Swimming ahead or treading water? Disaggregating the career trajectories of women self‐initiated expatriates

This paper explores the career choices and trajectories of women self-initiated expatriates (SIEs). Extant research on these issues has tended to view women expatriates as a coherent group. We used a qualitative approach, involving semi-structured interviews with 51 women SIEs, to examine women’s reasons to relocate, reasons for employment, their past and current work as part of overall career, and their future career plans. Drawing on literature on career theories, gender work segregation theory and women expatriates, we explore how national and individual factors affect women SIEs’ career choices and career trajectories. In providing a more nuanced discussion of the careers of women SIEs, our key findings are that women’s careers differ according to national grouping and marital status; with life-stages and happenstance playing a more important role in women’s careers than a planned career path

Low-status expatriates in the United Arab Emirates: a psychological contract perspective

This study examines the psychological contracts held by expatriates with low socioeconomic status. We develop and test a moderated mediation model that examines the direct relationship between organisational support and intention to leave via the mediating role of psychological contract fulfilment. We also examine the moderating role of transactional psychological contracts on this indirect relationship in a sample of 108 low-status expatriates in the United Arab Emirates. Our results validate the assumptions made in psychological contract theory on the direct effect of organisational support and contract fulfilment. However, contrary to our expectations, the findings revealed a positive relationship between contract fulfilment and intention to leave. We discuss the implications of these mixed results for theory and practice

The dynamics of workplace relationships among expatriates and host country nationals in international development organisations

Purpose- This paper aims to explore the dynamics of workplace relationships between expatriates and host country nationals (HCNs) in International Development Organisations (IDOs) through the lens of the social comparison theory. These relationships are likely influenced by the way HRM practices are implemented among individuals from both groups. Design/methodology/approach- We used an inductive approach and analysed qualitative data from ten expatriates and twenty host country nationals employed by five IDOs in Nigeria, a risk-prone context. Findings- Our findings demonstrate that both expatriates and HCNs perceive that the HRM practices implemented by IDOs are more favourable to expatriates. This leads to further social comparisons between members of both groups, affecting their workplace interactions. Practical Implications- The way expatriates and HCNs perceive and act towards these differential practices matters for the operations of IDOs. As such, we recommend that IDO management may consider acknowledging diversity in their workforce, enact inclusive practices, and make deliberate investments on learning opportunities and maximise the continued investments in expatriate use. Originality/Value- This study contributes to expatriation literature by clarifying the extent to which the enactment of differential HRM practices in a risk-prone context can exacerbate upward social comparisons and significantly influence working relationships. We explore this outside the context of multinational enterprises, focusing on IDOs that play a valuable role in local societies

International Human Resource Management in the Arab Gulf States – An Institutional Perspective

This paper seeks to explore the increasingly dominant role of International Human Resource Management (IHRM) policies and practices of Multinational Enterprises (MNEs) operating in the emerging economies of the Arab Gulf States and, more specifically, in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).The existing literature on institutions suggest that MNEs are under influence and pressure to adopt HR practices that are viewed as being appropriate for the context and situation. However, distinctive institutions in the Arab Gulf States such as the UAE, and their impacts on MNEs’ people management have been largely overlooked in prior work. Hence, with a particular focus on institutional theory, this work explores the effects of home-country institutional factors on IHRM in foreign subsidiaries. Furthermore, the paper aims to examine how regulative, cognitive and normative institutional dimensions affect the IHRM choices of MNEs. In depth interviews with 26 Human Resource (HR) managers located in the head offices of the participating MNEs were conducted, revealing that IHRM practices in this institutional setting are built upon fragile, dependent and uncertain conditions, and they are not grounded in the sort of deep and stable institutional foundations prevalent in most developed economies. As a result, we propose a more nuanced institutional framework that captures the peculiar aspects of the Arab Gulf States

Perceived Training Opportunities and Knowledge Sharing: The case of the United Arab Emirates

