Migrants' adjustment to career: an analysis in relation to Nicholson's theory

Australian Journal of Career Development, Autumn, 2008 by Nithiyaluxmy Tharmaseelan

This study addressed career transitions in view of new environments along with the mobility of individuals across cultural territories. It paid attention to various adjustments individuals can make in their career in relation to their new environment and analysed those adjustment modes in relation to Nicholson's theory of work role transitions. Different clusters of such adjustment modes were identified and their influences on different career outcomes were examined. The study suggested that individuals' adjustment towards their career plays an important role in determining career outcomes such as employment status and career satisfaction.

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Migration is a difficult issue to everyone, considering the challenges it can bring. A change is needed in an individual migrant's career to assure that his/her career expectations are achieved in the new environment. This study intends to address career transitions in view of new environments along with the mobility of individuals across cultural territories. It pays attention to various adjustments individuals can make in their careers, in relation to their new environment. Cultural assumptions can both enable and constrain what an individual is able to do in the environment in which he or she lives. Keeping these facts in mind, an attempt is made to identify the patterns of transitional behaviour and outcomes in new environments with regard to migrants' careers.

This study considered career as an individual's property and managing it successfully as solely the responsibility of the individual. At the same time, the increasing inter dependency of the contemporary world and individuals' propensity to move out of their cultural comfort zones to completely different environments was also considered. In addition, the situation of migrant individuals as self-expatriates (Richardson & McKenna, 2002) was examined, which is a quite different concept from many researches on expatriate employment and adjustment. Cultural adjustment along with adjustment towards career has been the core of this study. It has looked at what happens to individuals when they move between cultures, how culture interacts with individuals' careers and how the adjustment factors affect career success and satisfaction in a new cultural environment. The study also tried to identify whether the level of acculturation has an influence on the mode of adjustment to career. Based on these notions, the follow ing research questions have been developed for future analysis. (a). Is there a relationship between the level of acculturation and the mode of adjustment to career? (b). Do adjustment factors have any relationship to employment status after migration, subjective career success and career satisfaction after migration? (c). Does the employment status have an influence on present salary? (d). Does the employment status determine the level of subjective career success?

Migrant individuals, new environments and adjustment processes

The term migration simply means an individual leaving the territory where he or she was born and raised and going to live in a new environment. Migration is a major force accelerating social and cultural change (Baubock, 1996, p. 9). Many researchers (Abouguendia & Noels, 2001; Lay & Safdar, 2003) have studied the issue of acculturation and adaptation in relation to the general well-being of immigrants in different countries. For the purpose of this study it is important to look more specifically at encounters in the world of work.

Previous researchers (Adler, 2002; Berry, 1997) have discussed the adjustment process in relation to a new cultural environment based on two major dimensions, cultural maintenance and cultural adaptation. The basic dimensions of maintaining one's own culture and adapting to the host culture are similar in both cases. Expatriate literature (Kosic, 2002; Lopez, Ehly & Garcia-Vazquez, 2002; Selmer, 1999; 2000) suggests that acculturation and an understanding of the host nation's culture is important to migrants' success in general. This study is about the specific application of acculturation theory in processes of adjustment towards career. That is, the author seeks to determine whether the level of acculturation has a direct influence on the adjustment towards career.

Mode of adjustment to career

When migrants leave their home countries, a simultaneous change is needed in an individual migrant's career to ensure that his/her career expectations are achieved in the new environment. Migrants' transitions in the world of work can be viewed with the help of Nicholson's (1984) model, in which work role transitions are defined as any change in employment status and any major change in job content, including all instances of 'status passages', forms of intra and inter-organisational mobility and other changes in employment status (e.g., unemployment, retirement, re-employment). These concepts and phases are similar to those in the acculturation theory.