Global Careers Research Articles

Global career mobility: Turning perpetual liminality into a source of stability

This paper addresses the identity implications of global career mobility by investigating how global professionals, who move from country to country, are able to transform their experience of const...

Global Health Master’s Students: Demographics and Career Goals

The Master of Science in Global Health (MSGH) at Northwestern University is a new competency-based graduate degree program designed to prepare students for careers in global health. The purpose of our research is to determine the market characteristics for this degree, provide student backgrounds that will guide curricular and programmatic improvements, and determine if these students intend to pursue degrees in global health. This study examines survey responses from students admitted to the MSGH program between 2014 and 2015. Survey data were collected by the Northwestern University School of Professional Studies (SPS) as part of the online admissions application process. During the same period, all active students in the program were invited to complete a separate, online survey asking about their global health experience, skills and career goals. Application responses were analyzed using descriptive statistics. Free-text responses from the survey were hand-coded using 10 categorical variables developed through an inductive process. Fifty-four individuals were admitted to the MSGH program within 12 months of its inception. Of these 78% were female and the average age was 36. Of those who responded to questions about current employment, 57% were working in a health science field, 11% in government or public administration, and less than 10% responded in all other categories. Responses from the online survey revealed that most students had some prior global health experiences primarily in the medicine and mission/volunteer categories, 45% and 50% respectively. Responses regarding career aspirations were spread evenly across categories and nearly all students intended to join the global health workforce. Medicine was identified most frequently as a desired field for future careers (30%), followed by government and policy (25%). The wide variety of disciplines represented in students’ previous work histories underscores and supports the interprofessional nature of the field and the workforce. This diversity extends to both educational backgrounds and prior field experience and necessitates pedagogical techniques that can appeal to a wide array of students, particularly a majority female population. Findings regarding desired future employment suggests that career advising will need to adapt to market demands, prioritizing project and program management related careers.

A study of the impact of business education on global career mobility

PurposeThis paper aims to develop a clearer understanding of the role of business education and business schools in fostering global mobility. As business schools seek to educate managers who can work globally and adjust to new business and cultural environments, it is important to assess which specific dimensions of business education, such as the location of the school and its curriculum, play a significant role in fostering greater global mobility among business graduates. This also helps how business schools potentially influence global talent flows.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses an empirical research methodology in the form of a multivariate analysis to examine a sample of 91 business schools that are accredited by Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business (AACSB) in the 2015 Financial Times Global MBA Ranking.FindingsThis study finds that international mobility of MBA graduates is mediated both by the design of the curriculum and the location of the business school. MBA graduates from leading business schools that offer greater levels of international experiential learning are more likely to pursue overseas careers after graduation. MBA graduates from leading business schools that are located in economically globalized locations, by contrast, are often more likely to remain in the country where they studied after graduation to pursue local employment opportunities.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the knowledge of how business education influences the international mobility of business graduates and how it influences global talent flows.

Dynamic global careers: a new conceptualization of expatriate career paths

PurposeMost studies of expatriates have explored global careers as unfolding within assigned or self-initiated expatriation contexts in a predominantly linear fashion. The purpose of this paper is to conceptualize that expatriates’ career progression is facilitated by frequent moves between domains, with an increasing overlap among assigned-expatriate (AE) and self-initiated expatriate (SIE) contexts.Design/methodology/approachUnderpinned by findings from extant literature, the authors review and integrate studies of expatriation and careers to conceptualize an AE-SIE career continuum.FindingsThe authors debunk the idea that AEs and SIEs are a type of expatriate per se, but instead is indicative only of their career orientation in terms of where they choose to sit on the AE-SIE career continuum at any point in time. Specifically, individuals pursuing global careers in international labor markets include up to eight types of expatriate who retain varying degrees of AE vs SIE characteristics dependent on the point they choose along the continuum.Practical implicationsThe tension that dynamic global careers cause for multinational enterprises (MNEs) is not necessarily “bad”, and that by accepting and accommodating changes in career orientation MNEs will be able to make clearer and more consistent global staffing decisions.Originality/valueThe authors provide a new, improved conceptualization of linear and non-linear global careers and of the challenges global career actors face throughout their career development both at home and abroad. They further show that while career orientation explains why expatriates engage in various types of international work experiences, their typology adds explication of the various types of expatriate who pursue global careers.

