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The career reality of global managers: an examination of career triggersTineke Cappellena; Maddy Janssensaa Research Centre for Organization Studies, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

Online publication date: 29 September 2010

To cite this Article Cappellen, Tineke and Janssens, Maddy(2010) 'The career reality of global managers: an examination ofcareer triggers', The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 21: 11, 1884 1910

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The career reality of global managers: an examination of career

triggers

Tineke Cappellen* and Maddy Janssens

Research Centre for Organization Studies, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Leuven, Belgium

This study investigates whether the conceptualization of contemporary careerscorresponds with the career realities of global managers, a new type of internationalwork in organizations. Based on in-depth interviews with 45 global managers,or managers having worldwide coordination responsibility, we examine whether theirdifferent career moves are triggered by factors that reflect a short-term perspective,a non-hierarchical course, self-management, and internal values. The findings haveimplications for both the career and international human resource (HR) literature.They highlight that a balanced approach better captures the career realities of globalmanagers and suggest an altered meaning of midcareer experience. They further pointto the continuing importance of headquarters, question the necessity of an internationalcareer anchor, and indicate the opportunities of flexible global work to achieve a stablefamily life.

Keywords: boundaryless career; career development; global managers; protean career

Introduction

Careers in international organizations today are shaped by new developments in both the

career domain and international management. Due to changes in the nature of work,contemporary careers are, in contrast with the predictable, secure and linear careers of

the past, portrayed as flexible, dynamic and fluid (e.g., Arthur and Rousseau 1996;

Baruch 2004). They are presented as crossing organizational and functional boundaries,

being the responsibility of the individual rather than the organization. At the same time,

due to the increasing worldwide integration of business, international organizations

are witnessing a structural shift in the nature of their coordination mechanisms

(Galbraith 2000). Although they continue to rely on traditional expatriate assignments to

manage international operations, they increasingly use new types of international work

(Roberts, Kossek and Ozeki 1998; Kedia and Mukherji 1999; Collings, Scullion and

Morley 2007; Peiperl and Jonsen 2007). Similar to the changes in the career domain, thisnew international work is characterized as a flexible and dynamic way of coordination

(Bartlett and Ghoshal 1992; Galbraith 2000). Together, these two developments produce

the overall question of how careers of new international workers need to be understood.

In this study, we focus on one new type of international work e.g., global managers

whose task it is to achieve worldwide coordination (Bartlett and Ghoshal 1992; Pucik and

Saba 1998), sometimes also called the transnational competent manager (Adler and

Bartholomew 1992). It is our purpose to increase our understanding of these managers

career realities, examining whether the flexible conceptualization of contemporary careers

ISSN 0958-5192 print/ISSN 1466-4399 online

q 2010 Taylor & Francis

DOI: 10.1080/09585192.2010.505090

http://www.informaworld.com

*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]

The International Journal of Human Resource Management,

Vol. 21, No. 11, September 2010, 18841910

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holds for this new type of international work. Through in-depth interviews with 45 global

managers of three organizations in a transnational context, we wanted to capture their

personal perspective on their career reality and assess whether their different career moves

were triggered by factors that reflect recent ideas in career theory.

Connecting contemporary career theory with recent international human resourcesmanagement (IHRM) literature is relevant in keeping the field of career studies up-to-date

by examining a new critical mass of global professionals (Peiperl and Jonsen 2007) as well

as being important to understanding the nature of working internationally by studying their

career issues (Peltonen 1997; Suutari 2003). Although earlier studies already connected

career theory with IHRM literature, this study differs from them in three ways. First,

several studies (e.g., Black and Gregersen 1991; Fish and Wood 1996; Selmer 2005) have

focused on understanding the career issues of expatriate managers such as staffing and

selection, training and adjustment. Such studies are oriented towards traditional career

topics and traditional international assignments, neglecting the recent developments

in both literatures. Second, other studies have moved to aspects of recent career theory

but keep studying expatriate managers rather than new types of international work.

For instance, previous research (e.g., Dickmann and Harris 2005) has focused on

developing career capital from international assignments, but restricted their empirical

study to the role of traditional expatriate assignments. Third, still other studies have

combined recent career theory with new types of international work, but focused on other

global professionals. For instance, Mayerhofer, Hartmann and Herbert (2004) have

examined how flexpatriates the frequent flyers of international work self-manage the

career issues and family and personal demands linked to their flexpatriate lifestyle. Suutari

(2003) and colleagues (Suutari and Taka 2004) have studied career correlates such as

career orientation and career anchors of managers having successive expatriate

assignments.With our study, we aim to address two gaps. First, in the career literature, a discussion

has started on the accuracy of portraying careers as all change and fully dynamic,

suggesting the need to conduct empirical research that identifies a fair representation of

todays career realities (Baruch 2006). In this study, we empirically develop a balanced

approach to careers, identifying which elements of the traditional and nontraditional career

views are combined in the career realities of global managers. Second, in the IHRM

literature, our understanding of new types of international work is until now mainly based

upon conceptual theory and insights from HR managers, leading to several calls to study

these phenomena from the perspective of the managers themselves (e.g., Pucik and Saba

1998; Suutari 2003; Cappellen and Janssens 2005). Our interviews with global managersallow us to further gain insight into new international work, continuing to highlight the

role of headquarters, questioning an international career anchor, and identifying the

paradox that flexible global work is a way to achieve stability in family life.

The paper is structured as follows. We begin with a theoretical section in which we

discuss the international work of global managers and identify four characteristics of

contemporary careers from recent career theory. We then present our methodology,

introducing the three organizations in which we interviewed 45 global managers and

discussing our data analysis process. In the findings, we present the triggers that global

managers experienced as the causal factors to establish a new career move and discuss

whether their careers reflect the flexible and dynamic nature as suggested by recent careertheory. We conclude by discussing the contributions of this study and its implications for

future research and practice.

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Theoretical background

Global managers as a new type of international work

In line with previous scholars (Adler and Bartholomew 1992; Pucik and Saba 1998), we

introduce global managers as a new type of international work by contrasting them with

traditional expatriate managers. Examining the literature on managers having a worldwidecoordination responsibility, we identify three characteristics that focus on the distinct

nature of global managers work. First, a global managers main task entails worldwide

coordination. According to Pucik and Saba (1998), a global manager is someone who is

assigned to a position with a cross-border responsibility and needs to work across cultural

and functional boundaries. Having this type of responsibility, global managers need to

have the ability to resolve complex and potentially contradictory issues embedded in a

global environment (Bartlett and Ghoshal 1992) such as finding a balance between the

simultaneous demands of global integration and local responsiveness. According to Adler

and Bartholomew (1992), global managers must understand the worldwide business

environment from a global perspective. They further contrasted the nature of this workwith the work of expatriate managers, which they characterize as being an interface,

managing the relationship between headquarters and the country they are transferred to.

Second, global managers need to work with and learn from people from many cultures

simultaneously (Adler and Bartholomew 1992). This requires them to be flexible and open

minded towards a multitude of cultures (Pucik and Saba 1998), having a broad cultural

perspective and appreciation for cultural diversity. According to Adler and Bartholomew

(1992), this is very different from expatriate managers who interact with a single

foreign culture for a predetermined period of time. That way, expatriate managers are

considered to become experts in one specific culture (Adler and Bartholomew 1992; Pucik

and Saba 1998) while global managers learn about many foreign cultures perspectives,

tastes or trends.

