跨国外派管理实践对外派人员跨文化适应的影响——基于中国企业的实证研究

The Influence of Expatriate Management Practices on Expatriates' Cross-Cultural Adjustment:Evidence From Chinese Enterprises

外派人员的跨文化适应是近30年来西方管理学界的一个热点研究议题,而我国学术界和实践界对此问题的关注相对较少。本文以中国企业派驻海外的180名中国籍员工为研究对象,以组织支持为理论基础,探讨跨国外派管理实践对外派人员跨文化适应的影响。本研究表明,外派管理实践对跨文化适应有显著的正向作用,且部分作用是通过组织支持感实现的。外派管理实践由工作促进、福利支持、社会支持和回任安排构成。其中,只有与外派人员切身利益相关的福利支持和回任安排对跨文化适应有显著正向影响,而工作促进只对工作适应有显著的正向影响,国外文献中较为关注的社会支持却没有表现出任何显著的关系。

Expatriates＇ cross-cultural adjustment has been a hot research topic among western management scholars the last two decades, while the situation in China is totally different. But the truth is that expatriates＇ ad- justment has become one of the difficulties of Chinese enterprises＇ foreign expansion. How to help expatriates to bet- ter adapt to the work and life during assignment？ How to preserve and effectively manage the expatriates？ These all are new requirements and challenges of international human resource management for Chinese enterprises. Evidence from Western multinationals has confirmed many factors on cross-cultural adjustment, such as indi- vidual factors （ e. g. , personality, culture intelligence, self-efficacy, experience, motivation ） , work-related factors （ e. g. , role conflict, role ambiguity, role overload） , organizational factors （ e. g. , selection, cross-cultural training, or- ganizational support） , and environmental factors（ culture diversity, spouse＇ adjustment ）. Nonetheless,whether they are appropriate for the Chinese assignment situations remains to be discussed. On the other hand, these studies are so trivial and dispersion that we can not get a whole picture of expatriates, so a systematic empirical study is nee- ded. Taking 180 Chinese expatriates who have been on assignment abroad in Chinese multinationals as the object of this research, based on organizational support theory, this study explores the influence of expatriate management practices on cross-cultural adjustment, and also attempts to model the mediating process between them through POS （Perceived Organizational Support）. We use statistic tools such as Amos4.0 and Spssl 1.0 to analysis scales and examine hypothesizes. Conclusions are summarized as follows： 1. There are some significant differences between our sample and the Western sample：First, expatriates from Chinese enterprises have lower POS and cross-cultural adjustment. Second, expatriates from Chinese enterprises do not bring their families, so we don＇s need to worry about the families＇ cross-cultural adjustment. Third, most of the expatriates from Chinese enterprises are younger and new, while the expatriates from western and Japan are always old and experienced. 2. Chinese Expatriates＇ cross-cuhural adjustment is significantly different depending on their sexes, education backgrounds and positions. Female expatriates should play more important roles in global business in the future. 3. Organizational expatriate management practices have a strong positive influence on both POS and cross-cul- tural adjustment. 4. Chinese Expatriates＇ cross-cultural adjustment depends more on whether they are satisfied with their imme- diate interests. The data confirm that only welfare support and repatriation arrangements have a significant positive impact on cross-cultural adjustment, whiJe work promotion and social support have no significant effect. 5. The welfare support from organizations has a positive impact on all the three dimensions of cross-cultural ad- justment, while work promotion only affects the work adjustment. 6. Enterprises should not only pay attention to the improvement of expatriate management practices, but also the practices＇ utility. Data confirm that POS affects adjustment positively, and also mediates the relationship between management practices and adjustment.