This volume provides in-depth examinations of a variety of individual, social, and environmental factors that contribute to the success of expatriate employees. Using data from numerous large-scale studies from both the public and private sectors, this volume provides valuable insights into expatriate success with implications for both theoretical understanding and practical management.

The authors explore factors that influence employees to pursue expatriation, contribute to expatriate adjustment and satisfaction, and ultimately drive expatriate performance, well-being, and success. The chapters in this book consider the role of social demographic characteristics, personality and individual differences, training and preparation, and social and organizational support in contributing to each of these outcomes. Using findings from diverse countries and sectors and data-focused analytic techniques, this volume provides novel insights into factors promoting expatriate success.

Abstracts

Advancing Expatriate Research in Public and Private Sectors

Brenton M. Wiernik, Heiko Rüger, and Deniz S. Ones

This volume draws on four large and diverse investigations of expatriate employees to rigorously examine factors that contribute to expatriate success across cultural contexts, economic sectors, and expatriate populations. In this introduction, we present the studies contributing to these investigations, describe the research questions addressed in each thematic section of the book, and situate the studies in the broader expatriate research litera-ture. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of rigorous research for global human resource management practice.

Expatriate Personality: Facet-level Comparisons with Domestic Counterparts

Jack W. Kostal, Brenton M. Wiernik, Anne-Grit Albrecht, and Deniz S. Ones

We compared personality trait distributions for expatriates to those of domestic managers and general populations using cross-cultural meta-analysis and three personality inventories.We found that expatriate–domestic manager differences are negligible to moderate in mag-nitude. Differences varied across lower-order facets within the Big Five domains. Results differed somewhat across personality inventories. Results suggest that expatriate are higher on Experiences-related facets of Openness and Compassion-related facets of Agreeableness,but may be lower on Conscientiousness and Emotional Stability. Our findings indicate that there is likely great opportunity for organizations to enhance expatriate success by incorpo-rating personality traits into expatriate selection procedures.

Antecedents and Consequences of Mobility Self-Efficacy

Stine Waibel, Heiko Rüger, and Brenton M. Wiernik

This chapter explores the role of mobility self-efficacy (MSE; individuals’ beliefs about their capacity to move and adapt to new places and cultures) in expatriation. Using a sample of 1,771 German Foreign Service (GFS) diplomats on post abroad, we study potential ante-cedents of MSE as well as its consequences for diplomats’ well-being (locational adjustment, job satisfaction, satisfaction with relocation, health-related quality of life, work–life balance, and perceived stress). We find that language proficiency, international mobility experience acquired before entering the GFS, social and organizational support, and job recognition are associated with higher MSE. Mobility self-efficacy is related to expatriate well-being, especially for outcomes that are closely tied to the underlying mobility process (locational adjustment, satisfaction with the rotation process, and perceived work–life balance). Post-hoc sensitivity analyses suggested that the benefits of MSE may be limited in locations where general living conditions are exceedingly difficult. These results suggest that policies and interventions might focus on developing and maintaining individual mobility self-efficacy to promote positive outcomes for expatriate employees, their families, and their organizations.

Tolerance of Ambiguity: Relations with Expatriate Adjustment and Job Performance

Anne-Grit Albrecht, Deniz S. Ones,Stephan Dilchert, Jürgen Deller,and Frieder M. Paulus

International assignments are strongly characterized novelty, complexity, insolubility, and unpredictability. In such environments, dispositional tolerance of (or even attraction to) ambiguity may be an important contributing factor to expatriate success. We use data from the iGOES project to examine the contributions of tolerance of ambiguity to expatriate out-comes. Results show that tolerance for ambiguity has only small positive benefits for expat-riate locational and work adjustment, as well as for contextual and management/supervision performance. Tolerance of ambiguity-criterion relationships showed negligible variability across samples, suggesting that these weak relations are stable across differences in cultural distance and time on assignment. Results indicate that organizations selecting expatriates may realize better utility with constructs other than tolerance of ambiguity.