We seek to explore the interplay between perceived training opportunities (PTOs) and knowledge sharing in the context of the emerging economic setting of the United Arab Emirates. We also examined the moderating role of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation and engagement in social interaction on the relationship between PTOs and knowledge sharing. The study employed a survey method to collect the data, and tested the proposed hypotheses by using the partial structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) technique. Data is based on 815 responses across all sectors in the country context of the UAE. Our findings indicate that PTOs are positively related to knowledge sharing. Notably, the results show that the proposed relationship between PTOs and knowledge sharing is negatively and significantly moderated by intrinsic motivation. Moreover, the moderating role of extrinsic motivation and engagement in social interaction were insignificant. At a theoretical level, this article provides an individual level analysis, which indicates that PTOs pave the way for intraorganizational knowledge sharing; hence, they offer insights into the mechanisms in which PTOs impact on knowledge sharing. This article also contributes to our general understanding on human resource management (HRM) practices and knowledge sharing in the context of the emerging economy of the UAE; the latter has a number of implications for both, theory and practice as delineated in this study

Examining the impact of Brexit & COVID-19 on the working lives of business, management and economics’ academics in the UK

Report examined five issues: 1. How academics perceive Brexit and its potential impacts on the academic labour market? 2. How much more are academics Working from Home and why? 3. How academics’ ability to effectively perform and disseminate their research has altered as face-to-face activity returns? 4. Has academics ability to perform their teaching role been permanently altered’ by their experience of the pandemic? and, 5. How have academics’ levels of engagement evolved over the pandemic

Linking embeddedness to physical career mobility: How Brexit affected the preference of business, economics and management academics for leaving the UK

In this study, we use embeddedness and boundaryless career perspectives to investigate the extent to which Britain's withdrawal from the European Union (‘Brexit’) led business, economics and management academics to consider emigrating. Using a representative survey of two partially overlapping groups, we find that the impact of Brexit was surprisingly broad and nuanced. In particular, individuals who were born in the UK, but had obtained citizenship of another country, and foreign-born academics who obtained UK citizenship prior to the Brexit referendum have considered leaving the country, implying a broad discontent from mobile and less embedded individuals. Surprisingly, we did not find that the reputation of the institution where participants work, or differences in levels of academic seniority, influenced whether they were considering emigrating. More productive researchers are more likely to have considered emigrating, suggesting that Brexit may lead to a ‘hollowing out’ of UK research in the long term. However, personal circumstances, such as having children, or length of tenure, also entered into scholars' intention to emigrate. The results imply that managers should act to address the potential losses, and policy makers need to support the higher education sector, to ensure its sustainable competitive performance

Talent management in Covid -19 crisis – how Dubai manages and sustains its global talent pool

Taking stock is a difficult task to get right, particularly in a world where future outlooks are changing all around us, shifting the landscape on which we stand. Predictably, policy makers and business leaders feel anxious as they struggle to marshal and mobilize their talent pool through this global health crisis. Unlike other global crises, this exogenous shock has speeded up the adoption of social and physical distance and remote working and may be pointing the way to the future of global talent management. The increased IT capacity and a move away from traditional work arrangements make talent more mobile, which means cities and business compete for the best employees globally. This is in particular true for geographic locations in which demographic trends drive talent shortage, such as in Dubai

The impact of leadership on absorptive capacity: new insights from the UAE

This paper investigates the impact of transformational and transactional leadership on the absorptive capacity of firms within an emerging market setting. Unlike some findings from the Western world, the results indicate that both transformational and transactional leadership styles positively influence the learning processes of absorptive capacity. More specifically, the results indicate that transactional leadership style positively influences the exploratory and transformative learning processes, while the transformational leadership style positively affects the exploitative learning process. Given the unique context under investigation and the fluid institutional arrangements associated with it, the results reflect the need for leadership guidance. Implications for theory and practice are discussed

Comparative human resource management

This chapter focuses on comparative human resource management (HRM). It explores the differences between nations in the way that they manage their human resources. Within a context of increasing globalisation, the chapter highlights how context matters to HRM. Fundamental to understanding these differences between countries are two concepts: the notions of cultural and institutional differences, and the notions of convergence and divergence. The chapter contributes to a better understanding of the main concepts and theories relevant to comparative HRM. First, this chapter shows that cultural and institutional explanations are valuable to the comparative HRM approach. Further, it argues that convergence of trends is apparent, but final convergence remains unrealistic. Finally, it outlines some of the key theoretical, empirical and practical challenges posed by a comparative approach to HRM