international business research paper

Expatriation and personality: Personality differences and how they affect expatriation

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Expatriation and personality: Do personality differences as measured by the Big Five help to

explain differences in expatriate performance and adjustment?


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Abstract

Purpose: This paper serves to identify and explain the big five personality factor and how they

are used to evaluate whether or not an expatriate will be successful. This success includes job

performance as well as how well the expatriate will adjust to the new culture that they will live

in.

Design/Methodologies/Approach: The data was collected via research on prior tests that have

been used to determine big five personalities in expatriates.

Findings: The findings found that all of the big five personality traits are vital to the success of

an expatriate. However, some of those such as extraversion, agreeableness and openness to new

experiences are more important and better predictors that others.

Originality/Value: The value of this research is in the value that a successful expatiate can bring

to a company. A successful expatriate can increase the productivity and profitability of a

company. Managers need to know how to best predict which employee or manager will be best

for expatriation.


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Introduction

As studies have shown, people with certain personalities perform better or worse in

certain situations and circumstances. Companies measure personalities of their employees all

around the globe in an attempt to put people in the most productive positions. Recently,

multinational companies have begun to use theses personality tests to place employees in

expatriation roles. However, some companies do not fully understand what makes a good

expatriate and how a certain employee’s personality will affect their performance as an

expatriate.

Big Five Personality Traits

In psychology, the Big Five Personality Traits are five broad domains or dimensions to

personality, used to describe human personality. The five factors that make up the big five-

personality test are, openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism.

Although there are other personality traits that are relevant to a person, these five have become

the standard in personality testing.

“Openness to experience refers to personality traits like having wide interest,

imaginative, and insightful [personality] (Bhatti, Battour, Ismail, Sundram, 2013). “”Migliore

(2011) argued that high score in openness to experience explains broad intellectual curiosity with

an individualistic and non-confirming way of thinking, where as low score explains preference

for familiarity, and narrow intellectual focus (Bhatti, Battour, Ismail, Sundram, 2013).”

Conscientiousness is known as a persons’ tendency to be organized and dependable,

show self-discipline, and aim for achievement. People high in this category tend to be much

more comfortable with planned situations and do not like spontaneous events.

Extraversion is very broadly defined as a how outgoing a person may be, and how well a


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person will interact with people in large group setting. “Neubert and Taggar (2004) argued that

extraverted individuals expose low level of arousal if the workplace is social environment and

less level of stimulation at home. In contrast, introverts express high level of arousal outside the

workplace where stimulation is low (Bhatti, Battour, Ismail, Sundram, 2013).”

Agreeableness refers to ones’ tendency to be cooperative and compassionate, rather than

argumentative or judgmental. “Lepine and Dyne (2001) found that agreeableness is positively

related to cooperative behavior (Bhatti, Battour, Ismail, Sundram, 2013).”

Finally, neuroticism is the ability for a person to experience stable emotions and control

their emotions. “Migliore (2011) argued that high scores in neuroticism explain emotional

reactive behavior related to negative feelings like anger and anxiety, whereas low scores explain

emotional stability and calmness (Bhatti, Battour, Ismail, Sundram, 2013).”

The five personality traits can be measured in many different ways, however one of the

most common is the “5PFT [which] is a personality questionnaire designed to measure the Big

Five personality factors (Smits, Timmerman, Dolan, Vorst, and Wicherts, 2011).” Subjects are

given a series of questions designed around the five character traits and based upon their

response are given a score of high or low on that particular trait based upon their answer After

answering the series of questions, the data is placed together creating a personality profile for an

individual (Ones, Viswesvaren, 1999). “The 5PFT is among the oldest Big Five scales in the

world (Smits, Timmerman, Dolan, Vorst, and Wicherts, 2011).”

Expatriation

Expatriate describes a person living outside their native country.

“Effective international experience and the broad issues associated with expatriate

assignments are more important than ever in the global business arena. Recent research has


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demonstrated that US multinationals performed better with CEOs with international assignment

experience, and that, in highly global firms, CEOs with international assignment experience

appropriated a greater proportion of performance in their pay (Shay, Baack, 2004).” However,

“traditional expatriation is changing. Gone are the days of there-and-back one-off assignments

and the full-scale relocation of entire families. Today, we see an increasing trend toward

continuous mobility and semi localized career expatriates, as well as short term and rotational

assignments that require unaccompanied employees to work on specific projects that may last

only a few months (McNulty, 2014).”

