Overseas Experience Research Articles

A causal-comparative study of American expatriate adjustment in Russia and job-specific attributes

Employees of US-based MNCs working in other nations on expatriate stints must cope with cross-cultural adjustment and work-performance problems that affect their employer operations, productivity and profitability, and organizational morale. Americans’ adjustment in Russia is the subject of this work, specifically the role of job characteristics, rank, and previous overseas experience. Following a quantitative causal-comparative research design, a purposive sample of 197 expatriates from the American Chamber of Commerce in Russia (ACCR) completed an anonymous online survey developed from the Peltokorpi-Cultural Adjustment scale. A one-way ANOVA did not show a significant difference for job type or position for adjustment, but prior international stay was found significant (p<.05). Among the implications of the study are: First, managers of U.S.-based MNCs should use these findings in their operations; Second, recommendations call on the U.S Chamber of Commerce to develop support programs for better expatriate adjustment. Some of the areas for further research could be a closer look at the effectiveness of the pre-assignment training done and a closer look at how different facets of job characteristics influence adjustment.

Prospects of Internal Control in Chain Organizations

The article studies specific features of internal control in chain organizations and demonstrates topicality of the subject in business, including tourism sphere. The author analyses Russian and overseas experience of internal control used in key fields of today’s economic system, in particular, in finance and accounting. Different concepts of internal control are investigated, a great number of theoretical and methodological methods of internal control are provided and various systems, forms and types of internal control are studied. In order to extend the current ideas of internal control the article advanced the concept based on the notion saying that within the frames of one business sometimes it is necessary to discuss not a single system of internal control, but a complex package of such systems. The author came to the conclusion that such types of control components analyzed in the research as planning, cyber control, rewards and compensations, administrative and cultural control, in case systematic and process approaches are used in organization of the system of internal control could help attain the set goals and provide reliability of business, including tourism sector, and its efficiency.

Looking Ahead with the New International Studies

As I write this, the world seems to be in a more precarious position than it was 30 years ago, when the Bachelor of Arts in International Studies (BAIS) at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) was established. In 1994, the Cold War appeared to have come to an end. That year an Accord was signed between Israel and Palestine, and Yasir Arafat, Shimon Peres and Yitzhak Rabin won the Nobel Peace Prize. The discourse around global climate crisis had not yet emerged. The sharpened international geopolitical situation since 1994 cannot be sheeted home to our program, of course. But in 2024 the need for graduates with the skills, insights and cultural intelligence that language and culture learning and an immersive overseas experience gives—that our international studies students possess in spades—has clearly not diminished, hence the evolution of the BAIS into the Bachelor of International Studies and its exciting new options for international education.

Do technology-seeking transnational alliances promote the innovation quality of the parent company?

ABSTRACT The existing literature lacks research on technology-seeking transnational alliances (TTAs) in emerging markets. Therefore, we examine whether TTAs can improve parent companies’ innovation quality. Results of analysis of a sample of listed Chinese firms over 2006–2020 show that TTAs significantly boost parent companies’ innovation quality. Further analyses reveal that this effect is realized through executive overseas experience (EOE) and domestic technology alliances (DTAs). Overall, our study provides strategic options for managers when selecting international investments.

Translation and Dissemination of Contemporary Chinese Literature: A Case Study of LÜ Jiamin’s Wolf Totem

With its growing Comprehensive National Power and rising influence in the world, China is constantly presenting its image and voice to the world, and literature, an important carrier of a country’s cultural connotation, plays an important role in cultural output. However, compared with most developed countries in the world, the overseas dissemination of Chinese literature is not smooth. For decades, famous Chinese works have been widely distributed abroad, such as Yu Hua’s Brothers, Mo Yan’s Red Sorghum, Mai Jia’s Declassification, and The Wind. LÜ Jiamin›s Wolf Totem, set in the nomadic life of the steppe, was particularly popular with foreign readers and even made into a film. In the Chinese theme film and television drama overseas release of several films haven’t had a bad performance, for the overseas export of Chinese literature set a model. This article takes LÜ Jiamin’s Wolf Totem as the research object. The first part shows the spread of Wolf Totem abroad. The second part discusses the influence of English translation translators, translation strategies, and commercial publishing houses on the overseas dissemination of books. The third part is to study the promotion of books by film and television and then return to the text itself to explore the book content and the inherent charm of the story. Finally, this paper summarizes the overseas communication experience of Wolf Totem and provides experience for the dissemination of other Chinese literary works.

