Organizational expatriates and self-initiated expatriates: Who adjust better to work and life in Japan ?

Vesa Peltokorpi (1) , Fabian Jintae Froese (2)

1 GREGH - Groupement de Recherche et d'Etudes en Gestion à HEC
2 korea University Business School

Expatriates are often presented in the cross-cultural adjustment literature as a homogeneous, broad population. However, recent research that makes a distinction between organizational expatriates (OEs), those who are dispatched by their home companies to international posts, and self-initiated expatriates (SIEs), those who themselves make the decision to live and work abroad, has identified significant differences between the two groups. The present study compares the cross-cultural adjustment of these two groups of expatriates. Survey results of 179 expatriates in Japan show that SIEs are better adjusted to general aspects of their host country and interactions with host-country nationals than OEs. Suggestions for practice are provided.

Keywords: Cross; cultural Adjustment; Japan; Organizational Expatriate; Self; Initiated Expatriate

Domains: Humanities and Social Sciences; Business administration; Management and Human Resources

Vesa Peltokorpi, Fabian Jintae Froese. Organizational expatriates and self-initiated expatriates: Who adjust better to work and life in Japan ?. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 2009, Vol.20,nº5, pp.1096-1112. ⟨10.1080/09585190902850299⟩. ⟨hal-00491666⟩