Third, global managers cross-cultural interactions with colleagues occur on a daily

basis, on regular multicountry business trips (Adler and Bartholomew 1992) or through

virtual communication tools such as video- and teleconferencing. Working with people on

a worldwide scale, global managers need to interact with foreign colleagues as equals

rather than from within clearly defined hierarchies of structural and cultural dominance

(Adler and Bartholomew 1992). Again, scholars have contrasted this characteristic of

global managers work with expatriate managers who are considered to integrate

foreigners into the headquarters national organizational culture (Adler and Bartholomew

1992). These interactions are consequently taking place within clearly defined hierarchies

of structural and cultural dominance and subordination (Adler and Bartholomew 1992;Pucik and Saba 1998).

While IHRM literature considers these three characteristics as specific to global

managers, we notice that this way of working may also occur in a more geocentric or

polycentric approach of traditional international work such as expatriate assignments

(Edstrom and Galbraith 1977). Expatriate managers as well may have a global mindset,

collaborating with host and third country nationals in subsidiaries (Tarique, Schuler and

Gong 2006) or engaging in an expatriate assignment as a learning and development

opportunity that might change their frame of reference (Edstrom and Galbraith 1977;

Shay and Baack 2004). However, as we are interested in studying the career realities of

new global professionals, functioning in the way described above, we have chosen to focuson managers whose responsibility it is to coordinate on a worldwide scale in a flexible way.

This way, we are better able to capture the new type of responsibility in international work.

T. Cappellen and M. Janssens1886

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Characteristics of contemporary careers

In the 1990s, new ideas in career dynamics have resulted in concepts such as the

boundaryless career (Arthur and Rousseau 1996), the Protean career (Hall 1996, 2004),

intelligent career (Arthur, Claman and DeFillippi 1995) and the post-corporate career

(Peiperl and Baruch 1997). Although these concepts have their own specific emphasis,they all refer to a changing nature of careers that is characterized by an increased level of

flexibility and complexity (Baruch 2006). In this study, we refer to contemporary careers

to indicate that we are drawing on the general characteristics underlying each of these

career concepts (cfr. Lips-Wiersma and Hall 2007). Reviewing the recent career literature

(e.g., Arthur and Rousseau 1996; Hall 1996; Peiperl and Baruch 1997), we identify these

characteristics as: a short-term perspective, non-hierarchical course, self-management and

internal values.

Short-term perspective

The first characteristic of short-term perspective refers to the time frame according to

which contemporary careers unfold. Recent career theory tends to emphasize this short-

term perspective when discussing the career moves in itself and the employer-employee

relationship. First, careers are no longer thought to be one long cycle but are suggested to

be increasingly composed of many short cycles or episodes which last perhaps two to four

years (Mirvis and Hall 1996; Hall 2002). In this short cycle, individuals go through the

stages of exploration, trial and finally establishment after which the work is being

mastered (Hall 2002). They initiate a new cycle or career move when work becomes a

routine, making careers a series of ministages across functions, organizations and other

work boundaries (Sullivan 1999).

Second, the changing nature of the employeremployee relationship also contributesto a short-term perspective on contemporary careers (Adamson, Doherty and Viney 1998).

As the psychological contract between employers and employees tends to become

short-term and transactional, contemporary careers increasingly unfold across multiple

organizational boundaries (DeFillippi and Arthur 1994; Sullivan 1999). From an

employers perspective, organizations are increasingly looking for performance on an as

needed-basis, no longer offering long-term job security (Arthur and Rousseau 1996). From

an employees perspective, individuals are increasingly searching for new, bounded

opportunities for development (Herriot and Pemberton 1995; Rousseau 1996) in which

they seek continuous learning and marketability across multiple firms (Mirvis and Hall

1996; Sullivan 1999) rather than professional advancement within one or two firms(Sullivan 1999). The result is a psychological contract with conditional commitment and a

time span of only a few years (Baruch 2004).

Non-hierarchical course

A second characteristic of contemporary careers is its non-hierarchical course, which

points to the direction in which careers unfold, a pervasive theme in recent career theory

(Hall 2002). In contrast with traditional career literature (Rosenbaum 1979) which

emphasized stability, hierarchy and clearly defined job positions for career progression in

which success was measured by promotion and salary, recent career theory (DeFillippi and

Arthur 1994; Hall 1996) suggests that career development is no longer predetermined by a

linear, hierarchical path of promotion. Career progression or advancement has taken

on an entirely different meaning from the one entailing the notion of vertical mobility


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(Hall 2002). While not obtaining a promotion or failing to move up the hierarchical ladder

used to symbolize failure (Arthur and Rousseau 1996; Baruch 2004), the direction in

contemporary careers becomes uncertain. It is no longer apparent how a logical, ordered

and sequential career path may actually evolve (Adamson et al. 1998). Rather, career

development gains a personal meaning including a multitude of potential directions: eachcareer move can be a sideway move, change of direction, change of organization, or

change of aspiration (Baruch 2004).

Self-management

The third characteristic of contemporary careers refers to self-management, indicating that

the careerist him/herself is the agent in determining the course of his/her career. Recent

career theory suggests that organizations need to be aware that they are no longer the

sole owner of career systems and planning of career paths (Arthur et al. 1995; Hall 1996).

For instance, the protean career theory suggests that workers increasingly self-direct

their own career development, taking on the responsibility of planning and managing their

own careers (Hall 1996; Briscoe and Hall 2006). As such, they navigate their own career

which incorporates the advantage of having multiple options available to choose from

(Baruch 2004). In a similar vein, the boundaryless career theory suggests that workers

have the power to reject existing career opportunities for personal or family reasons

(Arthur and Rousseau 1996). This characteristic of self-management is further reflected in

the topics of employability, networks and self-awareness.

First, recent career theory strongly emphasizes self-management when discussing

employability or the extent to which employees are marketable through a high

transferability of skills and competencies (Sullivan, Carden and Martin 1998). Whereas

skills used to be organizationally bound and firm specific (Sullivan et al. 1998;Sullivan 1999), it is now argued that portable skills, knowledge and abilities (Arthur et al.

1995; Baker and Aldrich 1996; Bird 1996) increase workers range of potential jobs and

organizations on the labor market (Hall 1996; Mirvis and Hall 1996). Employees are

therefore advised to develop their knowing-how career competency (DeFillippi and Arthur

1994) to compensate for the loss of job security (Hall and Moss 1998; Savickas 2000;

Baruch 2004) and ensure future career possibilities within and across organizational

boundaries (Storey 2000).

Second, self-management is implied in recent career discussions on networks. Networks

are suggested to be an important strategy to self-manage careers because they provide

information that aids in the workers development of career opportunities and creates acompetitive edge in regard to career advancement, mobility and learning (Sullivan 1999).

In contrast to traditional career theory, these networks no longer exclusively refer to

business networks within the organization. Rather, they are suggested to incorporate

communities of practice (DeFillippi and Arthur 1994) and developmental relationships

outside ones place of work (Thomas and Higgins 1996) such as colleagues, friends and

other associates (Hall 1996; Sullivan 1999). Large, non-redundant networks are suggested

to make workers more successful in seeking jobs and crossing the boundaries of multiple

firms (Sullivan 1999; Littleton, Arthur and Rousseau 2000). Knowing-whom (DeFillippi

and Arthur 1994) therefore becomes an increasingly important career competency.

