Russian self-initiated expatriates in Finland: Expatriation success factors

Abstract

This study investigates expatriation success factors for Russian self-initiated expatriates in Finland. This study may become a guidebook for Finnish managers and Russian professionals to find a better approach to each other. The better employees are adjusted, the better they perform. This study helps Finnish managers to understand the nature and the thought process of their Russian employees better. The employees would benefit from this study by understanding expectations of their Finnish managers. The study concludes with two separate sections with practical implications for managers and expatriates.

The study defines the success factors through three dimensions: the adjustment between Russian and Finnish living and working environments, the liability of foreignness when equally competing with Finnish job seekers on the job market and understanding the difference between both managerial approaches.

There was no similar analysis done before. Global careers became more common with recent years, and a gap in research on management challenges with Russian professionals in Finland emerged. Ten semi-structured interviews were conducted with nine English- and Finnish-speaking Russian specialists and one worker. The practical implication for managers is that support with adjustment and clarity of tasks contribute into the expatriation success the best. The practical implication for expatriates is that carefully defined expatriation strategy and immersion into the society produce fruitful results. A significant finding was that Finnish tertiary education and previous foreign work experience give better professional job opportunities than fluency in the Finnish language.