Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of WERC.
In November 2024, shortly after the conclusion of GWS 2024, we provided a summary of the conference content overall and committed to a series of follow-up articles. Between now and the end of Q1 2025, we’ll recap ideas shared at GWS around the topics of innovation and artificial intelligence, the customer experience, and the evolution of the global talent mobility role. These insights can help guide strategies and solutions in a new era of global mobility, addressing challenges and opportunities in light of new geopolitical, economic, and global talent realities.
Guidance on Trends in AI and Technology
In that first article, we noted the far-ranging discussion WERC President and CEO Anupam Singhal held with several relocation management company (RMC) leaders, including Bob Olmsted, president and chief operating officer of SIRVA; Chad Sterling, CEO at Altair Global; Dave Bencivengo, president at Weichert Workforce Mobility; Joleen Lauffer, president at Aires, and Matt Tebbe, president and CEO at Cartus. The panel specifically addressed the role of technology in the very human industry of global talent mobility services. Sterling laid the groundwork in a theme that was a throughline in the leadership discussion and several related technology sessions when he outlined the three-legged stool of technology: the customer experience, internal efficiency, and data integrity, protection, and security.
As Bencivengo at Weichert noted, the smartest strategy is to automate “last”—after an organization has done the design work and process improvement that can then be made more efficient and valuable through the application of technology tools. In response to Singhal’s question, “Why won’t AI and technology eviscerate the mobility industry?”, the response was, essentially, “Because customers and clients won’t allow it.” Whether a lump-sum beneficiary managing their own move, a high-potential intern, or a senior executive, at some point in the mobility journey, employees and their employers turn to subject matter experts to resolve their specific needs. AI can make the process less disjointed, but as Lauffer noted, “We design for the personal.”
Innovation Is Not All AI-Centric
An industry vertical panel on technology was recorded and shared in advance of GWS. Host Amy Parrent, head of global mobility and enterprise recognition at Vanguard, guided a discussion with three industry thought leaders: William Taylor at Relocity, Nick Hedges at ECA, and Tom Richardson at Equus. The table was set by Parrent’s observation that, “As the world gets smaller, the way we manage is constantly being tested and transformed.”
Parrent asked her fellow panelists how a global mobility manager with an ever-expanding range of responsibilities and internal demands could best build a tech strategy and evaluate available tools. Each of the experts responded with a version of “Start with your business and customer service needs, and then look for solutions and partnership-oriented collaborators.” In a world of shiny objects, it’s good advice to think first about the business problem you need to solve, since all technology, no matter how sophisticated, is ultimately a means to an end.
Other good advice was to acknowledge that while an improved customer experience is the end game in a technology investment, it’s OK, and often preferable, to start with an internal focus. Optimizing your process and offering your team support and tools that improve their way of working is ultimately an investment in the customer experience and the operational ROI of any enterprise. Adopting technology that the global mobility team has a voice in assessing and implementing also upskills your program management talent and far from being a replacement threat, makes their roles more valuable and enables a higher level of contribution.
The experts made several other useful observations. Building on the theme of “understand your business needs first,” they advised global mobility managers to form internal partnerships with HR, IT, procurement, and finance to help them make their business case for investments and funding asks. And global mobility managers should certainly leverage the collective intelligence of the interrelated ecosystem of our industry. As Taylor noted, “The global mobility ecosystem runs on collaboration.”
Technology is also only as good as the data that it manages and analyzes. When Parrent asked, “Should corporates focus on their ‘data lake’ first?”, the answer was a resounding “yes.” An implementation will cost more, take longer, and be more prone to error if an employer doesn’t first make the effort to update their mobility data. The good news is that the work can be done incrementally. The focus should not be on quick fixes; it should be on prioritizing what Hedges at ECA called “moments that matter” and Richardson at Equus referred to as “time to value”—in other words, defining how quickly “x” investment in technology will begin to generate a meaningful return. Not everything can be done at once, and expectations should be articulated so any technology strategy considers when the benefits will be realized rather than setting unrealistic expectations and being disappointed in the timeline and results.
Regarding data management, the panel also agreed that data privacy and integrity are “table stakes” in an industry that has enormous obligations to manage the information of its customers and stakeholders. Investments in security are expensive, but the risk of data breaches and privacy protection failures outweigh this now essential cost of doing business. When assessing the features of any provider’s technology solutions, clients are right to first ask if the provider meets the threshold requirements of documented compliance with GDPR, a current SOC 2 audit, and other proof points that provide assurance “info sec” (information security) integrity is top of mind and tested.
This team purposely avoided centering their entire conversation on AI, but the topic had to be brought up in an industry vertical conversation focused on technology. Yes, the panel agreed, that embedding AI in global mobility is both inevitable and desirable. The ability to make queries of your data in natural language and simplify routine processes is a value. So is the ability to simplify supplier management and leverage investments that suppliers make in their offerings so that corporate global mobility does not need to make duplicated efforts.
Making the Use Case for AI Across Global Mobility Sectors
Two sessions focused specifically on AI applications in global mobility: “Raising the Bar (Code) – New AI Policies That Advance Immigration Processes” and “Demystifying AI: Understanding AI and Unveiling the Potential of AI in Global Mobility.”
Kelli Duehning and John Hamill, immigration attorneys at BAL, made a convincing case for the adoption of AI in driving efficiency and data-supported decision-making in immigration case management. They made the point that some AI-supported practices have already become standardized in immigration management and encouraged audience participants to become knowledgeable in AI given the significant and growing demands put upon immigration practitioners, applicants, and employers to manage outcomes in as short a time frame as possible.
