The globalization of business created a growing demand for internationally capable managers. Due to difficulties in “traditional” international assignments where home country employees are sent abroad (expatriate model) companies are looking for alternatives. One of these alternatives is inpatriation, which involves the transfer of subsidiary managers to the HQ and thus creating international diversity. Inpatriation was chosen as there is a smaller body of knowledge in the field which this paper can advance further. 3 Asian companies and their HRM strategies are compared: Toshiba, Samsung and Acer. Each company implemented a different type of inpatriation and the respective benefits and downsides are contrasted and discussed. The final chapter includes policy recommendations that point to the recommended courses of action for Chinese and Taiwanese companies who wish to internationalize their business operations and become global players.

published_or_final_version / Social Work / Master / Master of Social Work

Le but premier de cette étude sera de comprendre le rôle de l’écriture de voyage telle qu’elle est pratiquée dans l’œuvre d’Henri Michaux et d’expliquer le parcours qui mène ce dernier du voyage réel au voyage imaginaire. Les trois ouvrages principaux qui constitueront notre objet d’analyse, c’est-à-dire Ecuador (1929), Un Barbare en Asie (1933), ainsi que le récit imaginaire d’Ailleurs (1946), transforment chacun à leur façon le genre de la relation de voyage en mettant de l’avant non pas une écriture de l’Autre mais une écriture de soi. Il semble en effet que, chez Michaux, l’écriture de l’ailleurs n’a de valeur que dans l’affirmation de la position du sujet face à un réel angoissant, réel devant impérativement être tenu à distance par le biais du langage. Incidemment, dans sa volonté d’expatriation, le voyageur est pris entre deux temps bien distincts, celui du désir d’adéquation et celui du repli sur soi. / The primary focus of this study will be to understand the role of travel writing as put forward in the works of Henri Michaux and to retrace the itinerary that leads the author from real travel to imaginary travel. The three books that will constitute our main body of analysis, namely Ecuador (1929), Un Barbare en Asie (1933), and the fictitious journey of Ailleurs (1946), have transformed each in its own way the genre of travel literature by suggesting not only a representation of the Other, but a writing of the self. Indeed, it seems that for Michaux, the representation of unknown territories holds significance only in the way that, through it, the self can assert its own position in the face of a menacing outside world, an outside world that must be held at bay through a defensive use of language. Consequently, the traveler is stuck between two very distinct postures, the first being his desire for adequacy and the latter his turning in on himself.

Ce travail porte sur des aspects souvent oubliés de l'expatriation : les réactions des individus. A partir des théories du « coping » (faire face), et de la collecte de 559 questionnaires, les actions et cognitions des expatriés sont examinées au sein de trois essais – deux portants sur les facteurs qui affectent ces réactions, et le troisième sur leurs conséquences.Le premier essai étudie le soutien social organisationnel et révèle que le supérieur de l'expatrié possède une influence émotionnelle : son soutien facilite l'acceptation et la réinterprétation positive des difficultés auxquelles l'expatrié fait face. L’aide provenant des pairs a des conséquences plus instrumentales, favorisant la recherche d’informations et de conseils.Le second essai montre que différentes catégories d’expatriés réagissent différemment aux défis de l’expatriation : les femmes ont davantage recours à du soutien social, et ont plus de facilité à accepter leur expérience et à la voir de manière positive que les hommes. Les jeunes ont davantage de risque de consommer alcool et drogues que leurs aînés, et les expatriés ayant initiés eux-mêmes leur expatriation ont des réactions plus émotionnelles que les expatriés classiques. Enfin, dans un troisième travail l’influence des réactions des expatriés sur leur adaptation est examinée. Il en ressort notamment le rôle positif des réactions d’acceptation, ainsi que les risques à limiter ou arrêter ses efforts. / Some individuals enjoy their expatriation to the point of being reluctant to eve come back to their home country, but some experience terribly hard times. This research seeks to advance knowledge in the understanding of this variance by applying coping theory and methodologies. Three essays based on 559 questionnaires. Filled out by expatriates examine expatriate reactions. The first two aim to uncover antecedents of individual behavior ad cognitions abroad, while the third essay investigates the effectiveness of these reactions.The first essay focuses on the role of organizational social support and shows that supervisor’s influence is emotional, facilitating emotion-focused engagement coping reactions, such as acceptance or positive reappraisal, whereas peer support is more instrumental, easing the search for useful information and advice.The second essay focuses on expatriate categories that have been neglected for a long time in research: the self-initiated, female and young. This work shows that women use more social support and display more acceptance and positive reappraisal to face the problems of expatriation, the young are more at risk of drinking alcohol and taking drugs, and self-initiated expatriates have more emotional reactions than organizational ones.Finally, the third essay analyzes coping consequences. It notably shows that being able to realize and accept expatriation hardships (acceptance) facilitates adjustment. It also appears that giving up trying to solve the problems one is face with a dangerous reaction, jeopardizing professional and cross-cultural adjustment.

