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Article
Publication date: 8 February 2016

Carol-Anne Gauthier

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of obstacles to socioeconomic integration faced by highly-skilled immigrant women (HSIW) to Quebec, followed by a discussion of…

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Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of obstacles to socioeconomic integration faced by highly-skilled immigrant women (HSIW) to Quebec, followed by a discussion of Quebec’s socio-political context and interculturalism, in an effort to better situate these obstacles. With these in mind, implications for diversity management are discussed.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper is largely based on a review of the immigrant integration, interculturalism and diversity management literatures pertaining to the socioeconomic integration of highly-skilled immigrants. It focusses on the socioeconomic integration of HSIW in the Quebec context.

Findings

The authors find that researchers should continue to examine aspects of the social and political contexts in which immigrant integration and diversity management take place when conducting studies in these areas. The authors also encourage continued research pertaining to specific groups, as these may bring to light-specific dynamics that can lead to exclusion.

Practical implications

This paper includes implications for diversity management in organizations seeking to foster inclusive practices with regards to ethnic minorities and immigrants in general, and HSIW in particular.

Originality/value

The paper sheds new light on immigrant integration and diversity management in Quebec by bridging the gap between three areas of study that are interconnected but seldom discussed together: socioeconomic integration of immigrants, interculturalism and diversity management in organizations.

Details

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal, vol. 35 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2040-7149

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 28 March 2024

Nadia Caidi, Saadia Muzaffar and Elizabeth Kalbfleisch

This pan-Canadian study examines the information practices of STEM-trained immigrant women to Canada as they navigate workfinding and workplace integration. Our study focuses on a…

Abstract

Purpose

This pan-Canadian study examines the information practices of STEM-trained immigrant women to Canada as they navigate workfinding and workplace integration. Our study focuses on a population of highly skilled immigrant women from across Canada and uses an information practice lens to examine their lived experiences of migration and labour market integration. As highly trained STEM professionals in pursuit of employment, our participants have specific needs and challenges, and as we explore these, we consider the intersection of their information practices with government policies, settlement services and the hiring practices of STEM employers.

Design/methodology/approach

We conducted a qualitative study using in-depth interviews with 74 immigrant women across 13 Canadian provinces and territories to understand the nature of their engagement with employment-seeking in STEM sectors. This article reports the findings related to the settlement and information experiences of the immigrant women as they navigate new information landscapes.

Findings

As immigrants, as women and as STEM professionals, the experiences of the 74 participants reflect both marginality and privilege. The reality of their intersectional identities is that these women may not be well-served by broader settlement resources targeting newcomers, but neither are the specific conventions of networking and job-seeking in the STEM sectors in Canada fully apparent or accessible to them. The findings also point to the broader systemic and contextual factors that participants have to navigate and that shape in a major way their workfinding journeys.

Originality/value

The findings of this pan-Canadian study have theoretical and practical implications for policy and research. Through interviews with these STEM professionals, we highlight the barriers and challenges of an under-studied category of migrants (the highly skilled and “desirable” type of immigrants). We provide a critical discussion of their settlement experiences and expose the idiosyncrasies of a system that claims to value skilled talent while structurally making it very difficult to deliver on its promises to recruit and retain highly qualified personnel. Our findings point to specific aspects of these skilled professionals’ experiences, as well as the broader systemic and contextual factors that shape their workfinding journey.

Details

Journal of Documentation, vol. ahead-of-print no. ahead-of-print
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0022-0418

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 3 February 2023

Dunja Palic, Luciara Nardon and Amrita Hari

The authors answer calls for research on the experiences of international professionals' career transitions by investigating how highly skilled immigrants make sense of their…

Abstract

Purpose

The authors answer calls for research on the experiences of international professionals' career transitions by investigating how highly skilled immigrants make sense of their career changes in the host country's labor market.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors report on a qualitative, inductive and elaborative study, drawing on sensemaking theories and career transitions literature and nine semi-structured reflective interviews with highly skilled Canadian immigrants.

Findings

The authors identified four career change narratives: mourning the past, accepting the present, recreating the past and starting fresh. These narratives are made sense of in a transnational context: participants contended with tensions between past, present and future careers and between relevant home and host country factors affecting their career decisions. Participants who were mourning the past or recreating the past identified more strongly with their home country professions and struggled to find resources in Canada. In accepting the present and starting fresh, participants leveraged host country networks to find career opportunities and establish themselves and their families in the new environment.

Originality/value

A transnational ontology emphasizes that immigrants' lives are multifaceted and span multiple national contexts. The authors highlight how the tensions between the home and host country career contexts shape immigrants' sensemaking narratives of their international career change. The authors encourage scholars and practitioners to take a transnational contextual approach (spatial and temporal) to guide immigrants' career transitions and integration into the new social environment.

Details

Career Development International, vol. 28 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1362-0436

Keywords

Book part
Publication date: 21 August 2015

Chien-Juh Gu

This chapter discusses how gender scholarship has transformed the study of immigration in the United States since the 1970s.

