Repatriation & reverse culture shock

The excitement of returning home after several years on an overseas assignment is sometimes frustrated by the unexpected nature of what awaits expatriates and their families: reverse culture shock. The difficulties of reintegration into the person's native culture are usually a real surprise: coming home should be easier than going abroad in the first place. However, the stages of acculturation that took place when employees were posted abroad are no less relevant when they return home. This process of repatriation and the experience of reverse culture shock apply equally to the return to the office and the factory as to the return to family and friends. Honeymoon: the sharing of the foreign experience through photographs and stories, first glow of seeing family and old friends, the re-acquaintance with familiar products (food and drink, in particular) and services, the familiar surroundings of landscape and architecture that have been sorely missed, the return to the old working environment and colleagues. Negotiation: the greater awareness of the differences (good and bad) between home and the foreign country, the realization that some aspects of home are not as attractive as they seemed to be from a distance, the impact of the family of having to re-adjust to home life (perhaps in a smaller house, without domestic servants, without access to the social life and sports clubs abroad, starting again at school, and so on), the understanding that working practices in the company and the relations with colleagues have changed in unexpected ways. Adjustment: the period of re-settling into the different routines and paces of home life and work, the return to a more normal acceptance of the virtues and vices of being back home, the realization that the 'alien' aspects of being back home are becoming less foreign, the acceptance that the career progression in the company is now back on track. For many people who have had expatriate experience, they find coming home stranger than having been sent abroad. In some cases, they never settle down in their own country and become 'eternal expatriates'. These people find international assignments and an international way of life more appealing than being at home. Managers returning to their MNE's company headquarters often find that the organizational structures have moved in such a way that their success abroad is not regarded as highly as they expected. In terms of career progression and promotion,

they reach the conclusion that their time might have been more profitably spent in a lesser role at home than in the possibly grander position they held on their foreign assignment. For any ambitious manager, it is worth considering the relative benefits of international assignments versus the job back at the ranch. Further references