EXPATRIATION, CAREERS AND RESOURCE BASED VIEW: A Critical Study Based on Power - DOI (http://dx.doi.org/10.17800/2238-8893/aos.v1n1p61-78)

Abstract

This study presents eight interviews with executives of the same French company. We interviewed four Brazilian executives expatriated in France (from a subsidiary to headquarters) and four French executives expatriated in Brazil (from headquarters to a subsidiary). We considered in our study that the first situation, in which executives go from the outskirts to the center of power, is not comparable to the second, in which executives go from the center to the outskirts of power. We formulated some hypotheses for each concrete case, which could be confirmed according to the facts raised in the statements. In our study, we criticize some arguments that support learning organizations and strategic personnel management. We discuss that these frameworks do not sufficiently consider the issues of power involved in organizational change and innovation processes. We show that the discourse on learning organizations does not include the power variable – it is a powerless discourse. Our study on expatriation show that expatriated executive’s capacity for strategic action (that is, individuals’ capacity to rebuild their strategic alliances and join the new power games and politics that are part of organizational change and innovation) is a variable that must be considered in this kind of study.