Abstract

Purpose

This chapter discusses how gender scholarship has transformed the study of immigration in the United States since the 1970s.

Methodology/approach

This discussion is based on a synthesized review of immigration studies and their connections to gender scholarship in different historical contexts.

Findings

Over the past four decades, gender scholarship has significantly shaped the theories, methodologies, and core concerns in immigration studies in the United States. Before the 1970s, immigration research focused on men. Studies of immigrant women began in the 1980s, which not only challenged previous gender-blind perspectives but also highlighted women’s unique experiences. From the mid-1980s to the early 1990s, the study of gender and immigration focused on immigrant women’s vulnerabilities in the global economy and enhancing women’s status at home through employment in the host society. Since the 1990s, more diverse topics have emerged to involve discussion on globalization and transnationalism. These gendering trends in immigration studies have not taken place in an intellectual vacuum. Rather, they have been influenced by developments in gender scholarship within different historical contexts.

Research limitations/implications

To enrich gender-focused and feminism-informed research in immigration studies, scholars will have to build connections across subareas and engage in dialogues with each other. More immigrant groups must also be studied to reflect the extremely diverse make-up of current immigrants in the United States. Intersectional analyses are also needed to avoid homogenizing studied groups. Finally, mainstream immigration research must begin to perceive gender as an essential analytical framework.

Details

At the Center: Feminism, Social Science and Knowledge
Type: Book
ISBN: 978-1-78560-078-4

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 3 February 2023

Ksenia Usanova, Jelena Zikic and Vlad Vaiman

Although the literature on the careers of skilled migrants is growing, relatively little is known about their experiences inside host country organizations. This article is a…

Abstract

Purpose

Although the literature on the careers of skilled migrants is growing, relatively little is known about their experiences inside host country organizations. This article is a replication and an extension of a study by Zikic et al. (2010) on career challenges and coping strategies of skilled migrants. In contrast to the replicated study, where the focus was on the unemployed pool of talented migrants, in this study, the authors look at the career experiences of those who are already employed. Similar to the study of Zikic et al. (2010), the authors seek to explore how migrants understand their careers and what approaches they use to enact career opportunities from the perspective of “insiders” in local organizations.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors used a qualitative explorative approach. Based on 24 in-depth interviews with highly qualified specialists, who were hired for positions in Luxembourg corresponding to their professional profiles, the authors explore what challenges they face at the workplace and how they tackle them.

Findings

This research not only replicates the study of Zikic et al. (2010) but also extends the authors’ knowledge of the careers of skilled migrants in the context of local organizations. By focusing on employed skilled migrants, the authors open a “black box” of their career challenges and strategies and extend an earlier career typology (Zikic et al., 2010) into what happens within local organizations. In particular, this study identifies two major challenges that skilled migrants experience, namely, “trying to fit in” and “managing career mismatch”. Then, it shows three unique strategies that skilled migrants use to manage their careers. This allows us to cluster skilled migrants into three categories that the authors conceptualized, namely “workhorses”, “career rebels” and “career conformists”.

Originality/value

This study contributes to the literature on the careers of skilled migrants by theorizing the experiences of migrant careers after organizational entry. It also contributes to the talent management literature by providing nuanced insights into the challenges, strategies and profiles that this global talent has.

Details

Journal of Global Mobility: The Home of Expatriate Management Research, vol. 11 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2049-8799

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 3 August 2018

Saba Colakoglu, Dilek G. Yunlu and Gamze Arman

The purpose of this paper is to uncover career-related issues that high-skilled female immigrants face and their strategies for rebuilding their careers upon migration for a…

1341

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to uncover career-related issues that high-skilled female immigrants face and their strategies for rebuilding their careers upon migration for a diverse range of reasons including following a spouse, furthering education and self-initiated expatriation.

Design/methodology/approach

Using grounded theory to explore this topic, the authors performed 14 in-depth interviews with female immigrants that fit pre-determined inclusion criteria for high-skilled (e.g. educated, gainfully and professionally employed). The study context of immigration is the USA, and the authors performed interviews with high-skilled immigrants from Turkey – an underrepresented nation in the US migrant population.

Findings

Content analysis of in-depth interviews revealed five primary theoretical themes that captured the career experiences of these individuals: non-linear career entry, career orientation, strong commitment and will to succeed, socialization patterns at work and support network. Integrating these findings with theories on adult learning, the authors developed an experiential learning model of career reconstruction among high-skilled immigrants.

Originality/value

This study contributes to the global mobility literature by developing an experiential learning theory of careers and taking a gendered perspective to the career experiences of high-skilled female immigrants. It answers the questions: what are the individual and situation factors associated with career success among high-skilled female immigrants? and what is the process that high-skilled immigrants go through to rebuild their careers?