The thesis deals with the phenomenon of employees' global mobility in large multinational companies. Primarily, it focuses on the expatriation process from the perspective of the necessary support of expatriates by HR department. In the practical part, there are compared the current practices of four multinational organizations. The goal of the work is to choose the best practice, which the most eliminates the international assignment failure. The thesis further formulates the recommendations designed for companies implementing new policies in the area of employee global mobility. Work is processed by an analysis of secondary sources - literature, textbooks, professional journals, international studies and articles or websites of analyzed companies.

In order to stay competitive in the market, multinational corporations (MNC) need to expand their businesses in the international market. Sending employees to work abroad is a great way of expanding. However, having employees working abroad, brings a lot of advantages for the corporation, but it can also be a disadvantage for the corporation if the final step of international assignments, which is the repatriation process, has not been handled correctly. This thesis investigates how the managers of IKEA, Electrolux and SEB handle the repatriation process and how the repatriates experienced the process, during their pre-return period and post-return period. Our findings show that the repatriates experienced that the repatriation process was poorly conducted by the corporations due to lack of engagement from their side. On the other hand, managers of the companies felt that they handled the repatriation process very well. Therefore, it is essential that corporations prepare the employees well, before they start the international assignments, as well as help them to readjusting back in the home country. Working with practical expectations may lead to a smooth adjustment, which in turn, leads to a well-functioning repatriation process.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-04-28T20:39:54Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Daniela Borba.pdf: 1023335 bytes, checksum: b60738235fbb4b3ca6fde8bda517ff10 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2008-11-07 / The present study has intended to understand the acculturation experience in Brazil, among ten Latin-American Spanish speaking women, following their executive expatriate husbands. Expatriation is a form of globalized immigration, characterized by a change of countries without the changing companies. The verbal material from the interviews (were treated under the Collective Subject, Speech Method), the resilience test content, as well as the dialogue between three approaches: intercultural psychology, human resilience and the analytical psychology of C. G. Jung, have contributed to establishing findings that can contribute with the understanding of a transformation process that takes place in this context. A initial period of mourning is started by the enrooting process and the ambivalent losses from: social net and gender roles changing, professional versus family conflict and, cultural and intrapsychic boundaries destabilization. Such adversity has induced, through self overcoming, the development in other areas such as: the recognition of deep relationships importance, flexibility, patience, positive attitude, new cultural codes acquisition, deepening of family relations, and the increase of motherhood and femininity. On the other hand, some risk factors for this experience have been found. Their relationship with the Brazilian culture, for instance, were characterized as superficial e restrict, for the majority, indicating a acculturation process as separation. This defensive form of intercultural relation, allowed the participants to perceive some Brazilian inferior cultural complex symptoms (low self-esteem, passiveness, uncommitted behavior, pleasure search and law disrespect). Shallowness, thus, occurs both ways of this intercultural encounter. Risk factors were also found: a high control of impulses joined to a low regulation of emotions indicates that, as repression tends to increase, the emotional control diminish, stopping wishes and plans from happening, and also expanding the dependence on the spouse. Therefore, to stimulate a healthy development is most important that health and organizational professionals, and the participants themselves, notice and encourage: 1. acculturation by means of cultural integration, 2. the balance of resilience factors, and 3. the individuation process resulting from the elaboration of deeper layers of the unconscious, brought up by the intercultural experience. As conclusion, the path of development for these women indicates the need of investments in their own projects, apart from