Global careers in the Arabian Gulf

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to provide a better understanding of expatriation, both firm-initiated and self-initiated. The authors identified factors influencing the motives of expatriates to locate to the Arabian Gulf, and possible factors that may influence their decision to remain.Design/methodology/approachUsing a qualitative approach, the authors conducted 123 semi-structured interviews with expatriates in the United Arab Emirates, from various backgrounds. These interviews are analyzed based on the thematic analytic approach.FindingsThe authors identified four clusters of reasoning for global assignments to the Gulf and the outcomes of the expatriation. Remuneration was the main motivator cited for the move, but an obstacle for returning to the home country. For Westerners, the second most important factor was career opportunities, whereas for expatriates from Muslim countries it was cultural fit.Practical implicationsThe findings may be a valuable source of reference for individuals and for policy makers, employers, HR practitioners, and career counselors to provide an understanding of expatriation in emerging economies.Originality/valueThe paper uses evidence from the Gulf to bridge the gap between current knowledge of expatriation and the context of emerging economies.

Atlantic Studies: Global Currents Early Career Essay Prize 2016

Atlantic Studies: Global Currents Early Career Essay Prize 2016

Three aspects on studying abroad for global career developments

Three aspects on studying abroad for global career developments

The Global Career of Indian Opium and Local Destinies

Abstract: As is well known, opium was a major colonial commodity. It was linked to trade in several other commodities of the modern era such as tea, sugar and cotton and through these to Atlantic the slave trade. The movement of these commodities across continents shaped capitalism in very specific ways. In the case of India, for instance, earnings from the several components of the opium enterprise played an important role in the growth of industrial capitalism. This paper looks at the historical circumstances in which various localities and regions of the Indian subcontinent, especially western India, and the Indian Ocean became part of the opium enterprise during the early nineteenth century. It attempts to understand the manner in which local destinies were linked to the global, reinforcing and/or resisting British imperial interests. For this purpose I have chosen the port of Daman, on the West Coast of India as a representative example. Daman (Damao) was a Portuguese colony. The paper pays close attention to political processes at the local level so as to make sense of global patterns of trade in a commodity that was vital for sustaining the British Empire.

Mobila professionella subjekt eller immobila migranter?

This paper draws upon empirical material from my dissertation on Post-Soviet migration to Argentina to discuss how the implosion of the Soviet Union and the Argentine crisis of 2001 impacted upon everyday life for physicians trained in the USSR living in contemporary Argentina. For many, the demise of the USSR was a moment of liberation and future possibilities, however, the implosion of the system altered professional subjectivities and trajectories. What decides whether a movement across a national border is deemed migration or seen as part of a global career?

Exploring the development and transfer of career capital in an international governmental organization

This study investigates global career self-management behaviors of staff in an international governmental organization (IGO). The literature on global careers argues that individuals should maximize their career capital, operationalized in the intelligent careers (IC) concept as competencies, social networks, and motivations of persons related to their careers. The IC concept implies that career capital is transferable and argues that IC components are interrelated and self-reinforcing. We explored these assumptions through a case study in a United Nations (UN) organization. Using the IC framework we undertook 29 semi-structured interviews with international assignees, HR, and operational experts and conducted one focus group discussion with seven staffing coordinators. We found that the UN organization had high barriers to career capital transfer between head office and field stations. Therefore, the IGO staff experienced conflicting demands in terms of their career capital behaviors. Many staff did not focus on maximizing their career-relevant capabilities or social networks. Instead, they pursued international careers that intentionally sacrificed internal career progression in favor of their humanitarian aid duties. The research adds to the insights of the global careers literature and refines our understanding of the relationship of the organizational center to its foreign affiliates. The findings expose potentially contradictory behavioral implications of elements of the IC concept and call for a context-sensitive refinement. Managerial implications for resourcing, development, career management, and retention are discussed.