The presenters made the point that for all the attention paid to immigration enforcement in the U.S., there have not been fundamental changes in employment-based immigration law and policy since 1986. Between expected changes from the Trump administration and the unprecedented volume of employment-related immigration activity, AI-supported applications and data management are the most reasonable approaches to take in an administratively outdated environment.
Duehning and Hamill cited compelling statistics on the adoption of AI in employment-based immigration practice: 74% of the practitioners they surveyed use AI to some degree, primarily for data and documentation management and submitting initial applications. Interestingly, 30% of respondents said compliance would benefit from AI-supported service, but at the same time, 80% are also concerned about the potential for AI to make errors.
This seeming contradiction is the case in all AI scenarios discussed in our industry and for business applications in general. The promised efficiency is enormously valuable but depends on careful preparation, quality data, and human-expert controls so that the information generated through AI tools is reliable and accurate. In short, “trust but verify.”
There is no arguing, however, the trend toward adopting AI for immigration management needs. Examples given include using AI tools to simplify the manual tasks associated with matching family members applying for admittance to the U.S. AI can track the commonality across family member data and make matches that expedite processing, whereas the previous practice was a laborious and inaccurate manual review of applications with inevitable mismatches and delays.
AI also expedites the enormous amount of data required in U.S. requests for evidence (RFEs) related to immigration applications. AI tools can consolidate previous submissions and simplify and speed up the preparation of data. The presenters noted this process alone led to reducing the review time of adjudication officers in one U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) office from 30 days to a single day.
Numerous other examples were shared, all leading to the point that AI is being taken seriously in U.S. immigration. Clients/employers, government agencies, and process managers are working effectively to implement and adopt processes that improve data collection and support tools like intelligent chat bots that do more than respond to formulaic questions—they read and assess information across carefully managed and protected data to provide specific responses to specific questions.
As in all AI scenarios, emphasis was placed on controls and using private large language and generative AI tools, and on ensuring an oversight system that involved the assessment and experience of immigration attorneys and staff.
In line with the guidance shared in the technology vertical overview and the insights shared by mobility industry CEOs, the attorneys who hosted this session advised: 1) ask your immigration attorney and extended ecosystem about their AI strategies, tools, and platforms. There is a plethora of options and advice to be secured about systems that support employment-based immigration management; and 2) expect a relentless pace of change as well as leaps and bounds in the evolution of the technology.
Two technology leaders from Aires Relocation guided the GWS audience through a session that met the speakers’ commitment to demystifying AI. Anand Diraviyam and Jeba Jothimoni are technology leaders and industry veterans who demonstrated the potential for AI in global mobility with live examples of the company’s AI platform. Their helpful, pragmatic definition of AI demystified the topic and put it into easily understood terms: AI is the simulation of human intelligence by machines and computer systems.
Diraviyam and Jothimoni quickly moved from the theoretical to the practical with examples that addressed improving the customer experience and improving internal efficiency and closed their session with some comments on responsible AI. In this they were completely consistent with the messages about the promise of AI delivered throughout the GWS conference.
The Aires-led session shared advances in a digital assistant capability that went beyond programmed chat bot Q&A and pulled from reading client policies and history to provide specific and applicable guidance to questions. A similar depth of knowledge was demonstrated in sentiment analysis, a key expectation of clients wanting to understand the causes of employee satisfaction or concern early enough to take action and prevent undesirable outcomes. Other examples included using deep data to provide immediate and relevant analysis on global mobility spends and likely trends, as well as expedited and well-matched benchmarking analyses for policy development.
This session clarified how accessible AI-supported services can be. The capability of natural language interaction is within reach, which leads not only to conversational exchanges but also the capability to get instant representations of data in graphical formats.
The presenters were quick to point out that we are still at early stages in the use of AI, in global mobility and in business in general. Fast-moving next generations will include advanced tools for reporting, understanding drivers of employee satisfaction, analyzing ROI and retention, and training.
Touching on responsible AI, it was helpful to have the guidance of these technology experts to make sure your AI process always includes humans in the loop and practical advice to never let your private data be read by consumer-oriented services such as OpenAI.
Finally, referring back to Singhal’s opening, the experts from Aires noted that AI is not likely to replace human-led mobility services: “Our industry is in the ‘take care’ business, and the path forward to doing that best is through the collective intelligence of human and machine.”
Where Are We Headed With AI in Global Mobility?
A final look at the topic of AI was embedded in a session hosted by Cartus called “Take 5 (Years): Global Mobility Innovation and How to Navigate AI, ESG and Geopolitics for 2030.” A full room of global mobility professionals demonstrated our industry’s usual confidence and optimism with a very positive and humane outlook for the future, even in the midst of some especially high impact events and challenges. The session presented these consequential topics to participants and asked them to discuss and respond with their expectations and strategies for the next five years.
Relative to the topic of AI, the audience response was an interesting balance to the high-tech focus of much of the conference. As one table spokesperson said, “Not everyone needs automation.” In an echo of the insights from the industry vertical on technology recorded in advance of GWS, the advice was “Don’t rush to deliver solutions without first asking and understanding the customer’s goals.”
Looking across the full range of the people we move in our industry, this session reminded us that there are Gen Z’ers who would love to talk to someone about moving to an unknown destination and that there are hundreds if not thousands of brilliant interns launching their careers, who also need access to the “mom tool” that comes with understanding how all the pieces and parts of global mobility come together.
Global mobility is about value creation through talent and puts forth the expectation of growth not scarcity, of adding to and not taking away, and of the need for talent not automatons. GWS provided a positive and practical look at how innovation will continue to be human-led, supported by remarkable advances in technology.