Third, recent career theory strongly emphasizes self-management when discussing the

high level of self-awareness and personal responsibility (Hall 1996). Self-awareness is an

important strategy to self-manage careers because it allows people to choose meaningful

work that creates both a personal identification with work (Mohrman and Cohen 1995;


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Mirvis and Hall 1996) and psychological success (Hall 1996). As employees take on the

responsibility of planning and managing their career themselves, they will also change

them according to their will and inclinations (Mirvis and Hall 1996; Baruch 2004),

requiring a high level of self-awareness. Recent career theory strongly suggests that

careers, no longer following organizational needs, increasingly become an agreementbetween ones self and ones work (Hall and Moss 1998), stimulating the importance of

the career competency of knowing-why (DeFillippi and Arthur 1994).

Driven by internal values

Finally, recent career theory presents the contemporary career as increasingly driven by

internal values, referring to personal preferences guiding the course of careers (Mohrman

and Cohen 1995; Mirvis and Hall 1996). While the above three characteristics primarily

indicate the ways in which careers are changing, this characteristic assigns a certain

meaning to the contemporary career. In particular, it is argued that the values that drive a

career are no longer the traditional external measures of success such as income, rank and

status (Baruch 2004). Rather, self-actualization, fulfillment and satisfaction are suggested

to drive contemporary careers. The protean career for instance has been focusing on

psychological success which is based on ones unique vision and central values in life that

guide career decisions (Hall and Moss 1998; Briscoe and Hall 2006). In addition, the

values are not confined to work values but increasingly include other spheres such as ones

personal and family life or religion (Patton 2000). Furthermore, employees need to realize

that their internal values can develop across situations and time, leading to change over the

course of ones career (Patton 2000).

In general, recent career theory presents a flexible, dynamic and individualized

perspective on careers which strongly contrasts with that of traditional career theories.Overall, a nontraditional view is presented of individuals who take control of their career

in terms of what they themselves find important; pursuing short-term benefits in multiple

directions through proactive behavior, which is guided by internal values.

Career triggers

The purpose of this paper is to examine whether global managers careers are as flexible

and dynamic in nature as suggested by recent career theory. To do so, we use the definition

that a career is the unfolding sequence of a persons work experiences over time (Arthur,

Hall and Lawrence 1989). We consequently operationalize a career as a sequence ofdistinct career moves or short cycles (Hall 2002), each of them initiated by a causal factor

or trigger through which the person will start to explore a new career move (Hall 1986,

2002). These triggers are values, events and actions in global managers careers that

initiate new career moves (Hall 1986). In this study, we identify the triggers in global

managers careers and examine whether these reflect one of the four characteristics

underlying contemporary careers: a short-term perspective, non-hierarchical course,

self-management and driven by internal values.

Method

To examine the career realities of global managers, this study relies on a qualitative

research design based on a combination of grounded theory and content analysis

(Glaser and Strauss 1967; Weber 1985; Strauss and Corbin 1998). Through in-depth


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interviews (Kvale 1996), we aim to capture a richness of information, beneficial to

understanding the career realities of global managers. Our empirical study started with

identifying organizations in which global managers operate, followed by the data

collection with 45 global managers themselves and data analysis.

Three organizations in a transnational environment

To study global managers career realities, we turned to organizations in a transnational

environment. A transnational environment was chosen because it is characterized by both

a high need for global integration and local responsiveness (Ghoshal and Nohria 1993).

Operating in such an environment requires a global mindset (Kedia and Mukherji 1999)

and global managers who can resolve complex and potentially contradictory issues

(Bartlett and Ghoshal 1992) such as finding a balance between the simultaneous demands

of global integration and national responsiveness (Pucik and Saba 1998). Within the

transnational sectors of drugs and pharmaceuticals, photographic equipment, computers

and automobiles (Ghoshal and Nohria 1993), we contacted three organizations withheadquarters in Belgium: Pharma Corporation, View Corporation and Vision Corporation.

Although headquarters are no longer assumed to play the leading part in transnational

organizations (Galbraith 2000), we experienced in our search for global managers that

people with global responsibility are most likely to be employed at headquarters. We

therefore decided to restrict our sample to global managers at headquarters, minimizing

the influence of this extraneous variance on our research findings (Eisenhardt 1989).

Pharma Corporation is a Belgian headquartered organization in the pharmaceutical

sector that employs 8500 people worldwide. It presents itself as a leading global

biopharmaceutical company dedicated to research, development and commercialization of

biopharmaceutical products. It has the broadest international reach within our study, with

subsidiaries operating in 40 countries. View Corporation is a Belgian headquartered

company in the visualization or photographic sector that employs 4200 people. This

organization presents itself as a world leader in professional markets of displays and

visualization solutions. It has its own facilities for sales and marketing, customer support,

R&D and manufacturing in 25 countries in Europe, America and Asia-Pacific. Vision

Corporation is the youngest and smallest of the three organizations we studied, with 262

people employed worldwide. It is a Belgian headquartered organization in the

visualization sector that has six wholly owned offices in Europe, America and Asia, and

works closely together with another nine distributors in Europe, South America and Asia.

This company presents itself as a leading worldwide developer and supplier of visual

inspection equipment.Although these three organizations were different in size and level of growth towards

the transnational model (Galbraith 2000), our initial contacts with the global HR manager

indicated that all three organizations relied on global managers as characterized in

our definition.

Data collection: global managers

We interviewed 45 managers who, at the time of the interview, had a worldwide

coordination responsibility within the organization and were between 35 and 50 years old.

This age cohort was chosen because it reflects the middle career stage (Hall and Mansfield

1975). As this career stage is characterized by both career experience and future career

opportunities (cf. Super and Bohn 1970), we were able to identify an established career

pattern as well as future career aspirations.


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The interviewees were primarily male, except for six women. The majority of them

(41) were of Belgian nationality, but Indian, Luxemburg, French and Dutch nationalities

also occurred in our sample. These latter respondents either applied for a global

management position outside their home country (n 2), followed their previous

company to Belgium (n

1) or stayed in Belgium after an expatriate assignment (n

1).The average age of the interviewees was 40 years. They held positions with worldwide

responsibility in different functional domains: R&D, HRM, sales, finance, operations and

marketing.

We started each interview by stressing our interest in the respondents personal

experiences in the areas of work, career and organization (Peltonen 1999). We then

asked each global manager a generative narrative question (Flick 1998) on their career

history: Could you tell me the story about your career and the different steps you made

towards your current position? What were in your experience the different moves you

made during your career? Why were they important to you and how did they come about?

We formulated this type of question as it provides a facilitating context to speak

elaborately about career experiences in their context (Riessman 1993). In this way, the

career story becomes a meaningful structure that organizes events and actions into a

coherent picture of the career considering the extent to which they have affected it

(McGaughey 2004). The curriculum vita of each global manager, which was collected

beforehand, served as background information during the interview. The interview

continued using a semi-structured scheme asking questions about: (1) the international

dimension of work, such as Which of these moves do you consider international in

nature?, What was your task within this expatriate assignment? or How do you handle

cultural differences?; (2) individual and organizational career management tactics, such

as Does the organization have formal, institutionalized plans to develop your career? or

What personal efforts have you made to develop you career?; and (3) a generalevaluation of their careers and future career opportunities such as Did you make the

career progress you expected to make? The interviews were conducted in 2005 and 2006

at the interviewees offices and their length ranged from one hour to three hours. They were

conducted in Dutch or English and were tape-recorded and fully transcribed.