CEO OVERSEAS EXPERIENCE, CULTURAL DISTANCE AND CORPORATE FINANCIALIZATION: THE MEDIATING EFFECT OF ESG INVESTMENT IN CHINA

Recently, Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) with overseas experiences show the “star effect”, according to upper echelons theory, CEOs’ overseas experiences might relate to corporate financialization, but there is little evidence of whether and how overseas CEOs affect it. Given the increasing trend of hiring overseas CEO in China, the study fills in the gap in the literature by examining the effect of CEOs with overseas experiences on corporate financialization. In sum, the study employs a two-way fixed effect model and SYS-GMM model to investigate the relationship between CEOs with overseas experiences and corporate financialization. Our findings still hold after the endogeneity disposal with a two-way fixed effect regression by lagging variables, Two-Stage Least Squares (2SLS), Heckman two-stageregression, and the propensity score matching (PSM). Moreover, the cultural distance between the host countries where CEO worked or received education and China inhibits corporate financialization, especially, Individualism vs Collectivism (IC) distance makes the most significant contribution. Furthermore, overseas CEOs primarily inhibit corporate financialization by improving ESG investment.

Overseas Experience and Elite Scientists’ Career Mobility: A Case Study from China

Overseas experience constitutes an important feature for Chinese elite scientists, the returnees not only enhance the reputation of China's higher education system, but also profoundly change China's academic ecology. In this paper, we analyze whether and how overseas experience affects elite scientists’-career mobility in China. The research concludes that, compared with the local, those with overseas experience are more likely to choose job hopping. Moreover, elite scientists with overseas experience tend to move to provinces with better academic support conditions, and the research suggests that overseas experience is important for career mobility owing to the fact that it promotes scholars’-willingness to move by loosening the connection between scholars and local academic networks and by reducing flow costs.

Compromise or struggle: Extreme temperatures and environmental corporate social responsibility in China

This article uses China's A-share listed companies from 2008 to 2020 as a sample to examine the impact of extreme temperatures on environmental corporate social responsibility (ECSR). The results show that extreme temperatures can significantly enhance companies' performance of ECSR. Extreme temperatures primarily compel companies to engage in ECSR activities by increasing the costs of debt financing, reducing income levels, and intensifying government environmental regulations, thereby mitigating the negative impact of extreme temperature events on corporate production and operation activities. Further research found that in SOEs, companies with high government subsidies, and companies with executives with overseas experience, extreme temperatures have a more significant role in promoting ECSR. This article provides a novel perspective and micro-evidence for studying the external driving factors of ECSR, and provides useful enlightenment for managing climate risks and realizing the green and low-carbon transformation of China's economy.

The effect of board chairs’ hometown identity on labor cost stickiness

In this study, we examine the impact of board chairs' hometown identity on labor cost stickiness in state-owned enterprises (SOEs). Using data from China, our findings demonstrate that local board chairs can effectively mitigate labor cost stickiness by leveraging their communication advantages. Mechanism analyses reveal that local board chairs primarily achieve this through salary reductions rather than layoffs. We validate two plausible channels, cultural alignment and social trust, through a series of heterogeneity tests. Our results indicate that the influence of board chairs' hometown identity is more pronounced in SOEs located in provinces with smaller dialect diversity, less population mobility, and lower social trust levels, as well as those led by board chairs without overseas experience, serving longer terms, and far from retirement. Overall, this study contributes to existing literature by providing empirical evidence on how board chairs’ hometown identity facilitates the alleviation of labor cost stickiness in SOEs.

Relationship of Cultural Intelligence and Global Citizenship Levels of Preservice Teachers in the Philippines

With the global developments, educational institutions play a vital role in fostering cultural intelligence and global citizenship among individuals, including preservice teachers. Despite the plethora of research on cultural intelligence and global citizenship in higher education abroad, little is known about these in the Philippines, let alone their correlation. Employing a quantitative descriptive correlational design, this study investigated the relationship between cultural intelligence and global citizenship levels of 316 Philippine preservice teachers using the Cultural Intelligence and Global Citizenship Scales. The results revealed that although their cognitive cultural intelligence necessitates further development, the preservice teachers are highly competent and confident in communicating and functioning effectively in multicultural contexts. However, they exhibit limited global citizenship attributes, particularly in social responsibility. Most ethnic groups they represented were also identified to have high cultural intelligence and average global citizenship levels. Additionally, while the preservice teachers’ specialization, year level, and overseas experience did not play significant roles in their cultural intelligence levels, the study found their year level to be the lone variable that affected their global citizenship levels substantially. Overall, a positive correlation between cultural intelligence and global citizenship was identified. Aside from implications for strengthening internationalization strategies, recommendations for further investigations were discussed.

