In my research project, I want to answer questions like:
Do different types of Expats have different stress levels? Do they perform better?
What is their feeling about justice (payment, etc.) in comparison to locals?
I want to ask for your help by filling out my online survey. It will take about 20 min of your time and is completely anonymous. My target is 100 persons, but it is very hard to get them. I need them to achieve my Master's degree in business administration. I study at the University of Bamberg at the chair of Human resource management.
I would be very pleased if you could help me achieving my goal by filling out the survey under this link: expat-survey.de
Kind regards
Torsten Holzleiter
My University wants me to add the more detailed, official introduction text:
In times of internationalization of many companies, working abroad becomes a major part of an individual's career path. Questions that arise are “What are the consequences of my international work experiences for my career and my income development? How do different forms of expatriation differ in this respect? Which impact does a life abroad have on my life satisfaction?”
The aim of this research project by the Chair of Human Resource Management at the University of Bamberg is to learn more about your individual reactions to international work experiences and to derive practical recommendations for organizations in order to improve their career management in the international field.
This online survey is self-explanatory and easy to complete. There are no right or wrong answers. All responses are strictly confidential and your anonymity is completely guaranteed. It will take approximately 20 minutes to complete the questionnaire.
Thank you very much in advance for taking time to complete our survey. Before you start, an organizational issue: Please only complete this survey, if you currently execute your legal work abroad, including a change of your dominant place of residence.
If you have any questions or need further information concerning the survey or the use of it, do not hesitate to contact us at [email protected]. We welcome and appreciate your feedback, comments and suggestions.
Professor Dr. Maike Andresen, Susanne Imhof, Jil Margenfeld, Torsten Holzleiter
Survey is available under: expat-survey.de
Stress and performance of Expats
The aim of this research project by the Chair of Human Resource Management at the University of Bamberg is to learn more about your individual reactions to international work experiences and to derive practical recommendations for organizations in order to improve their career management in the international field.
What, with a survey of 100 people or less?
I will be brutal (please forgive me); the results of your work will be total rubbish.
The sample is far too small and, as always with these things, you're questions are far too limited.
With this one, you're only looking from answers from people in specific groups, you you're limiting yourself even further, so your results will be pointless crap.
Hi mas fred,
thank you for your comment. Within a reaserch project it is necessary to look a specific parts or groups. You have to set realistic aims which can be solved within a certain amount of time. If I had a few years and would do my doctoral degree I think a broader view would be great, but I have 3 more month so I just look und certain topics within a very specialized group of people to be able to make practical implications for this group as well as putting it into a broader context of my research stream.
As you mentioned the sample size of 100 is not much and a bigger sample would be great put there are a few points to consider. First, the time aspect mentioned above. Second, it is even hard enough to get 100 expats without knowing any. So how to get more (open for any suggestions)? Third, with financial support or organizational support from a big company, a much bigger sample size would be achieveable.
The target of a research project like mine is not to explain the whole world but a specific area of interest.
So, thank you again for your suggestion and hopefully you understand my point of view. Despite that I would be very thankful if you could help me achieving my academic goal to receive my master's degree by filling out the survey.
Best regards
Torsten
Holzleiter. What Fred said deserves more attention than you have given it. An MBA graduate should know what is a fair and representative sample-size and what isn't. I speak as an accountant and business consultant of many years' standing. Your OP didn't give any indication of where your sample would be drawn from. That's OK if you specify the source in your dissertation (e.g. 100 middle-class English-speaking expats working in office jobs in the Middle East) - but not if you don't specify. There are tens of millions (maybe hundreds of millions) of persons working in nations not their own, whose jobs range from domestic servants on slave wages to lawyers on a million dollars a year and whose locations range from Mongolia to Malaysia.
You will need to give us a whole lot more information, if we are to help you. What do you reckon, Fred?
I reckon you're bang on.
Time constraints, forcing poor research with way too small a sample group will invalidate any results. It won't even supply an accurate idea of the need for further research.
In other words, it's a total waste of time.
Three months isn't even time to set up the research parameters properly, much less conduct the project.
Stress is, just to really bugger up the project, an individual problem, not a group problem.
You can research a hundred people, all working in exactly the same job for the same pay, even in the same city, and the results will tell you nothing.
Some will have a state of mind that precludes stress, others will have very short fingernails.
Some will have a total <product of unwed parents> for a boss, others will have a great guy to work for - thus their individual working conditions will vary, adding another major variable to sour the results.
Some will love the country they're visiting, others will hate it.
Some will love the cultural experiences; others will search all night for a bar that serves their home country's food and beer, full of people from their home country, never being happy with a local place.
Most of this applies to expats just as much as people working a couple of miles from their home town, so tells you sod all about expat conditions.
Any results will be puerile and hopelessly inaccurate, thus pointless.
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