An Investigation On The Cross-cultural Adjustment Of Chinese Expatriates From Multinational Enterprises

Under the guidance of “going out” strategy and “the Belt and Road” initiative,the Chinese multinational enterprises continue to accelerate their internationalization.Meanwhile,numerous managers and professionals are dispatched overseas,in order to help explore the global markets,complete overseas projects or assist the flow of resources between the parent and subsidiary companies.Expatriates will encounter cross-cultural adjustment issues when entering unfamiliar social environment,and which may lead to problems,such as high expatriate failure rate,low work performance,and high expatriate turnover.Therefore,the cross-cultural adjustment of expatriates(referred to as “expatriate adjustment”)has become a strategic problem which troubling enterprises' global expansion.Overseas scholars have conducted many horizontal quantitative studies on this topic,but only did few qualitative explorations.Thus,there is a lack of in-depth empirical analysis of the expatriates' real experiences.Domestic scholars are still in the primary stage of exploring expatriate adjustment,and the relevant theoretical research lags far behind the practices of Chinese multinational enterprises.Although foreign research results have some reference significance,the particularity of expatriate management in Chinese context has not been discussed in depth.Based on these theoretical and realistic backgrounds,this paper explored the specific content and mechanism of cross-cultural adjustment of the expatriates who were from Chinese multinational enterprises.The author did in-depth interviews with 33 Chinese expatriates from Huawei company,and also collected various second-hand data to do the triangulation.By applied the grounded theory to analyze the numerous qualitative data,this paper explored Chinese expatriates' cross-cultural adjustment process in details,especially from three aspects which included work adjustment,psychological adjustment and cross-cultural interaction adjustment,and finally constructed the corresponding conceptual framework.The main research findings were as follows:(1)The work adjustment of Chinese expatriates was mainly reflected in the“work-family balance” problem caused by the dual changes of work roles and job responsibilities.The high intensity and pressure which caused by the change of job responsibilities made the work demands seriously “encroach” on the needs of the family,thus leading to the significant work to family conflict.The resource gain in work areas such as professional ability improvement,broad vision and wealth accumulation which were brought by the change of work roles,could improve family life quality in the future,thus generating the work to family enrichment.The mutual transformation of family resource loss and work resource gain enabled the expatriate individuals to find a new work-family balance.Organizational instrumental and emotional support could enable them to achieve temporary role balance.(2)The psychological adjustment process of Chinese expatriates had gone through three stages,which included “crisis period”,“adjustment period”,and “growth period”.The order of the severity of psychological pressure was as following: life pressure,work pressure,social pressure and then loneliness.The mechanism of psychological adjustment was mainly manifested as the dual drive of “internal adjusting and external nourishing”.“Internal adjusting” meant that the expatriates could adjust their mentality and cope with the pressure through active self-empowerment.Organizational support,colleagues' support and family support constituted the mechanism of “external nourishing”.(3)The main cross-cultural interaction subjects of Chinese expatriates in the host country included local colleagues and customers.The interaction with local colleagues was based on “demand orientation”,and the interaction with local customers was based on“utilitarian orientation”.The cross-cultural interaction between Chinese expatriates and the host country varied from time to time,and from situation to person.In this process,they were faced with a series of cross-cultural barriers such as cultural misunderstanding,communication and work habit differences.By recognizing and understanding the others' culture,changing the communication and management styles,they finally found the adjusting method of “both Chinese philosophy,and western standards”,and thus kept the dynamic balance between “learning to adapt” and “maintaining to be itself”.(4)Finally,this study integrated the above findings.On the one hand,it described the process and mechanism of expatriate adjustment in different dimensions,summarized thespecific behavior of each dimension,and constructed the conceptual framework of Chinese expatriates' cross-cultural adjustment.On the other hand,it deeply explored how expatriates interacted with organizations,families and host countries in this process,and constructed a comprehensive conceptual framework for the stakeholders of expatriate adjustment.The main innovations of this paper were as follows.First,it integrated the knowledge of cross-cultural psychology and international human resource management field,and constructed the conceptual framework of Chinese expatriates' cross-cultural adjustment.Second,it described the dynamic change and mechanism of each adaptive dimension,and constructed the corresponding conceptual model.Third,it deepened the theoretical interpretation of expatriate adjustment from the perspective of stakeholders.Fourth,it expanded the research context of expatriate adjustment and contributed the theoretical wisdom based on Chinese local practices.These conclusions could make some important contributions to the literature on the expatriate adjustment,and also could provide some enlightenment for the management practice of multinational enterprises.