Impacts on western expatriates' job satisfaction A study of adaptation, organizational context and support Vad påverkar västerländska utlandsstationerades arbetstrivsel? - en studie om anpassning, organisationskontext och stöd

Abstract

The aim with our thesis is to explore western expatriates' view of their own job satisfaction when on overseas assignment in China. Within the field of job satisfaction, there is an extensive amount of research conducted in a western domestic setting. Also, research on expatriates has been done extensively; much of this has focused on the cross-cultural setting. There is a dearth of studies that have incorporated these two fields and those who have, used a quantitative approach. We therefore sought to conduct our study in a qualitative way, where the six respondents were to give their own views and experiences on job satisfaction in relation to the Chinese business culture. For our theoretical framework we used Locke's (1976) definition of job satisfaction, dividing our literature study into the two categories: events and agents. The previous research used a range of variables from job satisfaction, to cross-cultural training, and organizational support.

In the analysis of the data, we apply Deci and Ryan's (1985) self-determination theory to explore the motivation and the satisfaction of our respondents. We also analyze the supporting factors in transition such as administrative support, mentoring and the expatriate community within the company. We conducted interviews with managers in different locations in China, all working for the same logistics-company. This organization is a multinational corporation (MNC) and the interviews were conducted face to face. We used a constructivist approach and therefore did not exclude ourselves and our effect on the material while processing it. While doing this, we took our basis in a grounded theory strategy and followed a coding structure, ranging from open to selective coding. The results indicate that the Chinese business culture is important, yet not the most crucial factor in having impact on job satisfaction. Rather, we found that specific personality traits of the respondents is of greater importance in feeling satisfied with the overseas assignment.

The reasons why this is of importance for HR, both as research field and profession, is the increasing amount of overseas assignments and the financial implications for the organization. Due to large expenses in the overseas assignments the return of investment is highly relevant. It is therefore significant that the expatriates succeed on assignment: be productive and satisfied with their work environment and by this creating value within the company.