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2021 | OriginalPaper | Chapter

8. Long-Term Managerial Assignment Challenges as Experienced by Assignees

Author : Iris Koleša

Published in: Becoming an International Manager

Publisher: Springer International Publishing

Abstract

This chapter summarises the findings of the individuals’ experience of managerial international assignment implementation and management in large, mature emerging market multinationals. It outlines the differences and similarities in managerial international assignment implementation and management challenges faced by assignee segments. It thereby distinguishes between internal and external recruits, managerial and non-managerial recruits, and junior and senior recruits for these assignments. The results show that the polar types of assignees by each segment engage in different preparatory, on-site, and repatriation adjustments due to their diverse backgrounds and thus require different organisational and collegial support for the assignment. They also indicate that some of the segments, such as junior and non-managerial recruits, may coincide and either reinforce or counteract the effects of each other’s characteristics on the individuals’ experience and implementation of their international mobility. Each individual-level case with its specificities is first briefly discussed. Cross-case findings with their practical implications for managing the different assignee segments of international assignees are then summarised. A particular emphasis is put on role shifts and identity work experienced by individuals throughout the international assignment process (i.e. before, during, and after international mobility) as well as the organisational and colleagues’ support (or lack thereof) for this. Sect. 8.1 presents the findings for each individual-level case, whereas Sect. 8.2 discusses the similarities and differences by assignee segment.

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previous chapter Short-Term International Assignment Challenges for Emerging Market Firm Employees

next chapter Multilevel Factors of International Assignment Implementation and Management in EMNEs

This was indicative of the firm’s international staffing strategy being more open to candidates from outside the firm as the interviews covered most of the firm’s current or recent assignees. As the firm-level interviewee explained, this approach was needs-based rather than strategic (see Sect. 6.1).

While past experience gained with other employers may have similar effects, I argue that firm-specific experience can have a more significant impact on self-efficacy in a particular working environment, as it provides similar situations in a similar (organisational) context that an assignee (based on past success) then considers they are capable of tackling elsewhere in the MNE network—regardless of the location of an assignment.

Giving such opportunities to junior employees (i.e. applying the riskier international staffing approach) signalled to the individual that the firm had a limited pool of assignment-ready individuals willing to take such positions and thus gave them some leeway in terms of negotiating and implementing the assignment.

This mainly took place cognitively, as the individual entered a new entity with their top managerial assignment and was establishing relations anew. In other words, the individual’s distancing from local staff happened intrinsically.

This was the only case where an EMNE included in this study considered the compatibility of the two managerial assignees when expatriating an individual to a foreign entity as a selection criterion and a factor contributing to their more effective and efficient integration in the foreign team, which in turn facilitates the assignee’s faster work adjustment and assumption of tasks abroad (Interview 4a).

Loyalty to the firm combined with a wish to finish their employment relationship with the firm on a positive note was their main motivation for accepting an international assignment and executing it well (Interview 4a).

Transfer of business from a senior assignee with many fundamental and challenging responsibilities in the headquarters to their colleagues in the headquarters can be complex and lengthy. In the case of Interviewee 4a, the length of time they had spent in the headquarters seemed to lock the individual’s primary loyalty to the latter—also during expatriation.

A relatively short absence from Firm A combined with the international assignment being aimed at reorganisation meant that the incomplete information on any changes in the firm during the assignee’s time of absence was not detrimental to the returnee’s assignment execution, nor did it impede the firm’s (perceived) familiarity with and trust in the employee, who had already been identified as a prospective talent by the firm during their initial employment in the EMNE’s subsidiary.

They were sent on a commuter managerial assignment with weekly rotations between the (host) headquarters in the emerging market and the (sending) foreign entity in a developed market, although the firm and its other assignees reported the many disadvantages of long-distance management. This was mainly due to the individual advocating for the format that was more favourable to their quality of life (Interview 6a).

This may not be the case for assignees, who have already been out-group representatives in the host units prior to an assignment, or who have a higher hierarchical status in the MNE network by headquarters-extension (see e.g. Interviews 3a and 8a).

Organisational identity work is beyond the scope of the book and presents an opportunity for further investigation.

Interviewee 7a spent more than two decades (a major part of their career) abroad, whereby their responsibilities increased with time—in both scale and scope: they were initially a commercial director in a single entity and later became a managing director of two entities. The gradualness of their career development and progress abroad as well led to a faster and easier (work) adjustment to the different environments they operated in during expatriation.

The socio-political and economic changes in both the sending and receiving markets were also the drivers of this interviewee’s assignments as well as determinants of their formats and locations (e.g. due to a need for regionalisation or localisation).

The assignment took the form of a commuter assignment as the assignee commuted between their sending and receiving countries weekly. However, since these commutes were not aimed at the assignee performing tasks in the headquarters, but rather involved spending weekends with their family (i.e. although financed by the firm, these visits were completely private), this assignment was treated by the firm as a traditional long-term managerial international assignment.

