The JGM BitBlog: Working with expatriates - The HCN point of view.
Anthony Fee, University of Technology Sydney, Sydney, Australia
Snejina Michailova, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
Marian van Bakel, Technical University of Denmark, Ballerup, Denmark
Expatriates are the focus of much research in global mobility because they are often strategically important and costly. But what about the host country nationals (HCNs) they work with?
Important stakeholders, yet often neglected
Despite decades-old calls for more attention to HCNs, they continue to be treated as
back-stage actors in global mobility. Published studies on expatriates have outnumbered those on HCNs by a ratio of 50 to one. When HCNs have been studied, it is often from the perspective of how they contribute to expatriate success. However, HCNs are the largest group of employees in multinationals and their work is global as their key functions contribute to creating value across borders. So, their experiences on their own deserve more scholarly attention.
Job Demands-Resources
Using Job Demands-Resources theory (JD-R) and drawing on the limited studies of HCNs, we map the major job demands and job resources influencing HCNs in their workplaces. From this mapping, we identify pressing future research avenues and considerations for practitioners wishing to better understand and support HCN employees.
Demands
Although HCNs do not cross any geographical or organisational boundaries, they work with expatriates on a daily basis. This places specific demands on them, which often go under the radar. We distinguish three types of demands:
1. Extra-role behaviours: HCNs are often expected to support expatriates' adjustment to a new host country, but this is usually not in their job description.
2. Productivity losses: The interactions with expatriates are intercultural and often in a different language, which introduces challenges and uses up time and energy that HCNs cannot use for their core work tasks.
3. Psychological burdens: HCNs may experience extra stress because of expatraites' very presence. For example, HCNs need to adjust to working together with expatriates, and they might also resent expatriates who are perceived to get a higher salary or more and better career opportunities.
Resources
HCNs can draw on several resources to meet the demands of working with expatriates. These resources can be personal, such as technical knowhow, interpersonal skills and general goodwill towards expatriates, but also external, such as support from co-workers and the organisation. Organisations can help increase these resources for HCNs by offering training and mentoring or redesigning HCNs' jobs to include their support function for expatriates.
Multinationals should support HCNs
HCNs face extra demands when working with expatriates, and they can and should be better prepared for this role. Multinationals wanting to optimally and strategically use expatriate assignments should consider investing not just in expatriates but also in understanding and helping HCNs to effectively perform their own roles and support expatriates in theirs. This is especially important when cultural distance increases the intercultural barriers between expatriates and HCNs.
To read the full article, please see the Journal of Global Mobility publication:
Anthony Fee, Snejina Michailova, Marian van Bakel; Expert Review Series: Global mobility's forgotten partner: the case for supporting host country nationals. Journal of Global Mobility 2025; https://doi.org/10.1108/JGM-05-2025-0051 (Open Access) ------------------------------
Professor Jan Selmer, Ph.D.
Founding Editor-in-Chief
Journal of Global Mobility (JGM)
Department of Management, Aarhus University
E-mail:
selmer@mgmt.au.dkTwitter: @JanSelmer_JGM
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