Data analysis

The data analysis was conducted in three distinct phases. First, we started by identifying

and reconstructing each global managers career. To this purpose, we relied on global

managers stories to identify relevant career moves. As we considered global managersindividual experience of career moves to be decisive (Flick 1998), the respondents

themselves determined whether the career move was distinct. Overall, we identified 330

career moves which referred to: (1) career moves outside a company context (n 40): a

PhD (n 7), MBA (n 8), internship (n 3), self-employment (n 4), world trip

(n 1) and compulsory military service (n 17); and (2) career moves within a company

context (n 290). In the latter group, we classified the career moves according to two

criteria: career moves were made either within (n 156) or outside (n 134) the current

organization and were local (n 102) or international (n 188) in nature. International

moves include: systematic commuting between countries (n 4), relocation of ones

professional base through an expatriate (from headquarters) experience (n 25) or

inpatriate (towards headquarters) experience (n 6) and a global career move (n 153).

This latter refers to the position as global manager having a worldwide responsibility.

Based upon these types of career moves, we reconstructed for each global manager his/her


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career. It is remarkable that 22 global managers in our sample had never had an

expatriate, inpatriate or commuting experience, exclusively combining global and local

career moves in their career, whereas 23 global managers combined an expatriate,

inpatriate or commuting experience with global career moves.

In the second phase of our data analysis, we searched these career moves for causalfactors or triggers that reflect peoples motivation for change. Working in the tradition of

grounded theory (Glaser and Strauss 1967; Strauss and Corbin 1998), we assigned

meaning to these data observations through constantly comparing data and emerging

categorization schemes. This method resulted in the construction of different (sub-)

categories of triggers in which each category refers to a common meaning that captures the

essence of multiple observations (Locke 2001). For example, we constructed the category

skill development for all interview quotes indicating a career move in order to gain

experience through which global managers could add or improve their skills. In a similar

vein, the category personal networks was constructed, grouping all quotes that indicate

the role of personal networks in helping global managers to obtain a specific position.After a category was named, we studied the data again and looked for similar interview

quotes that would fit this category. If revisited data did not fit well into a category,

we revised the category or abandoned it, rescheduling the interview quotes into other

categories.

In total, we identified 242 observations which we categorized as 15 triggers that caused

global managers to establish a new career move. Taking into account that we reconstructed

330 career moves, this means that global managers career stories did not contain a trigger

for each career move. This can be explained by our interpretation that some career moves

were not triggered by specific events or actions. This was the case, for example, when the

first career move was an arbitrary choice because my father had founded the company and

I just started there, there is no motivation at all or when male respondents were compelled to

join the military. Or, in some cases, global managers did not mention a specific trigger when

they, for example, considered their next career move a logical consequence of the previous

one. In contrast, some global managers mentioned multiple triggers for one career move, for

example when they were quite excited about the international aspects, and the other aspect,

it was a move to headquarters. In these cases, we coded two triggers for one career move.

Overall, we relied on global managers personal career stories to identify a meaningful

trigger(s) rather than trying to identify one trigger for each career move.

In the last phase of our data analysis, we relied on a content analysis approach

(Weber 1985) to interpret how each of these triggers reflect the four characteristics

identified from recent career theory: short-term perspective, non-hierarchical course, self-

management, and driven by internal values. We categorized triggers as reflections, both

confirming and contradicting, of: (1) a short-term perspective if they incorporated a time

frame; (2) a non-hierarchical course if they pointed to the direction of a career move;

(3) self-management if they considered theagent of a career move; and (4) driven by internal

values if they considered personal preferences. When triggers reflected multiple

characteristics, we categorized them into the characteristic most prominently emphasized.

In the findings section, we indicate these cases and argument our interpretation.

To improve the validity of these analytic processes, the two authors each separately

constructed the categories (triggers as well as characteristics), followed by a comparison and

discussion to establish agreement on category building. When differences in interpretationarose, we went back to the original interview texts and our coding to decide on the most

appropriate interpretation. The end result of our data analysis is presented in Table 1.


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Table1.

Dataanalysis.

Quotes

Trigger

Careercharacteristic

Confirming

Co

ntradicting

Iwasdoin

gthatforalmosttwoyears,andIwantedto

moveon

Breakingroutines(n5

10)

Tobecome

aproductmanager,youneededtobearep,salesrepinthefieldtoexperiencewhatitis

andIdidth

at

Lo

ng-termcareergoal(n5

13)

Short-termperspective

IdecidedtotrytomakeamoveleavingFinanceandenteringmorebusinessoperational

Lateralmoves(n5

8)

Iwanttok

eeponworkinginternationally,butIwould

needanorganizationwithalarge

headquartersanddecisionpowerhere

Workinginheadquarterenviron-

me

nt(n5

9)

Non-hierarchicalcourse

SoIstartedquitesmoothly,launchedaproductimmed

iately.Thatwentverywellanditwasfun

andthenIw

enttotheirheadquartersinParis.SoIdidtw

oyearsintheNetherlandsandthenIwent

totheirhea

dquartersisParis,asapromotion.Ibecame

InternationalProductManager

Promotionopportunities(n5

6)

Igotapho

necallfromthisprofessor,myPh.D.super

visor,whotoldmethattherewouldbea

positionhereatPharmaCorporationthatwouldbecom

evacantasheadofthechemistry

department

Personalnetworks(n5

19)

Igraspeda

nopportunitywhenIknewthatsomeonew

asleavinganareamanagementposition,I

asked,prop

osedtotakeoverhisjob

Proactivity(n5

18)

Managing

abiggroupofsixtypeople,sothatwas,whenyoulookonmyresume,missing

Skilldevelopment(n5

18)

Self-m

anagement

Thenthere

wasareorganizationandIbecameheadofthedivision

Theydida

numberofacquisitions,largerandsmalleronesandintheend,in2000Iwasaskedto

headanum

berof,start-upcompaniesinSiliconValley

Itwasaco

ntractfortwoyears,extendableforayear,V

iewCorporationdecidedhowevernotto

Or

ganizationalchanges(n5

42)

Becauseofmyfamilysituation,thatisachoiceIhavemade,thatIcannotmoveabroad

Familylife(n5

30)

Itwasnot

therighttimeformyfamily

OntheWe

stCoastoftheUS,mywifelikedtheidea

Thedifferencebetweenthetwocompanieswasquitelargeintermsofculture

Preferenceforworkenvironment

(n5

27)

Ilikedthe

productandtheservice,typeofactivityand

alsothefactthatitwasagrowingindustry

withaloto

fpossibilities

Iwasaimi

ngforaninternationalposition

Internationalism(n5

18)

Driven

byinternalvalues

Theaspectofworkinginalargeinternationalcompan

y

Sothatwa

sformeagoodmixofcontent-wisebeing

inamarketingenvironmentagain

Technical/functional

competence(n5

9)

Theintentionatthattimewasprimarilytomakemoney

Re

muneration(n5

3)

Ownchoic

e,Icouldhavestayed,butIdecidedafterfouryearsthatIwantedsomethingdifferent

Fundamentalcareer

change(n5

12)


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Breaking routines

The trigger of breaking routines (n 10) is an indicator of the short-term perspective

because global managers explicitly related the experience of a routine to a time frame. Nine

respondents in our sample felt their position to become a routine after having been there for a

certain amount of time. For instance, one global manager told us: it is time to move on asIm doing the same things as I was doing last year. Regular new career moves were

experienced as necessary. For instance, one respondent argued that in global management

positions, the zoom would be typically two, three, four years. This again confirms

Halls theory (2002) that contemporary career moves last between two to four years.