Despite having this negotiating power over the firm, the individual did not use it, making no special demands or conditions to accept the international assignment (Interview 8a).

The interviewee thereby stressed that an assignment to a new (as well as SME) entity in an EMNE network should not be status motivated or focused on their ‘elite’ role as a manager, because establishing and managing a new firm with yet to be developed business functions required a manager’s involvement in executing the operative and often less prestigious (non-managerial) tasks (see Interview 8a).

Such marginalisation also meant that the assignee was less burdened by control from the headquarters and had more autonomy in their decision-making. It thus supported their managerial identity (Interview 8a).

Separating their personal and professional lives acted as a coping mechanism that prevented the assignee from being completely consumed with and by work.

The interviewee described external factors not specific to expatriation, such as the economic crisis, as the most stressful part of their assignment. They also experienced high levels of stress when they had zero control over the situation and when they needed to fire employees based on context and not their poor performance. As a manager, they felt responsible for their subordinates as well as employee relations, usually particularly poor under crisis circumstances.

This interviewee’s expatriate identity was not particularly emphasised: it was only expressed through a sense of foreigness, de-rootednes from domestic networks and search of ties with other PCNs from Slovenian firms in the host environment. While the interviewee made comparisons with assignees from other firms, they preferred the autonomy and flexibility they experienced as an assignee in Firm B.

The same applied to business partners and potential assignment candidates as an ethnocentric staffing strategy was used as Firm B’s (employer) branding and differentiation strategy.

The interviewee suggested that the intensity of this rotation due to the often short timeline before the assignment can lead to information overload, however.

The assignment was framed as a traditional long-term assignment although it took the form of a commuter assignment. This was because commuting was related to the individual’s private life rather than work (i.e. trips to the sending country were aimed at home visits and not at visits of the home entity). It was also limited to weekends, and had no effect on the execution of the assignment from the perspective of the firm.

In the case of Interviewee 3b, gender-related norms were also relevant in this respect.

The concern regarding the lack of holistic knowledge of firm-specific processes was not limited to the individuals with junior status, but rather referred to all assignees from the headquarters, whose development in the domestic entity was focused on narrow (specialist) knowledge rather than a holistic comprehension of the firm-specific processes needed to effectively manage a foreign SME. This raises doubt in the effectiveness and efficiency of assignees from large entities managing SMEs in the MNE network.

Collaboration with the predecessor had two additional benefits: (1) guaranteeing continuous and prolonged content-based support for their work adjustment as a crisis situation has prevented effective transfer of business immediately upon the individual’s arrival to the firm, and (2) ensuring psychological support in an unaccepting local environment (Interview 3b).

They also stressed transitional nature of flexpatriation: i.e. the interviewee proposed that the quality of relationships diminished with time, which was why flexpatriation could not be used as a permanent solution. They moreover argued that flexpatriation could not be used for longer periods in relationship-oriented markets, where physical contacts were valued in doing business. They further stressed the implications of physical distance for timely problem resolution in the entity that additionally rendered flexpatriation a less effective and efficient managerial option in international staffing (Interview 3b).

With a rotation in the headquarters, the MNE eased the adjustment of an external recruit to the new work environment, a different organisational culture, firm-specific processes, and especially a new portfolio. Pre-assignment business trips, on the other hand, were aimed at the assignee’s familiarisation with the organisation of the foreign entity, its suppliers, system of sales and other local specificities (Interview 4b).

In 15 years, the firm grew into a medium-sized enterprise, which is the largest and strategically most important subsidiary in the MNE network (two-thirds the size of the parent firm) (Interview 4b).

Although the international assignment was prolonged several times and despite the changes in the position being filled by the assignee, the interviewee considered the entire period of their expatriation as a single assignment (Interview 4b). This suggests that individuals perceive and experience international assignments as location- rather than purpose-, format-, or duration-based.

See also Black et al. (1991), who argue that possessing information regarding any potential new behaviours that an individual is required and expected to adopt or old behaviours they should discard upon entering a new situation (e.g. expatriation) before they actually enter the new situation enables the reduction of (e.g. assignment-related) uncertainty through anticipatory adjustments.

These served the purpose of parent-country national identity preservation during expatriation (Interview 4b).

This further focused their managerial identity on an ‘operative manager’ identity, that matched the organisational need for managers willing to learn holistic processes and tasks as well as engage in these operationally in order to successfully manage smaller firms with limited business support functions (Interview 4b).

They did not reference experiencing a cultural shock, however. This was probably related to the similarities between the sending and receiving countries as well as setting up the organisation almost from scratch, which meant the individual could somewhat influence its organisational culture (Interview 4b).

This was grounded in the individual not being nationality- but rather task-oriented and in them working for the firm under a local rather than an assignment contract. Having had resided in the host market in the past as its citizen also contributed to the individual’s reduced sense of foreignness (Interview 5b).

