"More Firms Send Novices Overseas"
By Kevin Voigt
Staff Reporter of The Wall Street Journal
CareerJournal.com
Working abroad can be a tough assignment—even for seasoned
professionals—but things may be getting tougher. Recent research
has shown that, increasingly, workers being sent overseas are likely
to be international novices. The 2001 Global Relocation Trends Survey—co-sponsored
by U.S.-based GMAC Global Relation Services, the National Foreign
Trade Council and SHRM Global Forum—revealed that 75% of overseas
assignees surveyed from 150 multinational companies had no previous
international experience, compared with 45% in past surveys.
Especially for first-timers, it is important to carefully consider
a foreign assignment before accepting it, says Margaret Shaffer,
a professor of management at Hong Kong Baptist University who studies
relocation issues. Ms. Shaffer's interest in relocation has been
inspired by her own experience—she first came to Hong Kong
for a four-year stint in 1978 and has been back in the region since
1995. Ms. Shaffer tells Getting Ahead the essential issues to think
about before accepting a job abroad.
Career Prospects
When your boss asks you to consider an international post, the first
question to ask should be asked of yourself about your career: What
are my goals, and will I have the resources to achieve those goals
in the post?
On this subject, your company might not be much help— 35% of
the companies surveyed in the Global Relocation Survey say they
have no idea what effect an international assignment has on their
employees' careers. Half the companies surveyed don't track attrition
rates. But anecdotal evidence from the survey and Ms. Shaffer's
own research suggests that many companies have problems bringing
employees back into the fold after a foreign posting. Reverse culture
shock can be a problem, as can be adjusting to moving from a foreign
assignment's corner office back into home office's cubicle maze.
Reports of dissatisfaction upon return are commonplace, Ms. Shaffer
says.
She advises people looking at taking up an overseas posting to seek
assurances that there will be a position waiting for them when they
return. (Few companies give such guarantees—only 34%, according
to the survey.) "If so, will that position tap into newly learned
skills? Some expats I've talked to have been frustrated on return.
[They] come back doing the same thing they did before they left,"
Ms. Shaffer says.
Still, 36% surveyed believe an international assignment can put
careers on the fast track. Is your company one of them? "Talk to
other people who have been overseas, [with] the company and outside.
Probe as to why you're being sent. Some companies specifically ask
to send [people] to gain international experience. Most [send people]
to solve an immediate problem. Sometimes, they send people to get
[them] out of their hair," she says.
Does your company have a strong support program to help your career
from suffering culture shock? To keep a connection with home office,
find a mentor there "so you don't get this feeling of out of sight,
out of mind," suggests Ms. Shaffer.
Continued
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