Long-term career goal

Our data revealed, however, that 12 global managers in our sample reflected on their

careers from the perspective of a long-term career goal. This trigger (n 13) points to the

significance of a longer term, contradicting the short-term perspective as suggested in

recent career theory. Our interviewees seemed to have a clear sense of where they wantedto go with their career and acted correspondingly. For example, a global product manager

now working at Vision Corporation expressed how he estimated his long-term promotion

chances in a previous organization to be low:

I liked working at company X, I liked my job there, but I also had the feeling that I was a littlebit stuck in my career. The people that were one rank higher than me all, let us say, startedwith the company at the same time as I did, still young and, let us say, if you start there in thisway at the bottom and you work your way up and go through your career, you get stuck at acertain moment in time in everything you have done and achieved. [ . . . ] Thats why, that isthe primary reason to change.

This trigger also required global managers to be conscious about the next career moveto be taken and increased their willingness to change organizations. However, these

elements of self-management and crossing organizational boundaries tend to result from

the long-term perspective. For this reason, we categorized this trigger as contradicting the

short-term perspective. Further analyzing this trigger of long-term career goals, we noticed

that global managers only started to mention this from the fourth career move onwards.

This finding suggests that a certain amount of career experience is needed before global

managers start thinking about their long-term career future.

Non-hierarchical course

The second characteristic reflects the way in which global managers careers unfold alonga non-hierarchical course. Again, our data showed mixed results. While some respondents

mentioned the importance of making lateral career moves as a trigger, others still indicated

the relevance of working in a headquarter environment and promotion opportunities as

indicated in Table 3. We need to note here that not many triggers referring to the direction

of a career move were mentioned. This does not indicate, however, that other career moves

in our sample were neither lateral nor hierarchical, but points to the fact that their direction

was not the main trigger to establish them.

Lateral moves

First, our data revealed that some global managers (n 5) referred to lateral moves as

triggers in their careers (n 8). This confirms the non-hierarchical course as suggested in

recent career theory as it points to instances in which global managers consciously chose


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to make a sideway move (Baruch 2004) towards a different field of expertise compared

with their previous career move. For example, a global purchasing director at Pharma

Corporation told us how he preferred to leave the domain of finance after his fourth career

move rather than keep on growing hierarchically in this domain:

I decided to try to make a move leaving finance and entering more business operational andI had an opportunity to do this through the management controls of Pharma operations.

For two global managers in our sample, these lateral moves were an opportunity to

move back to a specific domain from which their careers had strayed off, for example

going back to a more operational responsibility for a smaller, in relative terms, business.

Working in headquarter environment

Second, our data revealed that some global managers referred to opportunities to work in a

headquarter environment as a trigger to establish a new career move (n 9). Aiming for

a headquarter environment indicates the direction in which the career is unfolding, in this

case contradicting the non-hierarchical course as suggested in recent career theory

(Arthur and Rousseau 1996). Six global managers in our sample referred to headquarters

Table 3. Triggers confirming/contradicting the characteristic of non-hierarchical course.

Trigger: Non-hierarchical course Quotes

Confirming

Lateral moves (n

8) I decided to try to make a move leaving Financeand entering more business operationalI had done a lot of headquarter-type jobs andI thought perhaps it would be beneficial to meto be closer to the real operational and businessissuesI accepted the position because I wanted to goback to a more operational responsibility in asmaller business

ContradictingWorking in headquarter environment (n 9) I want to keep on working internationally, but

I would need an organization with a largeheadquarters and decision power here

Some positions are global in nature and you arenot going to have that position if yourenot in headquartersI always thought you need to be at the center ofthe universe just to be in touch and have someexposure to the very senior management of thecompany

Promotion opportunities (n 6) So I started quite smoothly, launched a productimmediately. That went very well and it was funand then I went to their headquarters in Paris.So I did two years in the Netherlands and thenI went to their headquarters is Paris,

as a promotion. I became InternationalProduct Manager.What made me accept this, is my urge forpromotionAnd then I got a promotion, and I becameresponsible for the Application Lab, so I wasApplication Lab Manager


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as a powerful environment not only determining what others are going to execute, but also

the strategies or advantageous environment to work in. For example a marketing manager

at Pharma Corporation considered a Belgian headquartered organization to guarantee

international career opportunities, even if he would decide to have no expatriate

experiences any more:Why Pharma Corporation? [ . . . ] its a Belgian company and if you consider an expatriatecareer, its always good to have the headquarters in your country if you want ever to comeback or want to know the culture of your headquarters.

Analysing the timing of this trigger, we noticed that global managers only started to

mention the advantages of headquarters from the fourth career move onwards. This finding

suggests that global managers interest for working at headquarters comes from earlier

working experiences showing them the reality of international work.

Promotion opportunities

Third, our data revealed that some global managers (n 6) made hierarchical moves in

which promotion was the main trigger (n 6). This trigger of engaging in a vertical move

indicates that hierarchical career moves remain relevant in global managers career

realities. In some instances, these moves were the result of organizational requests to take

charge of the division or to manage a large strategic project for the division in Germany.

For example, after having launched a product successfully on a national scale, a global

manager in Pharma Corporation accepted a promotion within a previous organization to

launch the same product on a global scale, which implied that she needed to move to

headquarters in Paris:

So I started quite smoothly, launched a product immediately. That went very well and it wasfun and then I went to their headquarters in Paris. So I did two years in the Netherlands andthen I went to their headquarters in Paris, as a promotion. I became International ProductManager.

In a few cases, global managers themselves searched for opportunities reflecting a

vertical career move, for example in order to manage people. Or the trigger of promotion

opportunities sometimes entailed reference to the characteristic of internal values,

pointing out global managers preference for promotion. However, we categorized

promotion opportunities as an indicator of a hierarchical course in contemporary careers

because these quotes predominantly emphasized the vertical aspect and its implications

than the internal value as such.

Self-management

The third characteristic refers to global managers self-management of their careers. Table 4

presents the data indicating that global managers established new career moves triggered

by personalnetworks, proactivity and skill developmentwhich confirm global managers self-

management. However, the trigger of organizational changes contradicts this characteristic.

Personal networks

First, our data revealed that personal networks triggered global managers to make career

moves. This trigger (n 19) is an indicator of self-management as it results from global

managers personal initiatives to establish contacts that might, for example, serve as job

search mechanisms (Littleton et al. 2000). Fourteen global managers recounted how they


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Table 4. Triggers confirming/contradicting the characteristic of self-management.

Trigger: Self-management Quotes

ConfirmingPersonal networks (n 19) I got a phone call from this professor, my PhD supervisor,

who told me that there would be a position here at PharmaCorporation that would become vacant as head of thechemistry departmentWhat came about was the fact that this person spoke tosomebody else because he thought I was wasting my timethere and I got an employment with or an assignment withanother companyBecause an old friend of mine in PhoneCorp was the CEOof this company in Singapore and he found my name andproposed me that job

Proactivity (n 18) I grasped an opportunity when I knew that someone wasleaving an area management position, I asked, proposed to

take over his jobWhen I applied back here, my goal was to, in fact take thefirst, really senior position in my careerI thought well its probably a good time to go backand kind of leverage or capitalize on my US-experience herein Europe

Skill development (n 18) Managing a big group of 60 people, so that was, when youlook on my resume, missingIf I change my position, the reason has always been that Iwas able to learn something new. And learning somethingnew, for me its a way of increasing my experience thatwill allow me in turn to grow into another position

When I applied from working with global marketing to anaffiliate, my goal was to become better operationally, andunderstand how a big market really functions

ContradictingOrganizational changes (n 42) Restructuring (n 26) Then there was a reorganization and I became head of the

divisionThey needed some folks to come to Germany and help anintegration and growth of business and I was asked directly totake up an assignment in EuropeAnd then again, 18 months after, I was fired from thatcompany, because they decided to refocus on the Asianmarket

