This article is one of the first to examine the long‐term effect of expatriation on careers, comparing the impact of international work experience on the career success of assigned and self‐initiated expatriates. Our sample consists of employees who were working abroad in 2004, and we examine their subjective and objective career success eight years later. Despite the “dark side of international careers” arguments associated with the repatriation literature, we find that the long‐term impacts of international work experience on career success are generally positive and mainly unrelated to whether the work experience was acquired as an assigned or self‐initiated expatriate. Companies recruit employees with international experience externally but are much more likely to offer further internal jobs to assigned expatriates. This reinforces the need for further research and for companies to see all those with international experience as important elements of the workforce. © 2017 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Building on a modern careers approach, we assess the effects of working abroad on individuals' career capital. Given the dearth of longitudinal studies, we return to a sample of economics graduates in Finland eight years later. We measure changes in three dimensions of career capital; 'knowing how', 'knowing whom', 'knowing why' and find that company assigned expatriates learn more than self-initiated expatriates. All three career capital areas benefit from international experience and all are increasingly valued over time. Based on our findings we conclude that a dynamic notion of career capital acquisition and use is needed. Managerial implications include the need for a wider view of talent management for international businesses.

This study investigates how individual-and unit-level performance can be fostered by supervisors' behavioural styles (managerial coaching) and the personal relationship between supervisor and subordinate (leader-member exchange, LMX). The JD-R model holds that good leadership serves as a job resource and triggers a motivational process that will lead through work engagement to good performance. This study first introduces and validates novel measurement instruments for managerial coaching, LMX, and self-rated performance. Then, the study utilizes multilevel methodology (MSEM) to investigate the connections between study variables at the individual-and unitlevel. A sample from two organizations (N = 655) was utilized in the measurement validation and a sample from multiple organizations (N = 879) in the hypothesis testing. Samples using self-rating measurements were collected from different Finnish organizations between 2011 and 2012. The results show that, while managerial coaching was connected more to the unit-level performance, LMX had stronger effect to the individual performance and work engagement, which was connected with the unit-level performance. Analysing two leadership constructs at the same time suggests that there are different mechanisms driving managerial coaching and the LMX relationship in the motivational process and towards good performance as the JD-R model proposes. The study also contributes to literature by introducing and validating measurement instruments.

The combination of two trends common in working life -international work and a dual career situation -is challenging for both genders. In order to cope with the situation, international dual career couples have to be able to coordinate their careers. The purpose of this article is to identify how dual career expatriates view their career coordination strategies with their partners, and how these views differ between the genders. Semi-structured interviews were carried out among 39 expatriates on assignment who had a partner working, at least before the assignment. Our findings identify three career coordination strategies applied by dual career couples, and confirm gender plays an essential role in the formation of those strategies. Male expatriates predominated among the group adopting a hierarchical strategy and female expatriates predominated among the group adopting an egalitarian and a loose coordination strategy. Strategies also seemed prone to change over time. Companies should pay attention to both the career development of the partner and the relationship coping skills of the couple to maximize the chances of dual career expatriate assignments being successful.

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to identify how dual career expatriates view their spouses' roles during international assignments.Design/methodology/approachIn total, 39 interviews were carried out with expatriates who had a working spouse. The interview data were content analysed using replication logic.FindingsThe authors' findings indicate that the importance of spousal support increases among dual career couples during international assignments. Expatriates report their spouses as having supporting, flexible, determining, instrumental, restricting and equal partner spousal roles.Originality/valueThis study provides in‐depth understanding about multiple spousal roles during international assignments among dual career couples and contributes to the previous literature by showing how spousal roles appear in the international context, and by identifying two new spousal roles.