L. N., Salas, E., Hess, K. P., Paley, M., & Riedel, S. (2006). Expatriate preparation: A critical analysis of 25 years of cross-cultural training research. Human Resource Development Review, 5(3), 355–388. 31
Qin, S., Jia, N., Luo, X., Liao, C., & Huang, Z. (2023). Perceived fairness of human managers compared with artificial intelligence in employee performance evaluation. Journal of Management Information Systems, 40(4), 1324–1354. 32
Zielinski, D. (2023, Summer). Should AI make layoff decisions? HR Magazine, 68(2), 24–27. Society for Human Resource Management.