Growth (n 13) They did a number of acquisitions, larger and smaller onesand, in the end, in 2000 I was asked to head a number ofstart-up companies in Silicon ValleyAnd from there, until probably ten years later, I mean thetitle changes and things like that but it was really, I wouldcall it, the organic growth of the function, in line with thedevelopment of the companyTwo years ago, we acquired a product from our competitor,and we needed about a year to turn the prototype into aproduct. And midst last year, we started to produce it inlarge quantities and then we experienced the need to developan organization around the product. And they asked me to

do that


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made a new career move through their contacts with people who introduced them to other

companies or alerted them to available positions. For example, a global R&D manager at

Pharma Corporation recounted how his network, and more specifically his ongoing contact

with his Ph.D. supervisor, triggered him towards a new position:

I found that doing fundamental research on its own was not the most satisfactory job to do.The thing which simplified the . . . At that time, I was actually considering going back intoacademia, I was in contact with a chemical professor at the University of Basel, or theUniversity of Zurich, and I was trying to find out what could be the next move to go fromindustry into academia. And at that point I got a phone call from this professor, my Ph.D.supervisor, who told me that there would be a position here at Pharma Corporation that wouldbecome vacant as head of the chemistry department. And I remember that well, I had thatphone call on Thursday, on Friday I called the R&D director here at Pharma Corporation, onSaturday I was on the plane and at noon I had accepted the position.

Analysing the timing of this trigger, we noticed that it only emerged in the career stories

from the fourth career move onwards. This suggests that the career competency ofknowing-whom takes some time, after which it becomes operational in alerting people to

potential new career moves.

Proactivity

Our data also revealed that several global managers were proactive in their career

development. We consider this trigger of proactivity (n 18) to be an indicator of self-

management because it points to global managers personal and proactive initiatives in

career development (Carlson and Rotondo 2001). Self-directing their careers, several global

managers in our sample (n 12) grasped an opportunity and asked, proposed to take over

a job when work challenges presented themselves which offered chances for (career)development. Often, this proactive stance is opportunity-driven as recounted by a global

marketing manager at Pharma Corporation:

That was a three years contract, I prolonged it for a year and then just as I had done that,something happened here with the guy who was sitting in my seat, leaving to Asia, so I appliedfor the position here because it was really the ideal kind of next move for me and you know . . .These kinds of opportunities only come along once every three or four years, so I thought Imnot going to stick around in the UK longer, so I tried my chance and I got this position.

Skill development

Third, our data revealed that opportunities for skill development were a relevant trigger in

global managers careers. This trigger (n 18) is an indicator of self-management because

global managers themselves initiated this development as a means to heighten their

Table 4 continued

Trigger: Self-management Quotes

Project (n 3) It was a contract for two years, extendable for a year, View

Corporation decided however not toAfter a while, Pharma Corporation decided to leave thejoint venture, because it became a predominant financialinvestment rather than an industrial one. So I was lucky thatthey wanted to keep me within the organizationWell, it was just finished, and there wasnt any otherproduct in the company to move to


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employability (Hall and Moss 1998; Savickas 2000). In our sample, several global managers

(n 13) were triggered to take a new career move because of its potential to add certain

skills that were when you look on my resume, missing and creates additional value

for myself.

Organizational changes

Our data revealed, however, that organizational changes also triggered new career moves

(n 42). We consider this trigger to be an indicator of self-management as it points to the

organization as the agent in making new career moves, contradicting the recent career theory

of self-management. Overall, the majority of global managers in our sample (n 33) had one

or several moves in their careers that were triggered by organizational changes. First, 19

global managers referred to instances of organizational restructuring that triggered new career

moves (n 26), for example when the company changed from a product-based towards a

market-based organization or decided to refocus on the Asian market. Such organizational

decisions impacted global managers careers as they were forced to take up a differentposition. In some cases, these restructurings ledto negative consequences such as being fired

from the company whereas in other cases they provided opportunities, for example, when

they implied that, as a global manager recounted: I became head of product management and

marketing. Second, changes due to organizational growth triggered new career moves

(n 13) in 11 global managers careers as they created international opportunities.

For example, because of an acquisition, a global manager was asked to manage a number of

start-up companies in Silicon Valley. Another global manager told us how the international

growthof theorganizationimplies internationalgrowthof my responsibilities. Third,in a few

cases (n 3), global managersreferred to a project-based organizational strategythat implied

a search for new opportunities when the project is finished.

Analysing organizational changes as triggers to new career moves in global managers

careers, our data sample revealed an additional important finding worth mentioning.

The career moves triggered by organizational changes were often international in nature,

which for some respondents in our sample implied a switch from a local to an international

or global career move. Even when not actively aiming for an international position,

acquisitions or integrations for example suddenly made me, it was a Saturday morning,

worldwide operations manager. In these cases, the organization initiated the switch from

a local to an expatriate, inpatriate, commuting or global management position.

Driven by internal values

Our fourth and final characteristic refers to the internal values that drive global managers

careers. Our data revealed four internal values by which global managers careers were

driven, as presented in Table 5. They are, in order of importance, family life, preference

for work environment, internationalism and technical/functional competence. The trigger

of remuneration shows that an external standard remains important.

Family life

A very important internal value in shaping global managers careers was family life

(n 30) (Patton 2000). First, the family was considered an underlying constraint (n 16)

with regard to new career moves. For instance, expatriate assignments were not being

considered because it was not the right time for my family. Other global managers

mentioned this value as a discouraging factor (n 11), for example when it was the

main reason to return from an expatriate assignment or to decide to switch from an


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Table 5. Triggers confirming/contradicting the characteristic of internal values.

Trigger: Driven by internal values Quotes

Confirming

Family life (n

30) Underlying constraint (n 16) Because of my family situation, that is a choice

I have made, that I cannot move abroadI am not saying that it will be impossible for me tomove, nothing is impossible, but my wife is engineertoo, so she has her own career. So for me, the best isto have the roots here in BelgiumThan I had a second baby and it became even moreclear that I wasnt going to travel any longer.So my career became more Belgian instead ofinternational

Discouraging factor (n 11) It was not the right time for my familyI wanted clearly to go back to some stability, also in

my career but in my lifeI still have my mother here, that is something thatweighted on the balance

Stimulating factor (n 3) On the West Coast of the US, my wife liked the ideaWe decided to go for it, to broaden the childrenshorizon

Preference for work environment (n 27) Organizational culture (n 18) The difference between the two companies was quite

large in terms of cultureI joined Pharma Corporation because of its opennessto achieve what you want to doI could identify myself with the company

Sector (n

9) I liked the product and the service, type of activityand also the fact that it was a growing industry witha lot of possibilitiesI was attracted by the healthcare sectorI wanted to go back into industry

Internationalism (n 18) Position (n 13) I was aiming for an international position

It was an opportunity that they offered and I wasquite excited about the international aspectsI did that because it was a worldwide responsibility

Organization (n 5) the aspect of working in a large internationalcompanyI was attracted by their expat packages

Technical/functional competence (n 9) So that was for me a good mix of content-wise beingin a marketing environment againI was exposed again to a mix of finance and salesand business developmentI had an additional degree in quality engineering, soI started looking for a position in that area

Fundamental career change (n 12) Own choice, I could have stayed, but I decided afterfour years that I wanted something differentI prefer to do it a little slower nowI guess I met the objectives that were set in gettingthe product ready to launch, and so my interest backthen was to actually launch it myself

ContradictingRemuneration (n 3) The intention at that time was primarily to make

money


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expatriate/global to a local position. For example, a marketing manager in Pharma

Corporation expressed how he asked for a local position due to the intense travelling that

was required in a global position:

So after a year I asked my boss if there was something available in Belgium to . . . , which still

allows me to continue my career, but also to get a little more schedule in my life and lesstravel. And then I decided after six years, almost six years of intense, intense traveling, that itwas time to get more balance between being home and the job.