CEO Overseas Experience, Cultural Distance and Corporate Financialization: The Mediating Effect of ESG Investment in China

CEO Overseas Experience, Cultural Distance and Corporate Financialization: The Mediating Effect of ESG Investment in China

Supply chain digitalization and firms' green innovation: Evidence from a pilot program

Green innovation is essential for realizing environmental sustainability and achieving long-term ecological balance. This paper investigates the influence of supply chain digitalization on firms' green innovation in the manufacturing industry. China's 2018 Supply Chain Innovation and Application Pilot program as a quasi-natural experiment, we employ a difference-in-differences (DID) estimation approach to reach the following findings: (1) supply chain digitalization significantly enhances the quantity and quality of enterprise green innovation, with a more substantial impact on quality. (2) supply chain financing capacity and firm environmental awareness play a partial mediating role in the relationship supply chain digitalization and the quality and quantity of corporate green innovation. (3) the heterogeneity analysis reveals that the impact of supply chain digitalization on green innovation is notably heightened in firms with managers who have overseas experience, weak internal controls, and poor regional supply chain environments. This study enriches the theoretical understanding of enterprise green innovation from the perspective of supply chain digitalization, providing a theoretical basis and practical insights for green innovation practices in enterprises.

Post-return emotions: everyday food practices of overseas returned students in Shanghai

ABSTRACT Taking post-return everyday food practices as the primary analytical lens, this paper interrogates how the emotions of transnational returnees are structured by shifting spatio-temporalities in the process of return. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in Shanghai, the empirical discussion examines the experiences of overseas returned students in Shanghai through three cases. These respectively highlight how practices and emotions relate to the persistence of hometown tastes throughout migration, the embrace of host foods while studying overseas, and the adaptation to new dietary patterns after return. These cases of post-return exemplify the intricate connections between food, place, and emotions. There are two implications drawn from the empirical discussion. First, from the spatial perspective, the post-return emotions of transnational return migrants are intricately linked not only to the place to which they return and currently reside in but also to the places they previously experienced as emigrants. Second, the emotions of transnational return migrants should be comprehended under specific temporal frameworks, which, in this paper, refer to transitional life stages. By investigating the post-return place-related emotions indicated by everyday food practices, this research contributes a more intricate understanding of the emotional worlds of transnational returnees and sheds light on the emotionality of transnational return migration.

An Empirical Analysis of the Relationship Between Digital Transformation and Supply Chain Centralization

The study delves into the repercussions of enterprise digital transformation on supply chains, particularly scrutinizing how the international experiences of enterprise top management teams (TMTs) shape these effects. Drawing upon data spanning from 2007 to 2020 from Chinese listed companies, the research unveils that the digital metamorphosis of enterprises substantially diminishes the concentration within their supply chains. Interestingly, TMTs’ overseas experiences exhibit a mitigating effect on this phenomenon, indicating that such experiences significantly foster the reduction of supply chain concentration propelled by enterprise digital transformation. Moreover, they facilitate the diversification of supply chains. Further analysis underscores that this influence is more pronounced in non-high-tech sectors and privately-owned enterprises. This investigation highlights a noteworthy trend: as Chinese enterprises embrace digitalization, their supply chain configurations tend towards greater diversification rather than centralized structures. These findings underscore the pivotal role of TMTs' international exposure in shaping the dynamics of supply chain evolution amidst the digital transformation landscape.

How does Confucianism influence green innovation? Evidence from China

ABSTRACT This study develops a model to explore the relationship between Confucianism and green innovation and the moderating effects of CEO overseas experience, female CEOs, and institutional fragility on this relationship. Based on data from 11,430 observations across 2,812 Chinese listed firms for the 2014–2019 period, we find that Confucianism has a positive impact on a firm’s green innovation. However, this effect is weakened by CEO overseas experience, female CEOs, and institutional fragility. Our study offers novel insights into how informal institutions, such as Confucianism, affect a firm’s green innovation. In addition, it provides a comprehensive framework for the theoretical understanding of the influence of Confucianism on green innovation by revealing the moderating roles of CEOs’ characteristics and institutional environment.