Details

Journal of Global Mobility: The Home of Expatriate Management Research, vol. 6 no. 3/4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2049-8799

Keywords

Open Access
Article
Publication date: 3 June 2021

Luciara Nardon, Amrita Hari, Hui Zhang, Liam P.S. Hoselton and Aliya Kuzhabekova

Despite immigrant-receiving countries' need for skilled professionals to meet labour demands, research suggests that many skilled migrants undergo deskilling, downward career…

4694

Abstract

Purpose

Despite immigrant-receiving countries' need for skilled professionals to meet labour demands, research suggests that many skilled migrants undergo deskilling, downward career mobility, underemployment, unemployment and talent waste, finding themselves in low-skilled occupations that are not commensurate to their education and experience. Skilled immigrant women face additional gendered disadvantages, including a disproportionate domestic burden, interrupted careers and gender segmentation in occupations and organizations. This study explores how the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic impacted skilled newcomer women's labour market outcomes and work experiences.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors draw on 50 in-depth questionnaires with skilled women to elaborate on their work experiences during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Findings

The pandemic pushed skilled immigrant women towards unemployment, lower-skilled or less stable employment. Most study participants had their career trajectory delayed, interrupted or reversed due to layoffs, decreased job opportunities and increased domestic burden. The pandemic's gendered nature and the reliance on work-from-home arrangements and online job search heightened immigrant women's challenges due to limited social support and increased family responsibilities.

Originality/value

This paper adds to the conversation of increased integration challenges under pandemic conditions by contextualizing the pre-pandemic literature on immigrant work integration to the pandemic environment. Also, this paper contributes a better understanding of the gender dynamics informing the COVID-19 socio-economic climate.

Details

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal, vol. 41 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2040-7149

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 29 October 2020

Secil E. Ertorer, Jennifer Long, Melissa Fellin and Victoria M. Esses

This paper explores integration experiences of immigrants in the Canadian workplace from the perspective of immigrants themselves, focusing on cultural capital and cultural…

1795

Abstract

Purpose

This paper explores integration experiences of immigrants in the Canadian workplace from the perspective of immigrants themselves, focusing on cultural capital and cultural judgments as factors influencing workplace entry, advancement and social integration in an increasingly diverse work environment.

Design/methodology/approach

An interpretive approach that involved thematic analysis of in-depth interview data was employed.

Findings

The findings reveal that the official two-way multiculturalism policy of Canada is not reflected in the Canadian workplace and that structural forces of assimilation are evident. Cultural judgments and immigrants' cultural capital create barriers for integration.

Research limitations/implications

While highlighting important aspects of immigrant experiences within the Canadian workplace, the study findings cannot generate a fully representative theorization of immigrant employment experiences in Canada. Further studies with diverse migrant groups in different parts of the country would shed more light on the issues faced by immigrants.

Practical implications

The barriers to social integration identified by this study can be largely overcome by improving intercultural skills and cultural intelligence of employers and employees through training and incorporating values of diversity and inclusion into the corporate culture.

Social implications

The factors that foster and hinder workplace integration identified by this study can inform workplace integration strategies and related policies.

Originality/value

Much of the literature concerning immigrants' position in Canada address the economic integration and economic well-being of immigrants, focusing on quantitative, macro level analyses of earnings disparity and labor market segmentation. There is a lack of qualitative research that explores the integration process through the lens of immigrants. Informed by the theories of cultural capital, cultural judgment and integration, the study sheds light on the everyday workplace experiences of skilled migrants and perceived barriers to workplace entry, advancement and social integration.

Details

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal, vol. 41 no. 7
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2040-7149

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 November 2022

Thora H. Christiansen and Erla Sólveig Kristjánsdóttir

This study aims to explore the lived experiences of skilled racial minority migrant (SRMM) women who hold management positions in the White Icelandic labor market and to…

Abstract

Purpose

This study aims to explore the lived experiences of skilled racial minority migrant (SRMM) women who hold management positions in the White Icelandic labor market and to understand how gender, race, ethnicity and migrant status intersect to shape experiences of privilege and disadvantage.

Design/methodology/approach

In this paper phenomenological methodology was applied to analyze in-depth interviews with twelve SRMM women. Iceland provides rich context of high gender and social equality, but limited recognition of ethnic and racial differences.

Findings

SRMM women's self-efficacy and agency allowed them to source strength from their background and experiences of challenges. Through reframing they adopted a mindset of resilience and determination, proactively redefined the context, turned negatively stereotyped identities into positive assets and engaged strategically with barriers based on gender, language or migrant status. In contrast, the subtle and covert nature of racial prejudice in the context of the invisible norm of Whiteness felt impossible to address.

Originality/value

The study provides insight into the experiences of SRMM women who have attained upper- and middle-management positions. The findings illuminate the overt and covert barriers that the women experience on their career journey in the context of a White labor market that emphasizes egalitarianism and gender equality but does not engage with ethnic or racial prejudice. They highlight the role of self-efficacy and agency in deploying strategies to negotiate intersecting barriers and how that agency is disadvantaged by the invisible norm of Whiteness.

Details

Journal of Global Mobility: The Home of Expatriate Management Research, vol. 10 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2049-8799

Keywords

Content available
Article
Publication date: 8 February 2016

Inge Bleijenbergh, Charlotte Holgersson and Irene Ryan

330

Abstract

Details

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion: An International Journal, vol. 35 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2040-7149

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