family, so that, through self-accomplishment, they turn expatriation into their own journey / A presente pesquisa buscou compreender a experiência de aculturação no Brasil, de 10 mulheres hispano-americanas, casadas com executivos expatriados. A expatriação é uma forma de imigração globalizada, na qual o executivo muda de país, mas não muda de empresa. A análise de entrevista (pelo método do Discurso do Sujeito Coletivo) , a aplicação de teste de resiliência, bem como a articulação teórica entre três perspectivas, a saber: psicologia intercultural, a resiliência humana e a psicologia analítica de C. G. Jung, contribuíram para a elaboração de resultados com implicações para o entendimento do processo de transformação nesse contexto. Foi identificado um período inicial de luto decorrente do desenraizamento e das perdas ambíguas referentes a transformação na rede social, nos papéis de gênero, conflitos entre a vida profissional e familiar e, desestabilização das referências culturais e intrapsíquicas. Tal adversidade possibilitou também, por meio de sua superação, crescimento em outros aspectos como: reconhecimento da importância de relações íntimas, flexibilidade, paciência, otimismo, aquisição de novos códigos culturais, aprofundamento das relações familiares e desenvolvimento da maternidade e feminilidade. Por outro lado, foram encontrados alguns fatores de risco para essa experiência. A relação com a cultura brasileira, por exemplo, se mostrou superficial e restrita, no caso da maioria, caracterizando uma aculturação na modalidade separação. Essa forma de relação intercultural defensiva, permitiu que as participantes identificassem características (baixa auto-estima, passividade, descomprometimento, busca constante de prazer e desrespeito às leis) de um possível complexo cultural brasileiro de inferioridade. A superficialidade ocorre, portanto, em as partes desse encontro intercultural. Foram encontrados alguns fatores de risco importantes para o desenvolvimento resiliente das participantes: o alto controle dos impulsos somado à baixa regulação das emoções. Esse quadro indica que a repressão da autoexpressão tende a aumentar o descontrole emocional, dificultando a realização de desejos e projetos, e estimulando a dependência do cônjuge. Portanto, para um desenvolvimento saudável é importante que profissionais da área da saúde e das organizações, bem como as próprias participantes, atentem para e estimulem: 1. a aculturação por meio da integração cultural, 2. a resiliência mediante o equilíbrio dos fatores resilientes e, 3. o processo de individuação decorrente da elaboração do material das camadas inconscientes da psique, constelados na experiência intercultural. Pode-se concluir que o caminho de desenvolvimento dessas mulheres aponta para a necessidade de construção de projetos próprios, independentes da família, para que, através da auto-realização façam, da experiência de expatriação, a sua jornada

Le but premier de cette étude sera de comprendre le rôle de l’écriture de voyage telle qu’elle est pratiquée dans l’œuvre d’Henri Michaux et d’expliquer le parcours qui mène ce dernier du voyage réel au voyage imaginaire. Les trois ouvrages principaux qui constitueront notre objet d’analyse, c’est-à-dire Ecuador (1929), Un Barbare en Asie (1933), ainsi que le récit imaginaire d’Ailleurs (1946), transforment chacun à leur façon le genre de la relation de voyage en mettant de l’avant non pas une écriture de l’Autre mais une écriture de soi. Il semble en effet que, chez Michaux, l’écriture de l’ailleurs n’a de valeur que dans l’affirmation de la position du sujet face à un réel angoissant, réel devant impérativement être tenu à distance par le biais du langage. Incidemment, dans sa volonté d’expatriation, le voyageur est pris entre deux temps bien distincts, celui du désir d’adéquation et celui du repli sur soi. / The primary focus of this study will be to understand the role of travel writing as put forward in the works of Henri Michaux and to retrace the itinerary that leads the author from real travel to imaginary travel. The three books that will constitute our main body of analysis, namely Ecuador (1929), Un Barbare en Asie (1933), and the fictitious journey of Ailleurs (1946), have transformed each in its own way the genre of travel literature by suggesting not only a representation of the Other, but a writing of the self. Indeed, it seems that for Michaux, the representation of unknown territories holds significance only in the way that, through it, the self can assert its own position in the face of a menacing outside world, an outside world that must be held at bay through a defensive use of language. Consequently, the traveler is stuck between two very distinct postures, the first being his desire for adequacy and the latter his turning in on himself.