Validity of Big Five Personality Traits for Expatriate Success:Results from Turkey

Deniz S. Ones, Handan Kepir Sinangil, and Brenton M. Wiernik

Despite decades of research on individual and environmental factors that support expatriate success, knowledge of the validity of personality traits for expatriate adjustment and job performance remains nascent. In this study, we report validity results for broad Big Five and compound personality traits for a sample of 220 expatriates working in Turkey. We examine personality relations with both international adjustment and host country national-rated job performance. We find patterns of validity similar to those observed for domestic managers. We discuss implications for expatriate selection and theories of international job performance.

Core Self-Evaluative Traits: Self-Efficacy, Locus of Control, Optimism and Diplomat Success

Herbert Fliege and Brenton M. Wiernik

Work-related international assignments create a need for adjustment which may cause stress, diminish work satisfaction, and affect health which, in turn, may result in assignment failure. Foreign Service assignments, unlike most business assignments, follow a rotational pattern with postings to another country every few years, involving a regularly recurring need for adjustment. The study examines psychological factors that could facilitate adjustment and protect from negative outcomes. The focus is on three core self-evaluations (CSE) – self-efficacy, internal locus of control (LOC), and dispositional optimism. We test the hypothesis that each of these core self-evaluations is associated with better expatriate well-being in Foreign Service personnel. Employees of the German Federal Foreign Office in rotation were surveyed using online questionnaires on stress, physical and mental health, locational adjustment, job satisfaction, and work-family conflict as outcomes, and core self-evaluations as predictors. Each self-evaluative trait individually, as well as a composite CSE measure, showed strong relations with satisfaction, work–family reconciliation, health, and (low) stress. Relations were weaker with locational adjustment. Correlational patterns for the CSE facets were very similar, and all positive criterion relations were accounted for by the general CSE factor. Core self-evaluations play an important role for expatriate well-being in terms of health, work, and adjustment outcomes. Sending organizations can draw on these findings with respect to personnel recruitment, selection, and pre-departure training.

Integrity: Generalizing Findings from Domestic to Expatriate Contexts

Handan Kepir Sinangil, Deniz S. Ones,and Brenton M. Wiernik

Integrity tests have been established as strong predictors of both counterproductive work behaviors and productive job performance. However, heretofore no studies have examined integrity measures in expatriate contexts. In this study, we use a sample of 220 expatriates working in Turkey to examine integrity’s validity for both international adjustment and host country national ratings of ten dimensions of job performance. Consistent with domestic research, a measure of integrity provided substantial validity for counterpro-ductive work behaviors and other job performance dimensions. However, there were negligible relations with international adjustment. We recommend that integrity measures be incorporated into expatriate employee selection and assessment systems that aim to minimize expatriate counterproductivity and maximize job performance.

The Impact of Age and Experience on Expatriate Outcomes

Anne-Grit Albrecht, Brenton M. Wiernik, Jürgen Deller, Stephan Dilchert, Deniz S. Ones, and Frieder M. Paulus

Age and international experience are widely believed to importantly impact expatriate success. These variables are believed to be proxies for variables such as job knowledge, adaptability, and trainability and have a strong influence on organizational expatriation decisions. In this chapter, we examine age and experience relations with expatriate success in the iGOES samples. We find that age and experience have weak relations with most criteria and suggest more fruitful avenues for future expatriate research and practice.

