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Globalisation increases demand for managers with international mobility and competencies, with global companies recognising nurturing of global employees through international assignment as a key task for the development and sustainability of these global companies (Dickmann and Harris 2005). As international assignments often surround challenging environment, it facilitates learning and growth for the expatriates and therefore, is considered to be the most efficient mode to develop globally competent leaders (Tung 1998). Additionally according to Bossard and Peterson (2005), key rationale for organisation to promote international assignment is to access a global perspective through capitalising on repatriate’s knowledge and experiences. Edstrom and Galbraith (1977) classified organisation’s use of expatriates in three scenarios including position-fillers, management development and organisational development. With the increasing demand for international assignees, the study of expatriate lifecycle is also increasingly popular. However, majority of the research had focused on recruitment and selection, pre-departure and on-assignment component of the expatriation, and little attention was given to the repatriation process (Osman-Gani and Hyder 2008). Repatriation is the process of bringing an expatriate back to his or her home country after the end of the international assignment (Dowling, Festing and Engle 2013). Therefore this essay will discuss the various issues which may arise during the process of repatriation and provide relevant solutions.
Expatriate Life Cycle
Dowling, Festing and Engle (2013) illustrated expatriate lifecycle to consist of several stages including recruitment and selection, pre-departure, on-assignment a...

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