INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT PRACTICES: THE CHALLENGE OF EXPATRIATION

Business is no longer limited by national boundaries. The majority of the world's large corporations perform a significant portion of their activities now outside their home countries. As many U.S. firms continue to establish and strengthen their presence overseas, they are also experiencing high failure rates among their international managers. According to a number of recent studies, the rate of failure among American expatriates ranges from 25 percent to 40 percent depending on the location of assignment (Fortune, 1995; McDonald, 1993, and Ralston, Terpstra, Cunniff&Gustafson, 1995). These rates are quite high, particularly when compared to failure rates experienced by European and Japanese international corporations.