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Cartus, a subsidiary of Realogy Corporation, a global provider of real estate and relocation services, just released their 2010 Global Policy & Practices Survey.

According to Kaleidoscope, Cartus' new blog for corporate relocation and human resources, “Global companies are moving their employees to vastly different locations as they take advantage of new market opportunities, and they are using an expanded variety of programs and policy approaches to do so”.

This latest global relocation report, Navigating a Challenging Landscape, suggests that companies’ mobility volumes are beginning to recover but several new trends are emerging.

The 2010 survey attracted 196 human resource practitioners based in the Americas, Europe/Middle East/Africa (EMEA), and Asia Pacific (APAC) regions. Of the HR organizations surveyed, 71% were based in the Americas, 19% in EMEA and 10% were APAC-based and reflected industry segments such as manufacturing, technology, financially services, chemicals, and computer/telecommunications.

Exploring eight different assignment types that are now commonly used by companies deploying talent worldwide, the results showed that shorter-term assignments are being used more frequently for career and talent development.

Other key findings in the survey included:

• Young and single: There is a strong trend toward assignees who are young and single, with the under-30 group increasing substantially from 19% in 2007 to 29% now, and unaccompanied, married assignees increasing even more from 29% to 42%. This newer profile matches the emerging extended business travel policy type, which requires less financial support from the home office than those that encompass married assignees with accompanying families.

• More companies “going local” with their assignment approaches. In increasing numbers, employees who take jobs in other parts of the world may be doing so with the understanding that the jobs will be permanent and will have compensation and benefit scales that are more reflective of the new location than their home base. Both localization and permanent transfers, the two types that reflect this approach, are anticipated to increase over the next two years by more than 50% of respondents.

• New emerging markets: Multinational companies are moving assignees to many more countries than in the past—among them, new and challenging emerging market locations such as Mexico, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Vietnam. Although many of these new destinations are unprepared to accommodate assignees, the largest companies surveyed are willing to head in whatever unique directions are necessary to take advantage of opportunities for global expansion.

To obtain a copy of the 2010 Global Policy & Practices Survey: Navigating a Challenging Landscape, email CartusCommunications@cartus.com. Include "2010 GPP Survey" on the subject line.

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