This change in the methods of expatriation used by companies from long term to short

term, is in large part due to the lack of success that many companies and managers were

experiencing when sending an employee or manager over to a country on a long term basis.

However, there have been equally bad results from short-term “mobility “ managers. The

problem facing this changing landscape of expatriation is that “Mobility managers tend to act as

advisors rather than as providers of solutions, pursuing activities rather than results. They tend to

work with piecemeal practices rather than developing integrated systems to manage global

mobility (McNulty, 2014).” That means that there is a frequent gap between what is expected of

managers productivity and results and what is actually achieved.

In order to bridge the success gap of expatriates, both on long term leave and short term

projects, companies are beginning to use personality traits as predictors to determine the success

that a potential expatriate manager would have on a particular job/project. “In the international

domain, application of personality test to predict adjustment and performance is considered to be

fruitful (Aycan, 1997).” Although this is not a guarantee that the manager will perform well if his

personality traits fit the position, it’s a useful tool that can help companies gain more knowledge


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of a manager before sending him/her on an assignment.

Literature Review

Personality Traits Effects on Expatriate Job Performance

There are many factors that determine whether a manager will be successful as an

expatriate, including, but not limited to, self-efficacy, cultural sensitivity, and previous

international experience. However, many researchers believe that the most important factors that

determine the success of an expatriate manager are the big five personality traits. Openness to

experiences, agreeableness, extraversion, conscientiousness, and neuroticism are the five

personality traits that many believe are the best predictors and determinants of a managers’

success when working as an expatriate. “The number of variables relevant to global

management is not small, and thus it is important to decide on the most critical variables

(Oswald, 2008)” in order to give an expatriate manager the best chance at success.

The first personality trait, openness to new experiences, is correlated to success in that, an

expatriate manager must understand the new culture that he/she is working and be willing to

engage in that culture to succeed. “Caligiuri (2000) argued, “expatriates’ ability to correctively

assess the social environment is more complicated given that host country may provide

ambiguous or uninterruptable socials cues” (Bhatti, Kaur, Battour, 2013).” Furthermore,

“Researchers have suggested that expatriates should correctively assess host country culture in

order to adjust and perform better in the host country (Ones and Viswesvaran, 1999).”

Next, agreeableness is a key to success as an expatriate. On an expatriate assignment, the

ability and willingness to get along with others is very important. “Shaffer et al. (2006) argues

that agreeableness should be related with effort to get along. Therefore, agreeableness can help


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expatriates to effectively communicate and build better relationships with host country nationals

and in return can reduce the stress related to both work and non-work aspects of international

assignments (Shaffer et al. , 2006) (Bhatti, Kaur, Battour, 2013).” In addition, “Ramalu et al.

(2011) pointed out that individuals who are more flexible are less offensive to others, more easily

fit into and adjust in the new culture (Bhatti, Kaur, Battour, 2013).” In other words, an expatriate

manager high in agreeableness can reduce the number or arguments or disagreements that he has

with host county workers or management, therefore making his performance more successful.

Extraversion refers broadly to how outgoing a person may be and how willing and easily

they fit in and work with new groups of people effectively and well. “Caligiuri (2000) argued

that these personality traits will help the individuals when they go for international assignment to

socialize into their host country (Bhatti, Kaur, Battour, 2013).” “More specifically, sometimes

host country nationals might be reluctant to get close to expatriates due to their perception which

considers expatriate as strangers (Bhatti, Kaur, Battour, 2013).” To ensure against this, “by

interacting with others in the new society and by trying to learn their way of doing things, the

expatriate proves to the locals that he/she values and appreciates the new culture and is putting

effort into learning their ways. This will please the host nationals who will display greater

acceptance and co-operation towards the expatriate (Aycan, 1997).”

