Revisiting the expatriate failure concept: A qualitative study of Scandinavian expatriates in Hong Kong

This article advances the understanding of expatriate failure, which remains a contested social phenomenon in international work life as well as scholarly research. The study challenges the definition of expatriate failure and its inherent biases, i.e., the epistemological primacy of the firm level and the failure/success binary. We argue that this qualitative study of 51 Scandinavian expatriates in Hong Kong can contribute to advancing theory on the expatriate failure concept by asking individual expatriates what constitutes failure to them. By applying social constructionist and social anthropological ideas to the expatriate failure concept debate, we develop the internationality thesis which demonstrates a discrepancy between the expatriates’ perceptions of successful international assignments and the actual nature of their lived lives; many expatriates desire to enrich their lives through experiencing an international/intercultural and adventurous lifestyle, but, in fact, living lives with limited intercultural exposure and interaction. We conclude by proposing a reconceptualisation of expatriate failure in terms of offering both a new definition and approach to researching expatriate failure in which time/duration, context, and geographical location need to be taken into account. We believe the new approach can overcome some of the empirical unsoundness of mainstream definitions.     

‘Hidden’ expatriates: international mobility in the United Arab Emirates as a challenge to current understanding of expatriation

Expatriates are often assumed to have enhanced terms and conditions and, because that makes them expensive, to be in key managerial or technical specialist roles. Employees who come from abroad and are in more manual or even menial roles are usually referred to as ‘migrants’. However, there are millions of people around the world who are not migrants, their intended sojourn in a foreign country is seen by them and their employers as temporary, but their employment contracts are far from advantageous compared with those of locals. These ‘hidden’ expatriates are brought into focus in the emerging Arab Gulf States. In some of these countries, the population consists mainly of expatriates, with the local population a small minority: These expatriates include many in lower‐management or manual or menial jobs. We demarcate these expatriates from organisationally assigned expatriates, self‐initiated expatriates and migrants. We use qualitative data from such expatriates in the United Arab Emirates to explore the issues this raises for governments, employers and the expatriates – and for our understanding of the phenomenon of expatriation.     

IT运维外包中外派人员组织归属感的影响因素研究——基于心理契约理论的多案例研究

现在越来越多的客户将其部分或全部的IT运维工作交给外部的专业服务提供商。IT外派人员长期在客户的现场提供服务,这也导致了外派人员对母公司缺乏组织归属感。本文选择了四个涉及IT外派人员的IT运维外包项目进行案例研究,试图探寻影响外派人员对母公司组织归属感的影响因素。本文发现影响外派人员组织归属感的因素主要包括沟通、公平、员工关怀和稳定预期,但是在不同的心理契约情境下影响外派人员组织归属感的因素各不相同。     

Career self-management behaviour of Western self-initiated expatriates in local organizations in China

The available literature on self-initiated expatriates (SIEs) is generally based on the assumption that SIEs are protean in character and manage their careers independently. The current qualitative empirical study offers an alternative to this assumption, using 23 interviews with Western SIEs employed by local organizations in China to examine how and why SIEs target obtaining a labour market fit through career self-management behaviour, particularly in culturally distant career contexts. The assessment of the career self-management behaviour of Western SIEs was undertaken using King's framework (2004). Three approaches to self-management behaviour were identified based on the motivation and outcome expectations of SIEs: labour market entry, employability maintenance and career advancement. The research illustrates the flexible and dynamic nature of career self-management behaviour and reflects individuals' revised career expectations and the employment context of the host country. The findings contribute to the extant theory on SIEs by illustrating emerging means of realizing international careers in cross-cultural career contexts, and the significance of third-party initiatives supporting expatriation facilitated by the Internet and social media.     

