The Antecedents of Expatriates’ Creative Engagement
Purpose—This study aims to examine the significance of cultural intelligence and cultural adjustment on expatriates’ creative engagement. This study also extends relevant literature on expatriate management to examine the relationship between cultural intelligence, cultural adjustment, and expatriates’ creative engagement through a mechanism taking into account the moderating roles of psychological climate. Design/methodology/approach—The sample was collected from 328 Taiwanese expatriates working in Taiwanese MNC subsidiaries operating in China (Shanghai). Structural equation modeling in AMOS 21 and hierarchical regression (SPSS 19) were used to test six research hypotheses. Findings—The SEM results indicate that cultural intelligence and cultural adjustment make significant contributions to expatriates’ creative engagement. The results of a hierarchical regression analysis also confirm the moderating effects of the psychological climate. These findings suggest that cultural intelligence and psychological climate can play important roles as predictors of expatriates’ creative engagement in cross-cultural environments. Research limitation/implications—The main research limitations include the use of a cross-sectional research design using Taiwanese MNC subsidiaries in China as the sample and using self-reported questionnaires. Future studies can adopt a longitudinal research design or a case study to compliment the results of this study. This study focuses on the relationships between cultural intelligence, cultural adjustment, and expatriates’ creative engagement through the moderating roles of psychological climate which have rarely been investigated. The findings of this study are also very important for academia and professionals in an expatriate context. Originality/value—This study extends the theoretical model of cultural intelligence and psychological climate based on multiple perspectives of work-role transition, the principle of attribution, and social learning theories. Using a specific Chinese context, the current paper highlights the value and necessity of cross-cultural adjustment for successful expatriation.