EXPATRIATION OUTSIDE THE BOUNDARIES OF THE MULTINATIONAL CORPORATION: A STUDY WITH EXPATRIATE NURSES IN SAUDI ARABIA

To date, research has largely neglected individuals who become expatriates on their own initiative and outside the boundaries of multinational corporations. This study, which focused on 206 non-Saudi expatriate nurses employed in a Saudi Arabian hospital, investigated the relationship of job satisfaction and turnover intentions with four factors: cross-cultural training, protege experience, peer support, and the cultural clusters of the home and host countries. The study also examined the role of gender in the relationship of work attitudes with protege experience and peer support. Protege experience had the most consistent relationship with job satisfaction and turnover intentions, while attendance of cross-cultural training before expatriation was not involved in any of the identified relationships. In most conditions, protege experience and peer support were associated with higher job satisfaction for expatriates of Arab origin. Finally, gender did not play a moderating role in the relationship of work attitudes with mentoring or peer support. These results shed light on the factors that help determine the success of non-corporate-sponsored expatriates and have implications for practice and future research. (C) 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.