Managerial willingness to assume traveling, short-term and long-term global assignments.
| Verfasser | Konopaske, Robert |
Abstract:
* Drawing on reasoned action and family systems theories, as well as the domestic and international job transfer and relocation, global assignments, personality and work-life balance research domains, this study examines managers' willingness to assume global assignments.
* We propose a multi-factor model and test several hypotheses using survey data collected from 431 global managers and 162 spouses/significant others that examine the degree to which individual, family, and organizational variables influence managerial willingness to accept not only the more traditional multi-year, but also the increasingly common traveling and short-term global assignments.
* Results suggest that individual (adventurousness and destination country), family (eldercare, children at home, community tenure, and spouse/significant other relocation willingness), and organizational (compensatory rewards/benefits and career fit) factors influence managerial willingness to assume global assignments.
Keywords: Global assignments * Willingness to relocate * Short-term * Expatriate * Spouses/ Significant others
Introduction
International work assignments continue to be recognized as a means by which ambitious executives can enhance their career opportunities (Takeuchi et al. 2005). Moreover, international work experience has been recognized as an important component in global leadership development (Black et al. 1999) and as a method to build competitive advantage for multinational corporations (MNCs) (Carpenter/Sanders/Gregersen 2001, Spreitzer/McCall/Mahoney 1997). Many organizations encourage managers and future leaders to develop global vision, boundary-crossing skills, and effective global networks (Kanter 1995, Quelch/Bloom 1999). When high potential managers are sent on global assignments, they are forced to immerse themselves in a variety of novel and cross-culturally challenging business situations (Tung 1998). International management researchers have reinforced the importance associated with working overseas: "An international assignment is the single most powerful experience in shaping the perspective and capabilities of effective global leaders" (Black et al. 1999, p. 2).
Unfortunately, there is emerging evidence that some MNCs are having difficulty attracting internal candidates who are willing to accept traditional multi-year international assignments (Ball 1999, GMAC 2004, Konopaske/Robie/Ivancevich 2005, PricewaterhouseCoopers 1999, Tahvanainen/Welch/Worm 2005, van der Velde/Bossink/Jansen 2005). Such reluctance to transfer overseas can create problems for multinational organizations as they attempt to become more globally competitive (Tung/Miller 1990). Although there are many potential determinants of one's willingness to accept or reject an overseas assignment, family and career-related issues play a prominent role in such international relocation decisions (Black/Stephens 1989, Borstorff 1996, Brett/Stroh 1995, Harvey 1996, Scullion/Collings/Gunnigle 2007, Tung/Miller 1990). For example, an oft-cited family factor that can affect managerial willingness to relocate globally is the dual-career status of many couples and spouses' (or significant others') reluctance to disrupt their careers (Handler/Lane/Maher 1997, Harvey 1996, Harvey/Buckley 1998). From a career perspective, managers are concerned with the longer-term implications of being disconnected and removed from the home office for an extended period of time (Feldman/ Thomas 1992, Mendenhall/Dunbar/Oddou 1987).
In order to overcome this reluctance to accepting multi-year assignments, there is growing evidence that multinational organizations are increasingly using alternatives to long-term expatriate assignments, such as periodic traveling or short-term global assignments (Flynn 1999, GMAC 2004, Harris/Petrovic/Brewster 2001, Mayerhofer et al. 2004, PricewaterhouseCoopers 1999, Sparrow/Brewster/Harris 2004, Welch 2003, Welch/Welch/ Worm 2007). Scullion, Collings and Gunnigle (2007) state: "The emergence of these alternative, more flexible forms of global staffing and issues around their management and administration are likely to represent a key challenge for IHRM professionals and academics in the 21st century" (p. 314). Although there are many ways to classify the myriad of international assignments (for a review, see Briscoe/Schuler 2004), for the purposes of this paper, we define long-term international assignments as those requiring assignees and their families to relocate overseas for 1-4 years. In contrast, short-term global assignments require managers to relocate internationally for a period of less than one year; while traveling global assignments require managers to take multiple international business trips to one or more host countries each year, but these traveling assignments do not require relocation of self or family to an overseas location (Flynn 1999, Harris et al. 2001, Konopaske et al. 2005, Martinez 1999, PricewaterhouseCoopers 1999, Solomon 1999, Windham International 1999). These alternatives are often seen as lower-cost from an organizational perspective and lower-risk from both an individual career (i.e., premature return and being "out of sight, out of mind" regarding decision s at the parent country office) and personal (i.e., disruption of spouse/significant other's career; leave desirable home and community) perspective.
