Cross-cultural training and expatriate adjustment: A study of western expatriates in Nigeria

Multinational corporations (MNCs) are having difficulty retaining expatriates for their global operations. It is estimated that 10–80% of expatriates sent on foreign assignments return home prematurely. One of the reasons for expatriates’ failure has been cited as the inability of these managers and/or their spouses to adapt to the host-country's culture. As a result, cross-culture training programs provided to employees and their families by MNCs have become crucially important for successful international operations. The purpose of this study was to investigate the impact of cross-cultural training (CCT) on different facets of expatriate managers’ adjustment in Nigeria. A sample of 226 multinational western expatriate managers working in Nigeria was surveyed for this study. Results show that different types of cross-cultural training affect expatriates’ adjustment. Implications for practice are identified and discussed.