Back to BlogWhy Change Management, Compliance and Local Expertise Determine Success
Global contingent workforce programmes rarely fail because the strategy is completely wrong. More often, they begin to break down in the space between the strategy and the reality of how people work.
A process may be clearly documented, the VMS may be configured correctly and suppliers may have been given detailed instructions, but none of that guarantees that hiring managers, finance teams, HR leaders and local stakeholders will change ways of working that have been established over many years. Nor does it guarantee that the global process will reflect the legal, cultural and operational reality of every market.
That was one of the clearest themes to emerge from my conversation with Brenda Monaghan, EMEA Program Manager for Contingent Labor at Medtronic, at CWS Europe 2026.
Brenda spoke candidly about what global programme delivery looks like beyond the implementation plan. It is not simply a matter of rolling out technology, publishing policies and expecting adoption to follow. Success depends on whether local stakeholders understand the programme, whether compliance is built into daily activity and whether the organisation has access to the local expertise needed to make the global model work in practice.
This is the second article in our four-part series exploring the hidden complexity of global contingent workforce expansion. In part one, I looked at why global expansion is not a copy-and-paste rollout. Here, I explore why change management, compliance and local expertise are not supporting activities around the edges of a programme. They are central to whether it succeeds.
Change management is not the soft part
Ask most programme leaders what they underestimated during a global rollout, and change management will usually be high on the list.
It is often described as the softer side of implementation, sitting alongside communication, training and stakeholder engagement. The technology work tends to be treated as the hard part, while change management is positioned as something important but less tangible.
In reality, the opposite is often true.
Brenda was candid about this during our discussion at CWS Europe. Having worked in HR for many years, she acknowledged that change management can be difficult to quantify, but she has also come to see it as one of the most important elements of the entire rollout.
The reason is straightforward. A programme can establish a new process, but people still have to use it. Hiring managers may have worked directly with the same suppliers for years. Local finance teams may have their own invoicing routines. HR teams may already have established ways of engaging workers, while site leaders may be protective of relationships and processes that have worked well for them in the past.
A global programme does not enter a blank operating environment. It enters a network of existing habits, relationships and expectations.
When programme teams underestimate that reality, they often assume that once the new process has been communicated, behaviour will naturally change. But people rarely change the way they work simply because a new policy has been published or a training session has taken place.
They need to understand why the change matters, how it affects them and what they are expected to do differently. More importantly, the new process has to work in the context in which they are being asked to use it.
What quiet non-compliance looks like in practice
One of the most revealing examples Brenda shared came from India.
Medtronic introduced a vendor-neutral programme with full training, clear documentation and defined rules around supplier contact. The expectation was that suppliers would no longer engage hiring managers directly.
The process was clear. The training had taken place. The new operating model had been explained.
Yet suppliers continued meeting hiring managers on site.
This did not happen because the rules were misunderstood or because the suppliers were deliberately trying to undermine the programme. It happened because the existing relationships were stronger than the new process. Direct contact was how suppliers and managers had always worked, and changing that behaviour required more than a set of instructions.
This is what quiet non-compliance often looks like in global contingent workforce programmes.
The system may be live and the programme may appear to be operating successfully, but old behaviours continue underneath it. Suppliers keep using familiar contacts, hiring managers find alternative routes and local teams create workarounds when the new process feels slower, less practical or disconnected from how work is actually done.
The programme exists technically, but operationally it remains only partially adopted.
This is why change management should not be treated as a communication exercise. It is a control mechanism. If stakeholders do not understand or adopt the process, the organisation does not gain the visibility, consistency or compliance the programme was designed to create.
Cultural awareness is part of programme design
Change management also needs to reflect the cultural context of each market.
In Czechia, the programme itself was running smoothly until training was scheduled during Easter week with relatively short notice. From a central project perspective, this may have looked like a routine scheduling decision. Locally, it was perceived very differently.