The aim of the current study is to make the following contributions. First, although a modest amount of previous international management research has explored how spouses can influence managerial willingness to accept a global assignment (Brett/Stroh 1995, Konopaske et al. 2005), no previous research study to date has focused (in a single model) on how individual, family and organizational factors directly influence managers' willingness to take not only long-term international assignments, but also traveling and short-term international assignments. Second, a time dimension (i.e., traveling--brief international business trips of 8 weeks or less; short-term--less than 1 year; and, long-term--between 1-4 years) is incorporated into both the spouse/significant other willingness to relocate internationally construct and the manager willingness to assume a global assignment construct. Inclusion of a time dimension is important because multinational organizations are increasingly offering candidates traveling and shorter-term alternatives as a way to control costs and attract candidates who would otherwise reject the more traditional longer-term overseas assignments (Briscoe/Schuler 2004, Flynn 1999, GMAC 2004, Mayerhofer et al. 2004, PricewaterhouseCoopers 1999, Solomon 1999, Sparrow et al. 2004). Building knowledge about the intersection between emerging (traveling and short-term) international assignments and managerial global assignment willingness represents an opportunity to fill a gap in an under-researched area of the international management domain.
In the following section, a conceptual foundation and nine hypotheses are presented. The remainder of the paper is partitioned into sections addressing the research methods, results, discussion, limitations, future research and conclusion.
Conceptual Foundation and Hypotheses
Job transfer occurs when an individual employee changes jobs within a company and/or relocates geographically to do so (Brett/Stroh/Reilly 1992). Generally, employees accept transfers in order to pursue career development opportunities and to avoid negative career consequences if they refuse to transfer to another location (Brett 1982, Employee Relocation Council 1980, 1990). Research on geographic job transfer and relocation has focused on a variety of different domains, including the role of mobility in career advancement, adjustment to job transfer, and willingness to relocate (Brett et al. 1992). Though each area is important and worthy of additional study, this research project will focus on managerial willingness to assume a global assignment for the purposes of career advancement.
Our proposed framework is supported conceptually by the theory of reasoned action (Ajzen 1991, Ajzen/Fishbein 1977, 1980, Fishbein/Ajzen 1975). The theory of reasoned action posits that an individual is more likely to perform a behavior as behavioral intention increases. Sutton (1998) states: "Behavioral intention is both the immediate determinant and single best predictor of behavior" (p. 1318). Intentions to perform behaviors of different kinds can be predicted from attitudes toward the behavior, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control (Ajzen 1991). This theory has been tested successfully in many empirical research studies linking attitudes and behaviors (for a review, see Sutton 1998). In the framework presented herein, the influence of several individual, family, and organizational attitudes are studied relative to their effects on managerial intention to assume a traveling, short-term and/or long-term global assignment.
Our focus is on predicting the intention to assume these three different types of global assignments, and thus, we do not measure the actual relocation decision. We focus on the willingness construct for two reasons. First, there is a considerable amount of support in the literature for the relationship between an individual's intentions (i.e., willingness) and his/her subsequent behavior (i.e., decision to accept/reject international job assignment). For example, Sheppard, Hartwick and Warshaw (1988) conducted two meta-analyses of research studies that were direct tests of the Fishbein and Ajzen model (i.e., The Theory of Reasoned Action). Sheppard et al. (1988) found strong support for the general predictive utility of the model and concluded that there exists a "significant and substantial relationship between individuals' intentions and performance" (p. 336). In addition, Randall (1989) stated that the Fishbein and Ajzen model has been successful...
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