Barriers Expatriates Encounter During Cross-Cultural Interactions

Abstract

In the era of globalization, cross-cultural issues have been widely discussed. However, research concerning cultural barriers expatriates face in foreign subsidiaries are relatively rare. Hence, the aim of this study is to investigate and prioritize barriers that expatriates encounter during cross-cultural interactions. This study integrates a review of the literatures and experts’ experiences to construct an analytic hierarchy process (AHP) model. AHP questionnaires were distributed to multinational corporations (MNCs) and were analyzed using Expert Choice software. This study finds that national culture bonded barriers are the most critical factors that hinder expatriates’ cross-cultural interactions with the host country. In addition, the sub-factors of ethnocentrism, headquarter strategy and cross-cultural communication are the most important factors within the categories of national culture bonded barriers, organizational barriers and individual rooted barriers, respectively. Finally, this study concludes that because cultural barriers are the main factors causing the failures of expatriates, it is crucial for MNCs to provide their employees with cross-cultural trainings that prepare expatriates’ language and cultural abilities for cross-cultural interactions with the host country and non-work social networks to facilitate the cross-cultural adjustment in MNCs.