Globalization, academic knowledge interests and the global careers discourse

Purpose This paper aims to present two objectives. The first objective is to identify the academic knowledge interests (managerial, agentic, curatorial and critical) prevalent in research on global careers. The second objective is to consider and critique the discourse constructed and perpetuated in academic texts on global careers concerning globalization, global careers and the global careerist. Design/methodology/approach Using a critical discourse analysis, the paper analyzes 66 articles and book chapters and one book on the subject of a global career. The authors positioned the texts into one of the four academic knowledge interests – managerial, agentic, curatorial and critical. The texts were also analyzed with respect to the discourse manifested in relation to globalization, global careers and the global careerist. Findings The authors found that the texts were driven by primarily managerial academic knowledge interests, followed by agentic and curatorial interests. Very few reflected critical knowledge interests. In addition, texts on global careers accept the globalization of business as natural and unproblematic and, consequently, construct a discourse about the global career and the global careerist which fits the idea that global business expansion in its current form is inevitable and inescapable. Originality/value This paper is the first to analyze the academic knowledge production and discourse on “global careers” and the “global careerist” as it is emerging among career scholars. It is also one of the very few articles offering a more critical perspective on global careers specifically and careers more generally.

Nursing as a Global Career

In today's global environment, the nursing profession is regarded as a noble, challenging and competitive profession. Malaysian trained nurses are highly in demand due to their training and on-going efforts are made to ensure that the standards are well-maintained. This paper describes a part of a larger study. It reports the findings of a study pertaining to the needs of English language communication skills for nurses in a private hospital in Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia. The study focused on the needs of English language communication skills at the workplace. These skills were written and spoken English communication, reading, listening, and interpersonal communication. By identifying these communicative competency needs, the study has given insights into helping the nurses to increase their work performance, meet their work demands and help the employability of the nurses globally.

Can latitudes become forms? Unveiling purpose in higher education practice

Abstract My praxis as teacher/scholar and the journey that led me here is marked by the political dimensions of education and visual art. For me, this relationship between education and politics is rooted in the Brazilian context of the mid-1960s, a time of great upheaval. Then and there, education and art provided strategies of resistance, with the arts articulating protest in veiled and codified language and transformative education methodologies providing tools to displace oligarchical assumptions about knowledge and society. This manuscript explores the motivations shaping my higher education work and its trajectory from my formative experiences in Brazil, and my professional training in the United States, to a global career.

Counter-imperial orientalism: Friedrich Berber and the politics of international law in Germany and India, 1920s–1960s

AbstractThe most trenchant critiques of Western international law are framed around the legacy of its historic complicity in the imperial project of governing non-European peoples. International law organized Europe and its ‘others’ into a hierarchy of civilizational difference that was only ever reconfigured but never overturned. But when analysing the complex relationship between international law and imperialism the differences within Europe – as opposed to a dyadic opposition of Europe versus the ‘rest’ – also matter. Within the historical and political constellations of the early and mid twentieth century, German difference produced a set of arguments that challenged dominant discourses of international law by posturing as anti-imperialist critique. This article focuses on the global career of Friedrich Berber (1898–1984), who, as a legal adviser in Nazi Germany and Nehru’s India, was at the forefront of state-led challenges to liberal international law. Berber fused notions of German civilizational superiority with an appropriation of Indian colonial victimhood, and pursued a shared politics of opposition. He embodied a version of German–Indian entanglement which did not abate after the Second World War, emphasizing the long continuities of empire, power differentials, civilizational hierarchies, and developmental logics under the umbrella of international law.