Conscientiousness refers to ones’ ability to be organized, thorough and plan for events or

situations in advance to ensure success. “Hogan et al. (1996) argues that these qualities may

helpful for expatriates to achieve their goals, getting along, and finding meanings (Bhatti, Kaur,

Battour, 2013).” Furthermore, “Leiba-O’Sullivan (1999) explained that conscientious, motivated

expatriates can develop effective perceptual questioning skills which help them to adopt the

foreign culture easily (Bhatti, Kaur, Battour, 2013).”


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Finally, neuroticism, the ability of a person to control their emotions in any given

situation. A person high in neurotic personality traits is very emotionally stable and does not get

too high or low emotionally. “Neuroticism helps expatriates to effectively handle problematic

situations in a new environment (Bhatti, Kaur, Battour, 2013).”

Although all five of the personality traits are important to the success of an expatriate, the

three personality traits that are most important to expatriation performance are agreeableness,

extraversion and openness to new experiences. A person who is high in all three of these three

traits will have the best opportunity for success due in large part to their willingness to assimilate

themselves into a new society, and build quality relationships quickly in this new environment.

Adjustment to Expatriation

“Expatriate workers are necessary to guarantee foreign subsidiaries’ operations remain

competitive. Therefore, having effective expatriates is valuable for multinational companies’

headquarters. As suggested by Harvey and Novicevic (2001), the effective expatriate is one who

is able to adapt or adjust him/herself to the host country. When expatriates are not well adjusted

in the host country, it could be expected that their expatriation will not be successful (Lee,

Sukoco, 2008).”

Sending an employee on an expatriate assignment can also be a very costly expense for a

company. Those expenses include in general, a steep salary for that employee but also the

potential for lost sales and the increased cost due to poor productivity and/or performance from

the manager sent on assignment. “Many [employees] return early due to dissatisfaction with their

jobs or because they cannot adjust to a foreign country. Perhaps even worse, many who stay

perform poorly (Selmer, 2001).” This means that the ability of an expatriate employee to adjust


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to the new culture and environment is vital to the success of the employee and the company.

Some of the problems associated with an employee’s success are, “the manager's inability to

adapt to a different physical or cultural environment (Tung, 1987),” and “the managers

personality or emotional immaturity (Tung, 1987).” These problems can be overcome with

proper personality testing from an employer before sending an employee on an expatriate

assignment. As stated earlier, openness to new experiences is key to an expatriates’ adopting of a

new cultural environment. Similarly, a person high in neurotic personality traits would ensure,

that employee is emotionally stable enough to be a successful expatriate manager. Furthermore,

studies show “results indicate that personality significantly influences the degree of expatriate

adjustment (Lee, Sukoco, 2008).”

Selecting Managers for Expatriation


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(Adapted from P. Dowling and D. Welch, International Human Resource Management, 4th ed. (Cincinnati: South-Western

Thomson, 2005) 98.)

The arena of global business is becoming increasingly competitive. Hence, “it is not

surprising that an overwhelming majority of medium sized and large companies send

professionals abroad and many of them plan to increase their number of expatriates (Selmer,

2001).” However, “while some progress has been made in selecting and training expatriates,

many of the problems identified in the 1980s are still with us today (Varner, Palmer, 2002).” By

increasing their number of expatriates, a company can give themselves an advantage over other

companies, if, they choose the correct managers or employees for the assignment. The real test

for the company is in making sure that they choose the correct person for the expatriate

assignment. However, “selecting expatriate managers for an international assignment has been

hindered not just by a lack of empirical studies testing construct predictors, but more

importantly, by a lack of clearly defined traits and competencies that can, in the first place, be

introduced as construct predictors of success (Jordan, Cartwright, 1998).”

In recent years researchers have filled the gap in the lack of information about the best

personality traits for a successful expatriate. First, Openness to experience seems to be a

constantly recurring personality variable that is positively linked to successful performance in an

international environment (Jordan, Cartwright, 1998).” Second, extraversion is a key to the

success of an expatriate. However, in regards to extraversion, companies need to analyze the

country or culture in which the assignment takes place because, there is evidence to suggest that

extroversion is more important in some cultures than in others (Jordan, Cartwright, 1998).”