Unternehmen stehen vor der Herausforderung, effizient und kostengünstig zu produzieren. In diesem Zusammenhang kommt dem Industrial Engineering (IE) eine hohe Bedeutung zu, denn es besitzt das Potenzial zum ganzheitlichen Produktivitätsmanagement über den gesamten Produktentstehungs- und herstellungsrozess sowie alle Unternehmensbereiche. Dieses Potenzial wird zwar mittlerweile von einer Vielzahl von Unternehmen erkannt, jedoch kaum genutzt, was insbesondere in einem fehlenden Konzept für das ganzheitliche Industrial Engineering im Unternehmen begründet liegt. Daher wird ein fundamentales „Reengineering“ des Industrial Engineerings notwendig, das im Kontext des Zusammenwirkens von Mensch, Technik und Organisation, den Mitarbeiter in den Fokus seiner Aktivitäten rückt. Im Rahmen der vorliegenden Arbeit wird deswegen erstmals eine Gestaltungssystematik für das Industrial Engineering vorgestellt. Diese gibt Hilfestellung für die Implementierung des Industrial Engineerings im Unternehmen und speziell an ausländischen Standorten, um durch eine geeignete Gestaltung der Aufbauorganisation dessen adäquate Einbindung im Unternehmen sicherzustellen. Zudem liefert die Gestaltungssystematik wertvolle Hinweise sowohl für die Personalauswahl als auch den Personaleinsatz im IE. Ferner unterstützt ein Leitfaden für das kulturadäquate Change Management die Durchführung von Gestaltungs- und Rationalisierungsvorhaben im Rahmen der eigentlichen Tätigkeit des Industrial Engineers im internationalen Kontext. / To cope with tough international competition, companies are faced with the demand for highly efficient and productive manufacturing as well as service processes and the need to identify potential for rationalization in order to ensure the economic performance of the company. Industrial Engineering is playing a key role in planning and optimizing work systems and processes in ergonomic as well as economical terms to improve enterprise's productivity. Currently there is no common understanding of IE, of its specific functions as well as its organizational fixture in enterprise's praxis. Because of this lack between research and practice, enterprises waste the potential of IE for the increase in productivity. To overcome the problem of a missing holistic approach for the continuous productivity management, a systematic approach for the full potential utilization of IE will be introduced. This firstly facilitates the institutional configuration of a human-oriented IE in enterprises of the manufacturing and the service sector and secondly helps to realize measures of work design as well as work rationalization by means of a strong change management. Thus, the developed design approach systematically contains dimensions and parameters for the implementation of an overall Industrial Engineering enabling to unleash productivity potentials by considering the technology as well as the human factor and organizational conditions. Furthermore, for the first time the intercultural differences influencing the Industrial Engineering on the functional, structural and personnel level are explicitly considered in the novel approach. From a practice-oriented point of view, the approach helps to give concrete recommendations for the implementation of the Industrial Engineering as well as for the job of the Industrial Engineers being sent as expatriates to Poland or the Czech Republic.