In only a few cases, global managers mentioned their family as a stimulating trigger

(n 3) towards an international position. Here, global managers mainly referred to

enlarging the childrens horizon as the most important reason.

Preference for work environment

A second internal value that triggered new career moves was individuals preference for a

particular work environment (n 27). We consider this an internal value as it points to

personal preferences related to the work context of organizational culture as well as a sectorthrough which a person environment fit is promoted (Schneider, Smith, Taylor and Fleenor

1998). First, the organizational culture (n 18) determined 13 global managers decisions

to join, stay in or leave an organizational context. For example, a culture of

entrepreneurship or openness of discussion, of relationships triggered global managers

to join the organization, whereas the experience of having little room for participation or

ideas triggered global managers decision to leave an organization. In other instances, the

sector in which an organization operated (n 9) triggered nine global managers, following

their preference to work in an industrial environment such as the healthcare sector or

aviation and space.

Internationalism

Third, our data revealed that 14 global managers referred to internationalism (n 18) as a

trigger for a career move. Again, we consider this an internal value because it confirms the

relevance of ones central values in life guiding career decisions (Hall and Moss 1998;

Briscoe and Hall 2006). First, the international character of a position emerged from our

data as an important value (n 13) that triggers global managers in their careers. Often, the

underlying rationale was to have international exposure which brings an extra challenge,

extra dimension that is professionally very satisfying. Next to the position, the

international character of an organization (n 5) triggered some global managers.

For example, this marketing director consciously chose View Corporation because of itsinternational dimension:

Of course when I saw View Corporation, the ad, I was most certainly attracted by theinternational character, because well, View Corporation, a Belgian company with internationalfame.

Technical/functional competence

Additionally, the technical and/or functional area of competence in particular positions

triggered new career moves (n 9) for nine global managers. This trigger is an

internal value because it confirms that global managers work values guide their careers

(Sullivan et al. 1998). For example, a global manager referred to the functional expertise

of being exposed again to a mix of finance and sales and business development as the

main reason for the career move.


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Fundamental career change

Finally, our data revealed that 10 global managers made career moves because their

internal values were changing (n 12), which led to a fundamental career change.

For example, some global managers were triggered towards a new career move because

they reached a point in their careers at which they preferred to do it a little slower now,wanted to stabilize or wanted clearly to go back to some stability, in my career but also

in my life. Others decided to make a fundamental career change in terms of their

functional domain for example when they sort of had gone around the equity analyst job

or when their creativity was gone when you were doing this for too long. When analysing

the timing of this trigger, our data revealed that it occurred from the fourth career move

onwards. This finding indicates that global managers values change over the course of

their careers, in which the fourth career move is a critical turning point. Fundamentally

refocusing their careers at this point in time might perhaps also point to a kind of midcareer

crisis.

Remuneration

Our data however also revealed that the extrinsic outcome of remuneration as a trigger

(n 3) still lingered for three global managers in our sample. This trigger reflects the

traditional external measure of success which is income (Baruch 2004), contradicting the

claim that contemporary careers are driven by internal values. For instance, a global

manager expressed that he had the intention at that time to make money while another

one explained that he had chosen to work in Switzerland because of the salaries.

DiscussionAiming to increase our insights on the nature of global managers careers, this study

examined whether global managers career realities reflect the flexibility proclaimed in

recent career theory. In this section, we reflect on our findings by discussing the

contributions of this study and its implications for future research and practice.

A balanced approach to career

First, this study contributes to the career literature by offering insights into a balanced

approach in which neither the extreme traditional nor the extreme nontraditional view on

careers exists. While the career literature has started to acknowledge the relevance of abalanced approach (Baruch 2006), our findings empirically indicate which elements of

both views are combined in the career realities of global managers.

Within this balanced approach, Baruch (2006) argues that from the traditional view on

careers, moving up the hierarchy ladder, high earnings and gaining status or power remain

determining factors of peoples career success. Our findings confirm this argument.

Promotion opportunities, working in headquarters, and remuneration were in our study

important factors triggering a new career move. This suggests that individuals themselves

hang on to power and money, two traditional career aspects. Further, our study indicates

three other elements from the traditional view that continue to exist. First, global

managers continue to have long-term career goals that influence the direction of next

career moves. Second, organizations remain important in offering individuals new career

opportunities. Our findings indicate that it is especially organizational changes such as

restructuring and growth that triggered career moves. Third, this further implies that


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global managers organizational tenure reflected more than one career move, pointing to a

certain bond between the organization and the individual, another element of the

traditional view on career.

Discussing the nontraditional elements in a balanced approach, Baruch (2006) suggests

that people choose organizations which match their own career needs and fulfil theirpersonal values. This study mainly confirms the latter. Compared to other triggers, internal

values were most frequently mentioned suggesting that this nontraditional career element

truly guides global managers careers. Of the different internal values, our interviewees

mostly referred to the non-work valueof family life, either stimulating or constraining a next

career move. Family life as a dominant sphere may be due to our sample as working

internationally has drastic implications for spouses and children (Shaffer, Harrison, Gilley

and Luk 2001). The other internal values referred to three types of work values: personal

preference for a particular organization culture or sector, wanting to work in an international

context, and preference for a technical/functional competence.

Next to internal values, our findings showed the relevance of a short-term perspective,

a multidirectional career course and self-management strategies as three other

non-traditional career elements. Global managers career moves were on average short

in time (28 months) and sometimes triggered by the experience that work became a

routine. They were also lateral confirming that hierarchy, although it remains important, is

no longer the only means to achieve success. And finally, global managers were proactive

in their career development, considering opportunities for skill development as a reason to

switch career moves and relied on their personal network to do so.

Reflecting on the limitations of our study, we need to note that the importance of a

traditional career might be due to our sampling. This study took place in Belgian

organizations with mainly Belgian global managers, a culture in which employment

relationships carry the value of high loyalty (Janssens, Sels and Van den Brande 2003).This strong emphasis on loyalty and long-term security might have biased our findings,

overemphasizing the traditional nature of global managers careers. Future research may

therefore benefit from assessing a balanced career approach in different contexts,

differentiating on high and low loyalty employment relationships.

The relevance of the balanced approach may also be due to the fact that our

respondents were in the age category of 3550 years. Considering the time span of their

careers, these individuals might have experienced the transition from the traditional to the

non-traditional career era, explaining the mix of career elements. At the same time,

however, additional analysis of our findings showed that the youngest managers within our

sample equally valued traditional elements such as long-term career goals and promotion.Further, the older managers were equally self-managing their careers through being

proactive and relying on personal networks. Nevertheless, future research may benefit

from studying only managers who started their careers in the new career era. This will

allow a more critical assessment of the balanced career approach as one can expect their

career realities to reflect more non-traditional elements.

Midcareer experience of reflection

Second, this study contributes to the career literature by reconsidering the meaning of

midcareer experience. While a midcareer experience used to reflect workers perceived

constriction of career opportunity in the narrowing pyramidal structure of the organization

(Hall 1986), this study suggests an altered meaning. Our findings showed that certain

triggers in global managers careers occurred from the fourth career move onwards:


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long-term career goal, working in headquarter environment, personal networks and a

fundamental career change. Interpreting these findings, we propose that from the fourth

career move onwards individuals may encounter a midcareer experience of reflection. It is

especially the triggers of long-term career goals and fundamental career change that point to

moments of reflection in which the established career pattern is being revised and long-termcareer goals formulated. From the fourth career move onwards, some global managers in our

sample considered career redirection, for example by making a fundamental career change

or defining a (new) long-term career goal for the future. We consider them to be radical

moves as they point to a revision of career frameworks. Personal networks and working in a

headquarter environment, also mentioned from the fourth career move onwards, seem to be

supporting conditions, making this revision possible.

