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A decade has passed since Dabic et al. (2015) published a systematic review of the evolution of the expatriate literature from 1970 to 2012. Moreover, the past five years have been turbulent, with many global crises affecting organizational approaches to the global movement of people, particularly expatriate workers. Thus, this article seeks to understand how global mobility has continued to evolve during such turbulence and propose avenues for future research.

In this study, the authors undertook a constructive replication (Köhler and Cortina, 2021) of the systematic literature review conducted by Dabic et al. (2015), informed by guidelines offered by Donthu et al. (2021) for the period 2013 to 2022. The authors conducted a performance analysis of 1,517 academic articles about expatriates and broader globally mobile workers. Additionally, the authors analyzed all expatriate-related special issues published in the past decade and provide a narrative review of seminal works from the past five years.

The expatriation field has grown exponentially; greater attention has been paid to contextualizing research, particularly concerning emerging markets, although the field remains Western-dominant. This analysis stresses the increasingly strategic nature of expatriation at a time when global staffing has become dramatically challenging. Thus, this review highlights the need for more interdisciplinarity at different levels between expatriation and the field of strategy. The authors argue the need for a multifaceted understanding of the expatriation experience.

The authors offer a constructive replication of a bibliometric literature review extended by a narrative analysis to complement a critical perspective on a large set of bibliographic data on the broad subject of expatriation. This addition offers an integrated view of the different themes identified by the bibliometric analysis and paves the way for future replication studies to examine how fields evolve.

Despite being one of the most used dependent variables in expatriate management research, no clear-cut understanding exists of what expatriate success means. Thus, this study aims to propose an integrative definition of expatriate success by providing an overview of expatriate success's dimensions, antecedents, and their interplay.

A systematic literature review (SLR) was conducted to achieve the purpose. A total of 249 empirical studies (quantitative 111, qualitative 50, mixed-methods 17), literature reviews (67) and meta-analyses (4) on expatriate success were reviewed from Web of Science and Scopus databases published from 1990 until December 2021. The study selection criteria followed the PRISMA flowchart steps, and then descriptive and network analyses were performed to identify expatriates' success dimensions, antecedents and their interplay.

The findings show the interplay among antecedents and dimensions of expatriate success across three levels (individual, interpersonal and organisational) to clarify the concept of expatriate success. Also, the study offers a comprehensive definition of expatriate success based on the dimensions identified.

The suggested definition of expatriate success elucidates the “atheoretical”, multidimensional and socially constructed nature of the construct and hence, calls for more “theoretical”, multidimensional and subjective considerations of the term to ground human resource management practices addressed to attain expatriates' success.

This paper provides an integrative definition of expatriate success, giving greater insight into the construct, in addition to critically reflecting on it.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive framework that identifies thematic clusters and their interconnections within Global Talent Management (GTM), global careers and talent management (TM).

In this paper, this study conducted a co-citation analysis using bibliographic data to unveil the intellectual connections and relationships among thematic articles related to GTM sourced from the Web of Science.

This review highlights three key research themes: experiences working abroad, TM approaches and the complex nature of GTM as a living system.

The main limitation of this research is the sample itself. Content analysis based on the co-citation method resulted in some more recent releases being omitted.

The practical implications of the paper include providing a structured framework for understanding the complexities of GTM.

Research into the academic literature in this area is divided into various clusters, empirically demonstrating how GTM and global mobility are intertwined, revealing the need for us to more thoroughly comprehend the social ramifications of GTM practices and activities and the need to further analyse the influencing social aspects in a GTM strategy, like diversity, increased mobility and virtual reality.

The analysis revealed the emergence of three distinct thematic groups: (1) global work experiences, (2) TM approaches and (3) GTM.

The extant literature on expatriate adjustment primarily highlights the role of host country nationals (HCNs) in supporting expatriates during international assignments. However, there is a dearth of research exploring the expatriates’ socialization process in establishing interpersonal relationships with HCNs. Additionally, the pivotal element of expatriates seeking credible HCN sources, fundamental for fostering these relationships for adjustment, remains largely unexamined in the context of expatriate literature. Thus, this study addresses these gaps by proposing a conceptual model to provide a more comprehensive understanding of the expatriate adjustment process.

This conceptual paper draws upon the theoretical framework of social identity theory to elucidate how socialization processes initiated by the parent organization and the expatriate shape the expatriate’s perception of HCN credibility. This perception, in turn, serves as the foundation for building a robust support system, ultimately leading to expatriate adjustment.

The proposed model explores the nuanced dimensions of expatriate adjustment, emphasizing the complex dynamics between expatriates and host country nationals during individualized socialization. This model aims to assess the credibility of HCNs in the eyes of expatriates and understand the role of the institutionalized socialization process. Further, the model investigates the influence of perceived similarity traits in the examined relationship, shedding light on the interplay of these factors and their impact on the expatriate’s adjustment to the international assignment.

The study’s findings offer practical insights for organizations looking to enhance their support systems for expatriates, emphasizing the importance of nurturing interpersonal relationships and the credibility of HCNs.

This study contributes to the expatriate literature by shedding light on the often-overlooked interpersonal relationship between expatriates and HCNs. Doing so opens new avenues for further research, offering a fresh perspective on the expatriate adjustment process.