This study aims to analyze the resilient behavior of Brazilian expatriates in China, in the face of expatriation experience. As a research method was adopted a qualitative, exploratory and descriptive study. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with twelve Brazilian expatriates in China, which were analyzed with the technique of content analysis (Bardin, 2011). The categories of analysis defined a priori were: the experience of expatriation, situations of adversity, dynamic of behavior resilient, and, factors and resilient results. These categories were defined based on the theoretical approach of Hofstede (1991), Grotberg (2005) and Minello (2010). Were also defined two categories of analysis not a priori - emotions and feelings related to family and perception of Chinese culture related to business - which emerged from the respondent s reports. As a result, it is emphasized that the experience of expatriation has lots of adversities in everyday situations, especially related to cultural differences between Brazilians and Chinese, like the different habits of hygiene and food smells, gestures, Chinese language, and communication in order to understand the thinking of the Chinese people. Accordingly, the first expatriates reaction was denial, manifested by anger, irritation, insecurity and disgust; This is due to the fact that such situations were not part of the mental model of Brazilians expatriates interviewed, which resulted in cultural shock. However, one of the adversities that was more evident among respondents was related to geographical distance, which generated the feeling of suffering because of missing relatives and people who were living in Brazil. In the professional environment, the timezone was an element that contributed to the stress of expatriates due to long working hours they had to do to participate in the activities of the company in both time of Brazil and China. Thus, it was possible oscillation between moments of emotional stability and moments of grief and isolation, which can be related to the dynamics of resilient behavior of expatriates, sometimes positive, sometimes negative. It is noted as resilient factors, the search for social support in co-workers, on the internet, on courses and search for groups of Brazilian or foreign, seeking to learn more about Chinese culture, Chinese and English language. For expatriates married, nuclear family (spouse and children) was more united, representing a strong emotional support to face the difficulties of expatriation together. Another result of this experience, as a consequence of the positive resilient behavior, was the opening of consciousness to understand the Chinese culture, that reflected in maturity, patience, personal development, and professional growth and development. / Este estudo tem como objetivo analisar o comportamento resiliente de brasileiros expatriados na China, diante da experiência de expatriação. Como método de pesquisa adotou-se uma abordagem qualitativa, de caráter exploratório e descritivo. Foram realizadas entrevistas semiestruturadas com doze expatriados brasileiros na China, as quais foram analisadas sob a luz da técnica de análise de conteúdo (BARDIN, 2011). As categorias de análise definidas a priori foram: a experiência de expatriação, situações de adversidade, dinâmica do comportamento resiliente e, fatores e resultados resilientes. Estas categorias foram definidas com base no enfoque teórico de Hofstede (1991), Grotberg (2005) e Minello (2010). Também foram definidas duas categorias de análise não a priori - emoções e sentimentos relacionados à família e percepção da cultura chinesa relacionada aos negócios-, que emergiram a partir do relato dos entrevistados. Como resultados, destaca-se que a experiência de expatriação está repleta de situações de adversidades cotidianas, especialmente relacionadas às diferenças culturais entre brasileiros e chineses, tais como os diferentes hábitos de higiene e alimentação, cheiros, gestos, idioma chinês, e comunicação no sentido de compreender a forma de pensar dos chineses. Nesse sentido, a primeira reação dos expatriados era a negação, manifestada por raiva, irritação, insegurança e ojeriza; isso se deve pelo fato de que tais situações não faziam parte do modelo mental dos expatriados brasileiros entrevistados, o que ocasionou em choque cultural. No entanto, uma das adversidades que mais foi evidenciada entre os entrevistados, estava relacionada à distância geográfica, que gerou o sentimento de sofrimento por causa da saudade dos familiares e das pessoas que tinham convivência no Brasil, e o sentimento de isolamento pela dificuldade de fazer novos grupos sociais, em um primeiro momento da experiência. No ambiente profissional, o fuso horário foi um elemento que contribuiu para o estresse dos expatriados, devido à longa jornada de trabalho que tinham que fazer para participar das atividades da empresa tanto no horário do Brasil quanto da China. Diante disso, foi possível perceber oscilação entre momentos de estabilidade emocional e momentos de angústia e isolamento, o que pode ser relacionado ao dinamismo do comportamento resiliente dos expatriados, ora positivo, ora negativo. Salienta-se, como fatores resilientes, a busca pelo apoio social nos colegas de trabalho, na internet, por meio de cursos e, pela formação de grupos de brasileiros ou de estrangeiros, a busca por aprender mais sobre a cultura chinesa, o idioma chinês e inglês. Para os expatriados casados, a família nuclear (cônjuge e filhos) ficou mais unida, representando um forte suporte emocional para enfrentar as dificuldades da expatriação juntos. Outro resultado dessa experiência, em decorrência do comportamento resiliente positivo, foi a abertura de consciência para compreensão da cultura chinesa, em que repercutiu em amadurecimento, paciência, desenvolvimento pessoal, além do crescimento e valorização profissional.