Human factors in the transfer of the ‘Japanese best practice’ manufacturing system to Singapore

A detailed examination of the practices reported by managers in thirty-one affiliates of Japanese companies engaged in manufacturing in Singapore revealed a high degree of conformity with the Japanese best practice (also known as ‘lean production’) model in the way work is organized and in the shop-floor level manufacturing practices, but greater conformity to host country norms in the HRM practices applied to the local work-force. This is consistent with the patterns reported in the existing literature regarding Japanese transplants in other countries, including the US and the UK. Strong statistical relationships were found in the Singapore study among the work organization cluster, the manufacturing practices cluster, and the performance outcomes. No significant relationships were found between the HRM cluster and any of the ‘downstream’ variables (work organization, manufacturing practices or performance outcomes), but relatively heavy reliance on expatriates was found to be highly related to work organization, manufacturing practices and performance outcomes. These findings suggest that heavy reliance on expatriates may function as an alternative to Japanese-style HRM practices in situations where it would be unduly difficult or costly to extend the whole package of Japanese-style HRM practices to the local work-force.     

East meets West: the case of Polish expatriates in the UK

This paper attempts to redress the balance in research on expatriation by exploring the experiences of an under-researched group of expatriates in an under-researched destination. Although there has been an increase in research on the adjustment of expatriates, the focus of IHRM research has, to date, tended to view the expatriation process through a narrow lens, emphasising the role of managers from affluent ‘Western’ countries working in less affluent countries. The growing numbers of multinationals and therefore expatriates from other countries means that the research agenda must be broadened, in this case to the experience of Poles in the UK. By focusing on expatriates from a former socialist economy we highlight the differing motives and experience of adjustment that they face. We show how the economic and social benefits of this East–West transfer can be a powerful motivating factor and may override adjustment difficulties. Furthermore, the analysis of East to West European expatriate transfers, from less to more developed nations, contributes to and widens the range of parent and host countries studied within the realm of expatriate adjustment.     

Do Japanese MNCs use expatriates to contain risk in Asian host countries?

We investigate the impact of host-country risk on the expatriation strategies of multinational firms, using data on Japanese subsidiary firms in manufacturing industries in 13 host countries in Asia. We find that country risk is negatively correlated with the degree of expatriation and that, rather than host-country risk, firm-specific factors (particularly capital intensity, ownership share of parent firms in subsidiaries and the age of the venture) explain most of the variation in the degree to which subsidiaries rely on Japanese expatriates. Contrary to previous studies, the capital intensity of production is a key explanatory firm-specific variable that correlates positively with the degree of expatriation. Japanese multinational companies do not rely on expatria127=tes to off-set host-country risk, but to mitigate risk to parent investment in subsidiaries.     

Senior expatriate leadership's effects on innovation and the role of cultural intelligence

We propose that senior expatriates’ visionary–transformational leadership influences the rate of innovation adoption in the organizations or units they head, but cultural intelligence moderates this relationship. Our hypotheses were tested with data from 153 senior expatriate managers and 695 subordinates from companies in all 27 countries of the European Union. We found a direct influence of senior expatriates’ visionary–transformational leadership on the rate of innovation adoption. Cultural intelligence moderates the effect of senior expatriates’ leadership on organizational innovation, but not on product-market innovation. Implications for academic research and business practice are discussed.     

The development of political skill and political capital by global leaders through global assignments

The purpose of this paper is to explain how developing global leaders through global assignments (i.e. in the form of expatriation and inpatriation) may lead to their acquisition of valuable political skill and political capital. First, using the theoretical frame of political influence theory, the benefit of political skill is explained relative to the development and augmentation of global leaders' capital portfolio during global assignments. Second, a distinction between social capital and political capital, as the integral components of global leader's capital portfolio, is made. In conclusion, the value of acquiring political skill and building human, cultural, social and political capital by global leaders is discussed separately for expatriate and inpatriate assignments.     

外派员工工作——家庭平衡的组织支持研究

随着中国企业国际化的加深,越来越多的员工面临着自身职业生涯的国际化。来自工作与家庭的冲突成为企业和外派员工共同面对的难题,且已危及企业和员工个人的发展。文章分析外派员工家庭难题及其产生的根源,探讨企业如何帮助外派员工解决家庭难题。提出了从制度和程序两个层面,外派前、中、后三个阶段制定实施组织支持策略,以期实现企业与员工双赢,员工职业成功与家庭幸福的和谐共融。