Lastly, companies need to know that, “Expatriation is characterised by high levels of stress

(Furnham, 1990) as individuals move through the process of relocation and culture shock

(Jordan, Cartwright, 1998).” Therefore, companies must choose an individual who can handle


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the high stress and remain emotionally stable to make the best decisions.

Factors other than the big five personality traits serve as predictors to success as well.

These other factors can be broken down into two categories, Personal Factors and Situational

Factors. “Personal factors are closely linked to an individual's values, beliefs, expectations and

cultural background. They affect the employee’s ability to adjust in a new environment and

largely condition his/her response to outside stimuli (Erbacher, D’Netto, Espana, 2006).” These

include, perceived career path, willingness to relocate, and degree of international orientation.

“Situational factors focus on the role the organization plays in affecting expatriate success.

(Erbacher, D’Netto, Espana, 2006).” These include, training, role clarity, level of support,

relationship between expatriate and firm. Another factor that has proven successful for an

expatriates’ successful performance is the use of a mentor for the expatriate. A mentor is

someone who can guide or counsel the expatriate both while they are on their assignment and

also when they return to their host country. Most successful expatriates have multiple mentors in

their foreign country and also in their home country to guide them through challenges faced in

their personal life and also in business.

Conclusion

In concluding, expatriation is increasing around the world as the global business arena

continues to become more competitive. That means that the companies who want to succeed,

will be tasked with choosing the right people for the job. Personality tests need to be used to test

for big five personality traits in order to determine if a certain individuals have the correct

personality to succeed as an expatriate.

Although there is a good amount of research done on the topic of personality traits and


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expatriation, there needs to be more research done regarding the link between the big five

personality factors and other factors that affect expatriates such as self efficacy, cultural

sensitivity and prior international experience. These factors do not seem to directly tie into the

personality of a person; however, the big five personality traits directly affect a person’s self-

efficacy, cultural sensitivity and prior international experience.

Also more research should be done regarding cultural differences and how they affect

which personality traits are most important to success as an expatriate. Various cultures around

the world emphasize and put value on different personality traits. For example, the United States

emphasizes and rewards individuals high in extraverted personality traits. The ability to choose

the right person for an expatriate position largely depends on knowing what culture they will be

put into and which personality traits are valued most in the given culture. Further research is also

needed to determine which personality traits are valued in the various cultures that exist in the

world. There is also the need for more research in the way of adjustment of expatriates. More

specifically, what culture or part of the world is easiest for an expatriate to quickly adjust and

work in.

One of the major factors for expatriate failure is the lack spousal support. In general,

when the spouse of an expatriate does not fit into a certain aspect or all of a new environment,

the expatriate employee will more than likely fail. The research that needs to be done is on the

link between spousal attractions through personality traits linked to expatriation of the other

spouse. I would also like to see some research on the number of expatriates that enjoy their new

host country equal to or greater than their original home.

There could also be more in depth research done as to why neuroticism, the personality

trait in which many studies have concluded is the least important to expatriation success, is in


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fact one of the most important. When an employee is placed into an expatriate role, the stress

that accompanies that position is in many cases so great that it can effect that employees

emotions. If that employee is not able to remain stable in regards to their emotions, it can

severely hinder their performance in that position.

More research can and should also be done regarding expatriate assignments lengths and

how the length of an expatriate assignment is correlated to certain personality traits. By

conducting this research, corporations may discover that certain employees will be more suitable,

and will be more effective in a short term expatriate assignment based on their personality traits,

whereas, other employees could prove to be more successful in long term expatriate assignments,

where it may take them slightly longer to get adjusted but their overall performance outweighs

the short term struggle. As explained earlier, most successful expatriates have mentors in both

their host country and their home country. More research needs to be done on the personality of

mentors and how that affects the performance of the expatriate. For instance, should the mentor

have the same personality traits as expatriate or should they aim to have different personality

traits in an attempt to give the expatriate a different perspective on a certain situation.

Finally, one of the most overlooked elements of an expatriate’s success is their ability to

speak the language of the new host country. Some research should be done regarding how a

person’s personality affects their ability to learn a new language. This research could help

companies find the best person for an expatriate position that involves being fully immersed in

the culture and be able to speak the native language fluently or with very good competency.


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international business research paper

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