While the manager wished (and needed) to be a member of the local in-group for better team dynamics, they were also aware that they had to keep a certain level of distance and authority in order to lead the team. From a professional perspective, they had to remain part of the managerial out-group (i.e. a group based on their profession and position within the firm) (Interview 5b). Prioritising organisational objectives in their identity work was also consistent with a managerial identity.

The same applies to referrals for employees by trusted third parties that can only act as a partial substitute for trust building and thus a tool for initiating the firm–employee relationship. Further direct firm–employee experience in diverse situations during the employment relationship is then needed to nurture said trust and relationship (see both Interviews 1b and 5b).

While former employees of the assigning firm are classified as external recruits from the perspective of the moment in which the recruitment takes place; longitudinally, they can be considered as semi-internal recruits due to their past engagement and familiarity with the firm—especially if their experience with the firm is recent and no major changes have been introduced to the organisation (or the individual from the perspective of the firm).

This is particularly true for assignees from the headquarters, but may differ for inpatriates and assignees making shifts from one subsidiary or affiliate to another. More research is thus needed on the role shifts for assignees moving in these directions.

This is especially typical for ethnocentric staffing, as internal recruitment of candidates from the headquarters not only strengthens collaboration between the parent firm and manager, but also enhances collaboration between managers of entities across the MNE network who are usually familiar with one another from their time at the headquarters and can capitalise on these relations during international assignments. Having experience in a similar organisational as well as home-country environment fosters a common understanding of and familiarity with the firm, its business practices, and culture. It also suggests a shared cognitive schema among managers that stems from similar socialisation and fluency in a common (organisational working) language that increases mutual understanding and communication efficiency at the managerial level. It can thus strengthen good practice transfers, promote joint actions (e.g. for cost optimisation), and facilitate alignment of the potentially disconnected local strategies.

Former employees, who have left the firm due to their dissatisfaction with the employer or have been fired, can experience the opposite: i.e. mistrust in the firm and its promises.

The data from interviews shows that familiarity with the firm is likely to make an individual’s demands more realistic, though, as the individual’s socialisation into the firm is likely to make their demands more congruent with the organisational objectives (two additional benefits of internal recruitment for the firm, but also for the individual, as the individual’s satisfaction upon fulfilment of these demands is likely).

Senior employees may, however, engage in their colleagues’ development based on social norms and expectations linked to retirement and the related transfer of business. Further research on intergenerational collaboration of senior repatriates with prospective assignees and other employees in the MNE for mediated knowledge spillover effects is encouraged in this respect.

Although in the latter situation, it is highly unlikely that the firm would invite an employee to return—unless their dismissal was unfair and the cause for it has since been eliminated.

External recruits with limited time for rotation in the headquarters and almost immediate physical distancing from the parent firm with the assignment (much like local managers throughout their career) face the challenge of establishing a strong relationship with the parent firm.

For external recruits, proof of both competence and trustworthiness is essential, however.

The pilot interviews imply that this shift is also common for short-term project-based assignments, where individuals remain involved in the tasks in the domestic unit, if necessary.

Commuter assignments before traditional long-term expatriation, for example, allow assignees to gradually adjust to a new lifestyle by physically and psychologically separating their work and private life, focusing their activities abroad on work, and limiting their attention to personal stress while getting acquainted to the host entity and country. Flexpatriation can play a similar role upon repatriation as it enables the individuals to maintain a dynamic, independent international lifestyle upon re-assumption of a domestic role.

Because flexpatriates (usually former managers) often serve as ‘place-holders’ for their successors and have limited developmental potential due to the latter necessitating physical co-presence of employees, these individuals may also be experiencing deterioration of their managerial identities as they can no longer achieve the results they had as expatriates focused solely on one entity. Their identity work related to managerial identity (re)formulation, claiming and confirmation when shifting to or from this managerial format presents an opportunity for future research.

Unlike Rast et al. (2012), I describe such leaders as members of the out-group. This is because my findings clearly indicate employee diversification and segmentation into managers and non-managers (and to a certain extent to non-assigned and assigned managers)—regardless of them belonging to the same organisation’s in-group.

Although interviews in both Firm A and Firm B suggest that assignees’ colleagues (and not just assignees) experience role shifts, these are beyond the scope of my study and provide an opportunity for future research: especially in terms of the interactions and interdependencies of various employees’ role shifts and their impact on team dynamics and business performance.

Other relationship building tools mentioned by interviewees include jokes, identification of mutual goals and collaboration with the (local) team in their realisation.

While success is described as a contributor to the individual’s confidence and self-efficacy, it also enhances stress as the individual fears failure (or reduced success) upon repatriation: i.e. the individual puts greater pressure on themselves based on past results and raises the organisation’s expectations at the same time (see e.g. Interview 3b).

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Title: Long-Term Managerial Assignment Challenges as Experienced by Assignees
Author: Iris Koleša
Publisher: Springer International Publishing
Book: Becoming an International Manager
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-87394-3

Electronic ISBN: 978-3-030-87395-0

Copyright Year: 2021
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-87395-0_8