Management short-sighted behavior and enterprise ESG performance — Evidence from listed companies in China

High-order theory indicates that management characteristics determine strategic decision-making and enterprise performance. As developers of strategic directions of enterprises, managers are essential senior human capital. They are vital in strategic planning and adjustment based on external environmental changes impacting enterprise production and operation. China's current managerial context suggests a lack of long-term vision. Guided by sustainable development, long-term visioning is paramount for enterprises to resist external environmental threats and maintain sustainability. Thus, this study uses sample data of A-share non-financial listed companies from 2009 to 2020 to examine whether management's short-sighted behavior impacts enterprises’ environmental, social, and governance (ESG) performance and its impact mechanism using a measurement index of management's short-sighted behavior that includes “qualitative + quantitative” methods. The heterogeneity of this impact based on managers with different backgrounds and senior management team structure is discussed. Our research indicates that management's myopic behavior can significantly inhibit ESG performance. This conclusion is still robust after considering endogeneity and multiple robustness tests. The inhibitory effect is markedly evident in enterprises with no background of poverty and with no overseas experiences; at the same time, this negative effect is more obvious in the executive team with low gender heterogeneity and no professional background in management. Mechanism analysis indicates that management's shortsighted behavior inhibits enterprises’ ESG performance by reducing capital expenditure and green innovation performance. This study provides empirical support and theoretical evidence for enterprises to improve their ESG performance while offering insights for enterprises in developing countries to implement ESG practices.

EU–China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment: The impact of firm supply chains on firm value

This research adopts an event study approach to investigate the impact of the European Union (EU)–China Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI) negotiations on firm value. We emphasise two typical events during the process, i.e. the preliminary agreement and the suspension of the CAI, which result in completely distinct patterns of policy uncertainty for the EU and China. Using data from Chinese listed firms, we find that the Chinese stock market reacts positively to the preliminary agreement of the CAI but negatively to its suspension. A firm with global supply chains has better stock returns when exposed to the first event but no significant heterogeneity under the second event. We also find that these effects vary depending on the overseas experience of the CEO, firm ownership type, and whether the firm is in a high-tech industry.

Being internationally mobile while keeping domestic social capital: how postdocs from China manage precarity

Abstract International academic mobility has surfaced as a new factor in the mechanism of cumulative advantages in early academic careers, yet its interplay with the role of doctoral mentors remains understudied compared to other factors. This research delves into the entanglement of international mobility and the doctoral mentor’s role through a 4-year longitudinal study encompassing ten postdocs from a prestigious Chinese university’s department. By employing narrative analysis across diverse cases, we found doctoral mentors wield multifaceted impacts on the access, decisions, experiences, trajectories, and outcomes of a postdoctoral international mobility through their role as teachers, sponsors, and collaborators. PhD graduates, supervised by eminent mentors with extensive overseas experiences, can enjoy a significant advantage in managing precarity and domestic social capital through mentors’ impacts on international mobility. This study offers insights into the mechanisms underlying cumulative advantages fostered through international mobility, while revealing the enduring impact of doctoral mentors throughout the academic career development.

Impact of executive overseas backgrounds on corporate tax–avoidance behaviors

To examine the impact of executives’ overseas background on corporate tax aggressive behaviors, this paper selects A-share listed companies in China's stock markets from 2017 to 2021 as samples and shows that executives’ overseas experience has a significant effect on corporate tax aggressiveness. Compared with state-owned enterprises (SOEs), the executive background of non-SOEs plays a more significant role in promoting tax aggressiveness. Furthermore, an increase in ownership concentration weakens the positive impact of executive overseas background. Additionally, Big Four auditing weakens the positive effects of executive overseas background on tax aggressiveness, and increased media attention diminishes the positive relationship.

Can product specialization improve the internationalization level of enterprises? Empirical evidence from “SRDI” enterprises

AbstractCultivating “SRDI” (abbreviation for “Specialized,” “Refinement,” “Differential,” and “Innovation”) enterprises can help solve the current “bottleneck” problems faced by China, enhance the stability and competitiveness of the industrial chain and supply chain, and promote high‐quality economic development. Using the “SRDI” enterprises listed in Shanghai and Shenzhen A‐shares in 2011–2021 as samples, this paper empirically tests the effect of product specialization on the internationalization level of “SRDI” enterprises. The results show that the product specialization of “SRDI” enterprises can significantly improve their internationalization level. Heterogeneity analysis shows that under the conditions of executives with overseas experience, a low degree of financing constraint, and fierce competition in the product market, the product specialization of “SRDI” enterprises has a more significant effect on improving their internationalization level. Therefore, China's “SRDI” enterprises should focus on the core business, give full play to the advantages of specialized operation, actively promote the internationalization strategy, and attach importance to the internal training and external recruitment of overseas executives. Governments at all levels should improve the policy support system, strengthen the incentive mechanism of scientific and technological innovation, and alleviate the financing constraints of “SRDI” enterprises.