»non-work«

[p.435]
Ones and Sinangil see non-work considerations (spouse and family), female expatriates and the perspective of the host country to be the emerging areas in expatriate management.

· non-work considerations
While the influence of spouse's well-being on the expatriate's job performance is mostly explained by a spill-over theory, it is widely accepted that spousal adjustment or not-adjustment has great effect on expatriates deciding to return early: "the inability to interact successfully with host country nationals can lead to isolation, loneliness, inadequate adjustment, and premature return from assignment (Tung, 1988)". Black and Gregersen (1991b) found that spousal adjustment can be supported by cross-cultural training, a social support network, an acceptable standard of living, cultural novelty, and an early involvement in selection.

· women in expatriate management
Even though the number of women in management in general is raising, only 5-12% of the expatriates are female. Adler (1987) found three reasons for this:
"(1) women are not interested in international careers;
(2) organizations refuse to send women employees abroad for fear of poor job performance in foreign cultures; and
(3) foreign cultures discriminate against women."
Research showed that women are very well interested in international careers. While organization say that they are not any less likely to send women on missions abroad, women state the opposite to be true.
[p.436]
Only the last reason, which 70% of multinationals take as reason for not sending women on an expatriate assignment, has to be differentiated culture-specific. Ones and Sinangil report from their studies in Turkey that women expatriates directly compared to their male counterparts were rated higher by their host colleagues in terms of job performance and overall adjustment.

· host country perspective
Very little research has been conducted in this field. Ones and Sinangil call for studies on the expectations of host organizations on expatriates.


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My interview partner's company does not especially prepare their expatriates for their mission. Since they preferably hire people coming from a multi-ethnic background or having lived in another culture, they accept them to cope well in any cross-cultural setting. Prior to their employee's departure they conduct a so-called exit-interview. In this they simulate the employee's financial situation before and after his expatriate-mission, they talk about social insurance, the company car, .... and hard facts like that. My interview partner was actually disappointed that I did not show any interest in these facts, while they make up 90% of the future expatriate's concerns. Only by the time that they are on their second or third mission, they will start asking about the soft facts concerning the foreign culture and foreign attitudes.
In the host country a start up team which is assigned by the division manager is renting housing and helps organizing the required documents. If no facilities are available and the projects are planned to take longer, the company puts up its own camp.
The expatriates themselves are expected to learn the apparent cultural gestures of their host country and as said before they are expected to cultivate networks. The company understands itself as guest in the foreign country and it wants to keep that status/reputation. ("Wir sind Gäste in dem Land. Wir wollen auch in fünf Jahren noch willkommen geheißen werden.")

Additionally, it has to be mentioned that working for a big constructing company expatriates are not going to a "Polish" construction site - big construction sites are international by matter of investors and experts joining in. On 80% of their sites English is spoken as common language.
It also has to be remembered that expatriates are not coming to an unknown setting - they have worked on that project already for at least four years and know the relevant people on the other side, plus the colleagues they met in common workshops or trainings before. In addition construction sites offer a huge pool of diverse people thus it should be possible for everyone to find somebody he gets along with well. And, too, my interview partner says that it is still business and not about finding buddies.

They have hardly any problems with the acceptance of expatriates in the host country: On the one hand the expatriates are committed to excellence in their job, they want to show their best talents and thus are dedicated to absolute professionalism. ("Ich hab hier eine Aufgabe und ich zeige euch, dass ich das auch kann.") On the other hand their higher payments are usually accepted by host country nationals if they prove to be experts. ("Nach dem Motto 'ah-ha, der kann was', dann wird das auch akzeptiert.")

Nevertheless, expatriates especially in Eastern Europe hardly ever have problems with socializing. This is due to what my interview partner called "double binding". While it is simply their mentality to be more cordial than Germans, they are also aware that these are high-ranked people who are sent to them and they meet them as welcomed guests. Apparently, the biggest problem for expatriates is how to return this affection. Most of them can easily go along but then experience frustration and disappointment as part of a reversed culture-shock coming back to Germany. Others though perceive the call for socializing as an obligation and have a hard time to escape from it without appearing solitary.

In all cases it is up to the expatriate's personality if he succeeds in diminishing power structures or not. My interview partner argues that they never had any problems. "We are not putting anyone in a role, he couldn't play."
Every now and then they might have to send somebody who does not necessarily suit the expatriate profile but is an expert in a certain technique. In these cases it might happen that expatriate and host country nationals do not find a way to work together at all. But since the company cannot abandon the expert, they send a second expatriate to pour oil on troubled water by involving people in personal conversations, outlining the problem and showing empathy for the difficult situation. ("Ein Mensch kann nicht alle Fähigkeiten haben - in bestimmten Fällen muss man Abstriche machen. Da schickt man dann notfalls einen Gutelaune-Clown hinterher.")