Although the data suggest this experience of reflection, it remains unsure whether it

occurred in the midst of global managers careers. As we sampled within the middle

career stage (Hall and Mansfield 1975), we did not study global managers complete

careers in terms of the number of career moves. Future research can therefore benefit

from studying completed careers in order to determine whether this period of reflection

from the fourth career move onwards actually reflects midcareer and how it may alter the

course of global managers careers. Furthermore, future research may also benefit from

determining whether and when this period of career reflection ends.

Powerful role of headquarters

This study also contributes to the IHRM literature by further reflecting on the meaning of

new international work, in particular on global managers. A first contribution considers the

position of headquarters. When discussing the structural shift in the nature of global work,

the literature tends to emphasize equal power relations. For instance, Galbraith (2000)considers transnational organizations as having a distributed power structure. In a similar

vein, Adler and Bartholomew (1992) consider a transnational manager to be someone who

interacts with foreign colleagues as equals, rather than from within clearly defined

hierarchies of structural and/or cultural dominance. The findings of our study however

suggest that this stream in theorizing does not correspond to the current organizational and

international reality. The global managers in our sample still perceived power to be

centralized in one single headquarters. As such, it is the most powerful decision-making

body in international organizations through which the large majority of career opportunities

come to bear. By working in headquarters, global managers found themselves in the

most powerful positions within international management, developing and coordinatingstrategies worldwide, while making the most important decisions in business with

repercussions all over the world.

As headquarters remain powerful, future research can benefit from studying

headquarters influence on global managers careers more in-depth. For example, studying

completed careers might illuminate whether global managers remain at headquarters

throughout their careers or whether their positions at headquarters are a means to achieve a

career peak. In addition, future research can also focus on global managers in other centers

of excellence within the organization and examine whether their careers are different.

International motivationA second contribution to IHRM literature considers global managers motivation for

taking up a position as global manager. Our findings show that some individuals became


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global managers without ever having any previous international experience or aspiration.

In these cases, our respondents were directed into a global management position through

organizational changes or challenging opportunities that happened to be international in

nature. As such, our findings do not support the existence of a dominant internationalism

career anchor (Suutari and Taka 2004).This lack of support in our findings may stem from our distinct approach towards the

global manager. While Suutari and Taka (2004) approached global managers as frequent

relocates, sampled within a group of Finnish expatriates, our study approached global

managers as executives with a worldwide coordination task. As different approaches

towards the label global seem to yield very distinct research findings, it is of crucial

importance that studies on global managers, careers, organization or any other global

aspect clearly define their understanding of the term global.

Even if our approach may be the reason that many global managers in our sample had

no initial international career anchor, our findings raise interesting avenues for future

research. For instance, it raises the question whether the coincidental international nature

of a career move can lead to a particular career anchor, either in combination with other

anchors such as functional competence or replacing anchors such as pure challenge. Future

research can also increase our understanding of the international career anchor by studying

its content more in-depth. For instance, global managers in our study preferred working

internationally with regard to either the organization or their position. Future research

might consider whether such distinction leads to different meanings of the internationalism

career anchor.

Stability through flexibility

Finally, a third contribution to IRHM literature considers global managers flexibility.Whereas this literature emphasizes the flexible and dynamic nature of recent types of

international work (e.g., Bartlett and Ghoshal 1992; Pucik and Saba 1998), our study

suggests that from another perspective, these practices also contain the opportunity to

bring more stability. Considering the trigger of family life, our data indicated that stability

in family life was an important reason to switch from an expatriate assignment to a

position as global manager as this latter implied working from a stationary home base.

In other instances, family life was an underlying constraint not to initiate an expatriate

assignment. As such, a global management position tends to bring more stability into the

family life in contrast to traditional expatriate assignments which most of the time

involves a relocation of the family. Global managers family life is only partiallydisrupted in the sense that children and spouses are left behind in their native country for

only a limited period of time throughout which they can continue their education, work

and social life. In addition, organizations tend to increasingly make the distinction

between when it is necessary to physically be somewhere and virtually deploying

skills and knowledge (Roberts et al. 1998), which reduces the amount of traveling to a

minimum, often limited within the confines of a week. Global managers can therefore

attain stability for their family through carrying out flexible global work for the

organization.

Future research may focus on this paradox of balance between flexibility and stability

in new types of international work. They may for instance examine more in-depth the

individual tactics and strategies to achieve this balance between work and family life.

Or they can study the ways in which organizations support global managers to reach

family stability in exchange for flexibility.


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Managerial implications

Drawing on our findings, this study offers managerial implications, both in the career and

international domain. A first implication is that organizations need to continue their role in

offering employees a powerful environment and position to work in. As our study confirms

that contemporary careers continue to entail the traditional career elements of money andpower, organizations may benefit from providing high earnings, status and power, for

example through a (somewhat flatter) hierarchy ladder (cf. Baruch 2006). They further

may not underestimate the attractiveness of a headquarter environment in terms of power

in strategic decision making and availability of a pool of international career opportunities.

A second implication is that organizations may benefit from actively matching the

consequences of organizational changes such as restructuring and growth to individual

career opportunities. As our interviewees indicated that several career moves were the result

of organizational changes, organizations may consider these changes not only to be business

but also career related. The turbulent organizational environment is in this sense not

a hindrance for a longer term employeremployee relationship, as mostly suggested(Arthur and Rousseau 1996), but, in contrast, provides opportunities to attend to an

individuals search for new opportunities and skill development. Accordingly, contemporary

career management implies an active matching of business changes and training and

development policies through which organizational and individual needs can be aligned.

Third, organizations are advised to be willing to allow radical career moves,

potentially leading to a fundamental career change. As individuals can experience a period

of career reflection from the fourth career move onwards, organizations are likely to be

confronted with individuals searching for other career moves. If they want to retain

individuals and their knowledge and experience, they are advised to show openness for

periods of reflection and radical moves.

A fourth managerial implication is that organizations may benefit from actively managingthe balance of a stable family life in return for flexible global work. As stability in family life is

a crucial internal value for global managers, organizations are advised to support global

managers in creating a stable family life. For example, in return for the multiple business trips

and flexible work hours to communicate worldwide, global managers can be offered telework

facilities to enable them to restore the familywork balance.

Finally, our study indicates that important positions of worldwide coordination were

often performed by individuals having no earlier international experience and/or

motivation. Organizations may therefore need to provide such individuals with realistic

job previews towards the position and its requirements. They may also benefit from

offering them intercultural training in which potential global managers are taught how tosuccessfully negotiate and resolve conflicts across multiple cultures as this is the main

challenge for worldwide coordination. Such intercultural training is preferably also

oriented to the meta-cognitive component of cultural intelligence (Earley and Ang 2003),

rather than turning these employees into experts in a single foreign culture.

Conclusion

Studying the career realities of global managers, our findings suggest a balanced approach

to careers, only partially reflecting the proclaimed flexibility in recent career theory.

Although the career moves of global managers were rather short in time and they aimed to

break routines by making a new career move, the short-term perspective of contemporary

careers is balanced in this study by global managers long-term career goals, l

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