The purpose of this study is to examine the question of whether the repatriation adjustment process varies with different combinations of duration and purpose of international assignments.

A multiple-case study within one company was conducted based on in-depth interview data.

The authors find that learning-driven international assignments are more beneficial for career growth and receive better organizational support, as assignees are able to maintain regular communication (visibility) with the home unit. On the other hand, those on demand-driven, long-duration international assignments need to have a closer connection (integration) with employees in the host unit and find it challenging to maintain high visibility in the home unit simultaneously.

The authors contribute to existing research by highlighting that demand-driven assignees on longer assignments face greater challenges upon returning home. In addition, expatriates on short-term assignments face drastically fewer challenges than expatriates on longer assignments.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the success factors needed for the development of global human resources from both the organisation’s and expatriates’ perspectives in emerging eastern economies. Specifically, this study focuses on pre-expatriation preparation, during-expatriation adjustment and post-expatriation repatriation.

In total, 23 Taiwanese personnel contributed to this case study. Data collected from the focus group discussion and open-ended asynchronous email interviews was analysed using the content analysis approach.

The results of this study revealed four main selection criteria for the selection process and five desired preparation methods from the organisation and the expatriates’ perspectives.

This study makes two main contributions to cross-cultural related global human resources research. Firstly, this study deepens understanding on the pathway to developing culturally intelligent global human resources for successful mission accomplishment from both the organisation and expatriates’ perspectives based on a three-phase expatriation process in emerging eastern economies. Secondly, this study provides an insight into the best practices that HR practitioners can use in developing global human resources for expatriation.

This study aims to examine whether and why subsidiary-unit managers’ prior international work experiences across multinational enterprises’ (MNEs) home and host countries impact their subsidiary-unit performance, considering the mediating effect of their advice networks.

A survey on 222 subsidiary-unit managers (154 parent country nationals [PCNs] and 68 host country nationals [HCNs]) of a Korean MNE operating in China, Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, Hungary and Slovakia was conducted. The authors analyzed the data using partial least square structural equation modeling, multigroup analysis and bootstrapping techniques.

PCN subsidiary managers with more prior international work experience manage better-performing units due to the strength of the manager’s advice networks across local parties. However, for HCN subsidiary managers, this study did not find such mediating roles of the size and strength of their advice networks in the MNE home country.

This study provides novel insights and empirical evidence about the effect of the length of prior international work experience of subsidiary managers on their advice-seeking networks and subsidiary-unit performance. In addition, it draws on and add to social capital theory about how international work experience impacts dealing with local businesses and the relationship with corporate headquarters.

Chinese firms are winning market share from foreign multinational enterprises in domestic markets. The international business literature suggests that this is happening because these firms are developing non-traditional firm-specific advantages (FSAs). Strategic factor market (SFM) theory provides a good basis for explaining how this is happening. However, it is underdeveloped in terms of analysing unique resources and unique access to those resources by Chinese firms in their domestic markets. This paper aims to develop a framework to understand how Chinese firms have developed non-traditional FSAs.

The case study method is adopted to explore how Chinese firms develop non-traditional FSAs. Specifically, the authors compare paired case studies of a Chinese firm and a foreign multinational in each of two industries.

The authors find that Chinese firms have developed non-traditional FSAs because of more relevant experience, better adapted strategies and privileged relationships. This has enabled Chinese firms to develop non-traditional FSAs.

The authors propose a framework that conceptualises non-traditional FSA development in Chinese firms as a product of superior access to unique and valuable resources in their domestic SFMs.

This study uses a Kaleidoscope Career (KC) approach to explore how UAE women managers experience their careers, the advancement in management and the career models they encounter.

This study employs an interpretative phenomenological approach to analyse in-depth face-to-face interviews with 22 Emirati women in middle and senior management positions across various industries in both the public and private sectors.

This research is significant in uncovering career advancement mechanisms and three career models: “my life is not elsewhere,” “seizing opportunities” and “wholehearted dedication to the country.” These models highlight women managers' pivotal role in UAE's economic development.

This study is confined to a convenience sample of women managers from Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah. While not fully representative of all local women, the findings on career advancement mechanisms and Emirati women managers' non-traditional career paths hold theoretical significance. The results challenge the uncritical adoption of Western career models, highlighting the need to consider alternative career models and advancement mechanisms.

This research expands the authors' knowledge of career advancement mechanisms and models experienced by Emirati women, offering insights for enhancing gender equality in Arab world managerial roles.

These findings open new research avenues to explore Emirati women's careers beyond the largest Emirates and assess their broader economic and societal contributions.

In this chapter, the authors examined expatriates that self-initiate their international work for personal reasons and the factors that affect their departure from an organization. The authors conducted a systematic review of self-initiated expatriation (SIE) and its definitions in order to propose an integrated definition of SIE and model its nomological network. In addition, the authors construct a roadmap for future research directions in the SIE domain. Finally, using a qualitative research design, the authors studied the organizational practices designed to reduce SIE turnover in an exemplary multinational organization. Overall, our contributions are enhanced clarity of the SIE construct and the theorized practice of SIE retention.