Enhancing employment and work-life satisfaction through acculturation for international workers

Abstract

Driven by globalisation trends, self-organised international work is becoming increasingly prevalent around the world. We apply the acculturation theory in exploring employment experiences among previous working holidaymakers, who self-initiated their temporary international work and relocation from Taiwan to Australia. Through in-depth, narrative interviews, we identify four dimensions of work-related outcomes enhanced by acculturation including geographical mobility, increased employment opportunities, enhanced employment conditions and increased work-life satisfaction. Drawing on the model of acculturation strategies, we find that while the separation strategy only contributes towards geographical mobility and increased employment opportunities, the integration strategy can contribute across all four dimensions of enhanced employment and outcomes, particularly work-life satisfaction, which results from emancipating people from their previously socialised cultural values. Moreover, international workers may perceive job quality as a relative concept through comparing work practices experienced in their home and host environments. Our study contributes to the international careers literature by demonstrating how international workers’ experiences of enhanced employment quality may be perceived as a process of accumulating and leveraging sociocultural resources within the host culture.