Impacts of Age, Tenure, and Experience on Expatriate Adjustment and Job Satisfaction

Stine Waibel, Heiko Rüger, Brenton M. Wiernik, and Herbert Fliege

This chapter analyses how time-related variables such as age and organizational tenure relate to expatriate adjustment and job satisfaction using a sample of 1,771 German Foreign Service (GFS) diplomats, as well as the moderating effects of hierarchical level and job autonomy of these relations. We observed no significant age effects on locational adjust-ment, supporting meta-analytic findings and theoretical predictions from socioemotional selectivity theory that diverging growth and loss processes may cancel out. We find that, in general, diplomats report similar levels of job satisfaction across career stages, but that that job autonomy moderates relations between tenure and satisfaction among high-level diplo-mats. When high-ranking civil servants lack job autonomy, their job satisfaction decrease with progressing tenure and age, likely due to increasingly frustrated expectations. The present study adds to a still sparse literature analyzing changes in expatriate outcomes asso-ciated with time-related factors.

Expatriate Leadership Experience: Host Country Burden or Resource?

Jack W. Kostal, Brenton M. Wiernik, and Deniz S. Ones

Expatriates have the potential to strongly positively or negatively impact the host country nationals (HCN) with whom they work. Scholarly discussions of expatriation have at times characterized expatriates either as promising high-potentials with substantial knowledge and experience to offer, or else as employees lacking critical experiences, knowledge, and skills needed to successfully navigate challenging managerial situations overseas. This chapter examines the accuracy of these stereotypes as characterizations of the typical level of managerial experience that expatriates possess. We use transcultural meta-analysis of experience data for a total of 728 expatriate managers and 9,995 domestic managers originating from 32 countries and working in 30 countries to examine differences in leadership experience between expatriate and domestic managers. Results show that expatriates tend to have more experience than domestic managers in both their host countries (δ = .27) and their origin countries (δ = .29), with consistent differences across experience dimensions and countries. We describe a theoretical framework linking expatriate experience and actions to HCN outcomes that provides context for results call for further research on the impact of expatriates on their host countries.

Success among Self-Initiated versus Assigned Expatriates

Anne-Grit Albrecht, Stephan Dilchert, Deniz S. Ones, Jürgen Deller, and Frieder M. Paulus

This chapter compares the success outcomes of self-initiated and employer-initiated expat-riates. Results show negligible to small differences between these groups on adjustment, job satisfaction, and job performance, though self-initiated expatriates do show somewhat better interaction adjustment. Results suggest that self-initiation is not a powerful determi-nant of expatriate success.

Lingua Necessaria? Language Proficiency and Expatriate Success

Brenton M. Wiernik, Anne-Grit Albrecht, Stephan Dilchert, Jürgen Deller, Deniz S. Ones, and Frieder M. Paulus

Local language proficiency is often regarded as a key enabling factor for expatriate success. In this study, we use data from the iGOES project to examine how language proficiency contributes to expatriate outcomes. Language proficiency is negligibly to weakly related to most outcomes, but does show positive relations with interaction adjustment. Moderator analyses support the interpretation of this relation as reflecting increased comfort from being able to communicate effectively, rather than reflecting cultural engagement or social inclusion effects. Overall, results indicate that local language proficiency can contribute to expatriate comfort, but is not absolutely necessary for expatriate success.

Expatriate Training: Intercontextual Analyses from the iGOES Project

Jack W. Kostal, Anne-Grit Albrecht, Stephan Dilchert, Jürgen Deller, Deniz S. Ones, and Frieder M. Paulus

Cross-cultural training (CCT) is used to provide expatriates with the knowledge, skills, and abilities necessary to function effectively in the cultural contexts of their host countries. Previous meta-analyses of the effectiveness of CCT have found that, while CCT is on aver-age beneficial for expatriates, there is large variability in effectiveness across studies. We use data from the iGOES project to examine potential moderators of CCT’s effectiveness, including type of training, specificity of training to the host culture context, presence of a mentor in the host country, and length of training. In contrast to previous findings in this literature, we found that associations between participation in CCT and expatriate job per-formance, job satisfaction, and international adjustment were small, and sometimes negative.

