Expatriate management and national culture: a bibliometric study of prolific, productive, and most cited authors and institutions

Abstract

This is a bibliometric study of reference literature related to the influence of national culture issues on expatriate management. It is based on publications in elite Management, International Business, and Human Resource academic journals between 2000 and 2012. The database comprises 222 articles involving 368 authors and 223 academic institutions. The analysis uses a broad scoring procedure that includes: (I) scholars and institutions’ productivity in terms of number of publications (both, total and adjusted), (II) authors and institutions’ productivity in terms of potential impact based on journals’ performance (a wide spectrum of different metrics is used in order to allow for alternative perspectives), and (III) a citation analysis. The use of multiple and diverse scores provides a comprehensive understanding of the ranking of academic institutions and scholars within this particular subfield of research. In addition, the article analyzes collaborative research patterns, expected institutional influence in the near future, and main issues to be included in the field’s research agenda.

Keywords:

• Expatriate
• culture
• bibliometric study
• citation analysis

Notes

1. The reason that underlies the choice of 2000 as the first year of the period is that some journals particularly relevant for our study were not included in JCR/Eigenfactor lists and/or the Scopus database prior to the 2000s (e.g. Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources, Human Resource Development Quarterly, Human Resource Management Journal, Human Resource Management Review). Our choice of 2012 as the last year of the period is due to requirements relative to the citation analysis, as it needs a lag period in order to provide enough time for an article to be cited.

2. This type of articles can be considered to be validated knowledge (Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Bachrach, & Podsakoff, 2005; Ramos-Rodríguez & Ruíz-Navarro, 2004). Conversely, editorials, comments, book chapters, etc. are often not reviewed under the same competitive review process as regular articles.

3. Just to give some specific examples that help to contextualize our search, see Chan, Shaffer, and Snape (2004), Dickmann and Harris (2005), Doherty and Dickmann (2009), Lauring and Selmer (2010), Lazarova and Caligiuri (2002), and Parry, Dickmann, and Morley (2008).

4. The total number of pages per article was standardized based on a conversion factor using the average number of pages in IJHRM’s articles.

5. A slight percentage of authors (lower than 3%) showed a multiple institutional affiliation; full credit was given to each institution.

6. A review of collaborative patters in a wide range of scientific fields can be found in Glänzel (2001).

7. See, among others, Bergstrom (2007), Bergstrom, West, and Wiseman (2008). Colledge et al. (2010), González-Pereira, Guerrero-Bote, and Moya-Anegón (2010), Guerrero-Bote and Moya-Anegón (2012), Moed et al. (2012), Sicilia, Sánchez-Alonso, and García-Barriocanal (2011), and Waltman, van Eck, van Leeuwen, and Visser (2013).

8. Cross Cultural Management: 2000–2009, Human Resource Development Quarterly: 2000. Human Resource Management Journal: 2000, and Management International Review: 2000–2004.

9. Unfortunately, one of these outstanding scholars has recently passed away.