The escalation that followed had nothing to do with the technology, supplier model or process design. It was about timing, cultural expectations and the sense that an important period in the local calendar had not been respected.
This kind of issue is easy to dismiss as a minor communications problem, but it has a much wider effect. When local teams feel overlooked or misunderstood, trust begins to weaken. Once that happens, the programme is more likely to be viewed as something imposed by headquarters rather than something designed to support the local business.
Cultural sensitivity is not an optional addition to a global rollout. It affects participation, engagement and adoption.
The same communication style will not work in every country. The same timeline will not be appropriate everywhere. The same training approach may be well received in one market and poorly received in another.
A global programme needs consistency, but it also needs judgement. That means understanding local calendars, communication norms, stakeholder expectations and decision-making structures before the rollout begins, not after an escalation has occurred.
Stakeholder engagement cannot begin at go-live
The need for local engagement becomes even more important in markets where works councils, unions and formal consultation requirements are involved.
In France, for example, a manufacturing site may involve HR, finance, procurement, site leadership, union representatives and works councils. Each group sees the programme from a different perspective.
Finance may be focused on cost control and invoicing. Procurement may be concerned with supplier governance. HR may be looking at worker treatment and policy. Site leaders may be prioritising operational continuity. Works councils and unions may want clarity on how the programme will affect workers, processes and local decision-making.
Bringing these stakeholders into the process late creates resistance. Not necessarily because they disagree with the programme itself, but because they feel the change has been designed without their involvement.
I have seen this first-hand. While supporting a large US-headquartered aviation company with a rollout across Poland, the Netherlands and Sweden, our team spent significant time engaging works councils and key stakeholders across manufacturing sites and regional offices. That included conversations with finance directors, local CEOs and union leaders.
Some of those discussions were uncomfortable, but they were essential.
They created space for concerns to be raised, local requirements to be understood and expectations to be managed before the programme went live. Without that groundwork, the rollout may have progressed more quickly on paper, but it would have carried much greater risk.
This is what effective change management looks like in practice. It is not a series of announcements sent before launch. It is the work of building trust, addressing objections and creating local support before the new process is introduced.
Compliance is not something you set up once
Change management and compliance are closely connected because even the strongest compliance framework depends on people following it.
There is a common assumption that compliance is largely completed during implementation. The contract is signed, the system is configured, the framework is established and the policy is approved. The organisation then moves on to delivery.
In reality, compliance in a global contingent workforce programme is not a one-time setup. It is a daily operating discipline.
It appears in every decision about worker classification, every supplier engagement, every payment, every SOW arrangement and every hiring manager request. It depends on the right people following the right process consistently.
As Brenda explained during our conversation, companies often assume that once the system, contract and framework are in place, compliance has been addressed. But the real risk sits in the everyday activity of hiring, managing and paying workers.
A programme can have an excellent policy and still create exposure if hiring managers use the wrong engagement route, suppliers bypass the approved process or finance teams apply local invoicing rules incorrectly.
Compliance is therefore not separate from programme operations. It is embedded within them.
Policy documents are not enough
The challenge is not only knowing what the rules are. It is making them usable for people who are not employment law specialists.
A hiring manager does not need a dense policy document explaining every legal distinction and regulatory obligation. They need a practical answer when they want to engage someone.
They need to know which route to use, what information is required, which approvals apply and who to contact when the situation is unclear.
If the correct process is complicated, slow or difficult to understand, managers will find an alternative. They may contact a supplier directly, place the engagement under SOW or use a local route that sits outside the global programme.
The policy may still exist, but the organisation has lost control of the decision.
The strongest compliance programmes make the right process the easiest process. They turn regulatory and policy requirements into a simple operational route that managers can follow without needing specialist knowledge.
That means separating the legal complexity behind the programme from the practical experience of using it.
Regulation is constantly moving
The challenge becomes harder because the regulatory environment is not static.
