People are the key to global competitiveness of companies. Integrated in company development, global assignments can play a strategic role in a variety of aspects critical to company success: coordination and control of international operations, technological and information exchange between the parent company and subsidiaries and between subsidiaries as well as in succession planning for global management and leadership development. Firms should send both home-country nationals and foreign-country nationals on global assignments. This paper provides a framework for people management including cross-cultural, competence-based selection, training and coaching, cross-cultural adjustment ...