Organizations and migrant integration: Towards a multiparadigm narrative approach

Abstract

This paper explores the potential of conducting multiparadigm research within and beyond cross-cultural management, using narratives to examine how organizations shape migrant integration experiences and trajectories. It highlights the strengths of paradigmatic multiplicity in research with examples of three illustrative studies respectively using functionalist, interpretive and critical perspectives, while also considering the boundaries of these individual approaches. The paper proceeds to explore the potential of adopting a multiparadigm approach within a research strategy that places narratives at the centre of enquiry. It identifies the scope and focus of future research for a socially and politically important area of enquiry; it evaluates the application of diverse paradigm-driven methodological perspectives including the challenges involved in using them alone and in combination; and it develops a transferable framework to guide research in cross-cultural management, organization and migration studies that helps to assure procedural and conceptual rigour, and to generate practicable insights that facilitate successful integration outcomes.

Understanding the early career self-initiated expatriation

“…Acknowledging the value of both functionalist and interpretivist approaches, some authors select a multiparadigm strategy (Primecz, 2008;Primecz et al, 2023). Relying on functionalist principles, the first author began with a systematic search strategy to identify key articles from multiple disciplines.…”

Cross-cultural management and women pioneers

“…Interaction between paradigms makes CCM research more accessible and enables new insights. Significantly, in line with a unified integrative approach, there are "second generation" CCM women scholars who not only engage with paradigms but also argue against their strict separation and exclusivity (Romani et al 2011a;Mahadevan 2013;Primecz et al 2015;Romani & Primecz 2019;Primecz et al 2023). On the contrary, they advocate a "paradigm tolerance" (Mendenhall & Hippler 2020) and a complementary interplay, "paradigm interplay" (Romani 2008), in which they conduct multi-paradigmatic analyses.…”

Investigating otherness, not difference: Should saming and othering be the focus of the discipline? Implications for a contemporary cross-cultural management studies

“…When taking this wider view on what the discipline is responsible for, Otherness emerges as a central disciplinary concept. It is situated against the background of the global rise in certain ideologies and practices such as nationalism, populism and xenophobia which disadvantage, marginalize or exclude certain individuals and groups (Mahadevan et al, 2023), and which also manifest on the level of management and organizations (Besic et al, 2023; Primecz et al, 2023). For example, qualified self-initiated expatriates from the non-West often have a higher likelihood of being perceived as unskilled – potentially undesirable – migrants at Western workplaces (e.g.…”