Across EMEA, organisations may need to respond to worker classification rules, temporary worker protections, pay transparency requirements, umbrella company regulation, platform work legislation and new obligations connected to AI in recruitment and employment.
The difficulty is not simply identifying that a law has changed. It is understanding what that change means for the operating model.
Does the supplier process need to change? Does the contract need to be updated? Should the VMS workflow be reconfigured? Does a different engagement model need to be used in that country? Do hiring managers need new guidance?
These are practical programme questions, not theoretical legal ones.
A central team may be able to define the global framework, but it cannot always monitor and interpret every change across every market without support.
This is where local expertise becomes essential.
Local expertise should come before the problem
Too often, local expertise is brought in only after something has gone wrong.
An invoicing process fails, a classification issue is identified, a works council raises concerns or a supplier arrangement creates unexpected risk. The organisation then looks for local advice to fix the problem.
By that point, the programme is already in remediation mode.
A better approach is to involve local expertise during discovery and programme design.
Local specialists can help the central team understand how workers are typically engaged, which labour and tax rules apply, what consultation obligations exist, which supplier models are common and where the global process may not fit the market.
They can also identify issues that are difficult to see from headquarters, including cultural sensitivities, informal working practices and stakeholder relationships that may affect adoption.
At CXC, we have seen repeatedly that local knowledge does not weaken global consistency. It makes global consistency possible.
Without local expertise, the global model may be applied in a way that creates resistance, non-compliance or costly rework. With the right local input, the programme can maintain clear governance while adapting the delivery model to the realities of each country.
Training is only the beginning
Training remains an important part of the rollout, but it should not be mistaken for adoption.
People may understand the new process during a training session and still return to the old way of working afterwards. This is especially likely when established supplier relationships remain strong, the new workflow is unclear or the local team feels the process does not reflect how the market operates.
That is why follow-up after go-live matters.
Programme teams need to look at what is actually happening. Are managers using the correct engagement route? Are suppliers following the new rules? Are local finance teams able to work within the process? Are the same questions and workarounds appearing repeatedly?
The first few weeks and months often reveal the gap between the process as designed and the process as used.
Change management does not stop when the training finishes. It continues until the new way of working becomes the normal way of working.
What successful adoption looks like
The discussion at CWS Europe highlighted several practical lessons for organisations expanding their contingent workforce programmes.
Local stakeholders need to be involved before the key decisions are final. HR, finance, procurement, legal, site leadership, hiring managers, suppliers, works councils and unions all need to be engaged where relevant.
The reason for the change must also be clear. People are more likely to support a new process when they understand how it improves visibility, reduces risk, strengthens supplier governance or makes workforce engagement easier.
Communication needs to reflect the market rather than simply repeating a global message. Timing, language, format and cultural context all influence how the programme is received.
The process itself must be simple enough to use. Hiring managers should not need specialist expertise to determine how a worker should be engaged.
Finally, support needs to continue after go-live. Questions, workarounds and unexpected behaviours should be expected. They are not always signs that the programme has failed, but they are signs that the programme needs to keep adapting.
Success is measured by behaviour
A programme is not successful because the policy has been published, the training attendance was high or the VMS went live on schedule.
It is successful when people follow the correct process, local stakeholders trust the programme and the organisation can see and govern how work is being engaged.
That is why change management, compliance and local expertise are so closely connected.
Change management helps people understand and adopt the programme. Compliance defines the controls that need to operate every day. Local expertise ensures those controls reflect the legal, cultural and operational reality of each market.
Remove any one of those elements and the programme becomes weaker.
Bring them together and the organisation has a much stronger chance of building a programme that works in practice, not only on paper.
Coming next in the series
In part three, I explore where workforce governance often breaks down, including the limitations of VMS platforms, SOW leakage and the growing demand for executive-grade workforce reporting.
CXC has supported contingent workforce programmes for more than 30 years, across over 100 countries. We’ll help you combine global governance with the local compliance knowledge, stakeholder support and in-country expertise needed to make your programme work in every market.