Organizational and Social Support Among Foreign Service Diplomats

Maria M. Bellinger, Brenton M. Wiernik, and Herbert Fliege

International relocation is increasingly common in a globalized world. In our sample of Federal Foreign Office staff, it is part of the lifelong job routine. This process is extremely demanding on employees and is associated with a variety of negative outcomes. External support systems are an important factor that can facilitate adjustment during international location and contribute to expatriate success. We describe support interventions imple-mented by the Federal Foreign Office to facilitate preparation for international rotation and adjustment of employees at their new postings. We distinguish between perceived organi-zational support and non-work social support. We find that employees’ perceptions of these two forms of support differ by gender and family status. We find that organizational and social support show small to moderate relations with a variety of outcomes, including work attitudes, family and life attitudes, and mental health outcomes. The contributions of sup-port systems to many of these outcomes appear to differ by gender and family status.

A Family Affair: Spouse and Children’s Role in Expatriate Adjustment and Job Performance

Deniz S. Ones, Hannah J. Foldes, and Handan Kepir Sinangil

Previous research has consistently identified a relation between family and expatriate outcomes (e.g., adjustment, stay intentions, job performance), but little research has sought to isolate the various roles of the spouse and other family members (e.g., children) in relation to these outcomes. This study examined the influence that the spouse and family have on expatriate adjustment, stay intentions, and job performance in Turkey. Data were obtained for 311 expatriates and 308 Turkish host country national coworkers. Results indicated that marital status, presence and adjustment of family, and family support have a differential impact on various outcomes. The influence of children appeared to be more pronounced than that of spouses in terms of their presence in the assigned country and their adjustment. Also, family support influenced job performance strongly, but had no effect on adjustment or stay intentions. Organizations could benefit from attending more to family and spouse issues to increase the chances of successful expatriate assignments.

Influence of Family Presence on Expatriate Outcomes

Brittany K. Mercado, Anne-Grit Albrecht, Frieder M. Paulus, Stephan Dilchert, Deniz S. Ones, and Jürgen Deller

The role of expatriate families in the success or failure of international assignments is often overlooked. Organizations often consider employees’ family status when making expatriate selection decisions, and as expatriates prepare for their travels, they must make important decisions about whether their partners and children will accompany them. In this chapter, we examine the impact of partner and children presence on expatriate outcomes. We find that family presence is generally beneficial, but note some important contexts where family may interfere with expatriate acculturation. We highlight implications for practice and areas for future study.

Gender Differences in Job Performance and Adjustment: Do Women Expatriates Measure Up?

Hannah J. Foldes, Deniz S. Ones, and Handan Kepir Sinangil

This study examined gender differences in expatriate job performance and general adjust-ment to living abroad to determine whether women effectively perform job duties and ad-just in Turkey, an environment potentially perceived to be unfriendly to women managers (N = 308 expatriates). Findings lend support to the employment of women expatriates. Men and women expatriates rated themselves similarly in terms of adjustment to local condi-tions. Host country national (HCN) ratings of job performance revealed that men and women expatriates were rated similarly in terms of job performance. However, moderator analyses revealed that HCN subordinates gave lower ratings to women than HCN co-workers and supervisors. Additional moderator analyses revealed rater-ratee gender effects in expatriate ratings: women HCNs gave women expatriates higher ratings than their male counterparts.

Influence of Gender and Family Status on Expatriate Well-Being

Stine Waibel and Heiko Rüger

This chapter examines how gender and family status interact to impact expatriate outcomes (locational adjustment, job satisfaction, satisfaction with relocation, health-related quality of life, work-life balance, and perceived stress) in a sample of 1,771 German Foreign Service diplomats on post abroad. Results reveal that both female and male diplomats who are single parents report a significantly lower health-related quality of life than diplomats in other family arrangements. Moreover, single male diplomats with children report signifi-cantly lower adjustment levels. Irrespective of the presence of children, single women are particularly uncomfortable with how their profession and frequent moves affect their per-sonal life. We discuss the need for further studies of the challenges of family formation during expatriation, especially for women, as well as issues connected to geographically-separated families.