Integrating motivational interviewing in career counseling: A case study

Motivational interviewing (MI) is receiving increasing attention in the field of career counseling. However, none of the previous studies have concretely presented how this method could and why it should be integrated in career counseling. Through the use of a single case study design, this paper illustrates how a brief MI (BMI) intervention can be integrated into career counseling interventions to help resolve career dilemmas. An analysis of the interactions between the client and his counselor using the Motivational Interviewing Skills Code 2.1 illustrates why this method can be useful for career counseling. Immediate and long-term effects of the global career counseling intervention on the client's career decision-making difficulties, as well as the specific impacts of the BMI intervention, are assessed. This case study shows that the BMI approach can be integrated in a career counseling intervention to help career counseling clients overcome career dilemmas and increase their readiness to make career choices.

Changes in Students’ Global Perspectives through Short-Term Overseas Internship Programs (How to Help Students Develop Skills Necessary for Global Careers)

Changes in Students’ Global Perspectives through Short-Term Overseas Internship Programs (How to Help Students Develop Skills Necessary for Global Careers)

Career Mobility in a Global Era: Advances in Managing Expatriation and Repatriation

The surge of interest in expatriation and repatriation within the broader discourse on labor mobility of professionals and high-skilled labor, human capital development, and the theory and practice of people management serves as the backdrop to this paper. We propose that expatriation and repatriation be framed in the context of global careers and embedded in the wider social-economic environment of globalization through the lens of a career ecosystem theory. We chart the evolution of scholarly publications on career mobility over the past four decades and highlight current trends, in particular the emergence of self-initiated expatriation as a pivotal change in the direction of expatriation studies and derived practice. We assess the rigor of empirical findings, weigh theoretical underpinnings, offer a research agenda for future research, and outline managerial implications.

Career Mobility in a Global Era: Advances in Managing Expatriation and Repatriation

The surge of interest in expatriation and repatriation within the broader discourse on labor mobility of professionals and high-skilled labor, human capital development, and the theory and practice of people management serves as the backdrop to this paper. We propose that expatriation and repatriation be framed in the context of global careers and embedded in the wider social-economic environment of globalization through the lens of a career ecosystem theory. We chart the evolution of scholarly publications on career mobility over the past four decades and highlight current trends, in particular the emergence of self-initiated expatriation as a pivotal change in the direction of expatriation studies and derived practice. We assess the rigor of empirical findings, weigh theoretical underpinnings, offer a research agenda for future research, and outline managerial implications.

Married, mom and manager – how can this be combined with an international career?

The purpose of this paper is to examine the experiences of females combining global careers, in particular, frequent international business travel and a dual-career family. With the increasing popularity of alternate forms of expatriation, females have the opportunity to follow a global career while being in a dual-career partnership and having children. Previous research has suggested that alternatives to long-term expatriation, such as international business travel, are considered more family friendly. Integrating family and international business travel, however, still poses many challenges to women. This paper examines the ways in which they handle this challenging situation according to social capital theory. It presents initial exploratory insights stemming from interview data including 25 female international business travelers living in dual-career families from four Western and non-Western countries on four different continents. These interviews, which were analyzed using template analysis, show common ways and similar experiences and understanding of integrating family and career life as female non-traditional expatriates across cultures. Differences remain, however, because of conditions in the local environment.

Graduate Emigration from Ireland: Navigating New Pathways in Familiar Places

This article examines the ability of young Irish graduates to enact mobility as a form of personal and career development both during economic expansion and recession. Of particular interest is the observation that Irish graduates are much more mobile than those in other countries which were also badly affected by the recession. Drawing from a study of recent Irish graduate emigrants (Irish Graduate Abroad Study), the article demonstrates how Irish graduates have successfully negotiated routes into global labour markets, facilitated by the relatively straightforward recognition of their qualifications, their ability to speak English and the visa permissions that enable such movement. Irish graduates have incredible global networks generated through a family history of migration. Irish graduates also have a considerable prior culture of mobility facilitated through institutionally mediated mobility programmes. Taken together, Irish graduates have amongst the lowest barriers globally to actually enact global careers. In the context of limited opportunities in Ireland due to its size and its current economic situation, mobility is an attractive choice with far more to gain than lose for many young Irish graduates.