5 Discussion
5.3 Environmental adjustment
According to this research, the professional development service offered by the Hidden Gems was perceived as being beneficial in terms of career support in Finland. More specifically, the career-support was described as a skill discovery channel and support on understanding the
Finnish labour market. Many of the spouses stressed the importance of understanding the Finnish culture and labour market in adjusting into Finland. For example, the participants mentioned that “Hidden Gems helped me understand the Finnish society and the labour market” and “It prepared myself for possible opportunities”. This form of direct support (Vainikka, 2016) was perceived the third most valuable by the participants and refers to the environmental adjustment characteristics introduced in the spouse adjustment model by Shaffer
& Harrisson (2001).
This theme closely relates to the environmental adjustment because it provided the participants with support resources to cope with the novelty and uncertainty of the Finnish society. More specifically, as the literature indicates that, the duration of a stay overseas has been found correlated to positive adjustment (Shaffer & Harrisson, 2001); the results show that all the participants had some kind of understanding of the length of their stay in Finland. This is consistent with the research that spouses experiencing a fix-term assignment establish a feeling of control over their situation, resulting in reducing uncertainty and enhancing adaptation (Ashford & Black, 1996). However, the results do not present a clear correlation between the employment status and an extended length of stay after the participation in the Hidden Gems spousal programme. Although, this research did not seek to find a relationship between expectation and adjustment, the results support the studies indicating that anticipatory expectation can potentially moderate one’s adjustment (Black & Mendenhall 1990; Black, Mendenhall & Oddou 1991; Oberg 1960). This thesis supports Ivancevich’s (2007) research, stating that companies should include the spouses in the selection process in order to take part in the expatriation decision-making process. Further studies could evaluate the relationship between the organizational support programme and the retention of international talents within the host country.
6 Conclusion
To conclude, this thesis enhances the literature on cross-cultural adjustment as well as contributing on societal improvement into the Finnish context. The Finnish population is facing a decline, research says that attracting the best, and the brightest into the country is a permanent solution to reduce the gap as well as stay competitive worldwide. While companies and countries are fighting to become the most attractive places to work and live, the people are forgotten in the process. The talents themselves and the spouses have been found to play a critical role in the decision process to accept, complete and extend international assignments.
The number of couples where both partners are engaged in work relationship has drastically increased in the past years, hence companies must embrace new approaches to attract and retain those talents. In fact, employer spousal support has the potential to reduce the risk of premature return and of complete assignment failure.
Hidden Gems is a new service innovation at Tampere University supporting dual-career spouses in their adjustment into the Finnish society. After securing funding from the European social fund institution in March 2018, the Hidden Gems programme was born. The programme aims to support the employment and to facilitate the full integration of the spouses in the Finnish society. By collaborating with the local ecosystem, the Hidden Gems engages companies in reflecting on internationalization, their benefits and the potential growth possibilities by enabling them to tap into the “hidden expertise” of international talents. This study was set to explore the effectiveness of the Hidden Gems project by examining the participants’ experiences and perceptions regarding the support they received.This study uses both qualitative and quantitative approaches with semi-structured individual interviews, social mapping and survey questionnaire as data collection instruments. A total of 17 spouses taking part in the Hidden Gems spousal programme undertook this two-waves study.
Overall, the findings of this study present evidence that the three services offered in the Hidden Gems spousal support programme are perceived as tools that facilitate the employment and adjustment of spouses. To begin with, the results suggests that the participants have experienced four categories of benefits such as networking, self-confidence, peer support and career support. The latter categories have been found to relate to the three-dimensional model introduced by Shaffer and Harrison (2001). This study provided insight on the type of services that are perceived effective in facilitating spouse adjustment into the Finnish context.
Consequently, we can argue that the Hidden Gems programme can contribute to the formulation of spousal services at the Tampere University.
In addition, this study confirms the role of organizational support in the spouse adjustment, however, I suggest that the effective adaptation of international talents is a synergy of proactive tactics such as information seeking, relationship building and positive framing, as well as receiving organizational support in networking, mentoring and professional development (Asford & Black, 1996). Moreover, this study also confirms the role of network ties with host country nationals as well as non-natives in order to seek informational and emotional support resources (Johnson & al., 2003).
Moreover, the Hidden Gems programme has attracted eight employees at the Tampere University because of the Hidden Gems services provided for spouses. Since the beginning of the development of the Hidden Gems activities, national and international exposure created a interest within Europe. For example, the Hidden Gems was nominated one of the fifth best family support programme in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) countries by the Forum for Expatriate Management (FEM) in September 2019 and is now nominated in the European countries as well. In addition, the Hidden Gems programme won in September 2019 the societal impact award of the year at the Tampere University. Different cities in Finland such as Helsinki, Espo
and Turku have presented the need of acquiring the Hidden Gems service support for their talents, therefore the current government is looking into a way to make the Hidden Gems a national spousal support programme. Evidence is provided here to acknowledge the need of the Hidden Gems to enhance the adjustment of international highly skilled talents into the Finnish society.
In conclusion, according to the spouse’s perspectives, the Hidden Gems provide services that aims at securing employment and integrating its participants into the Finnish labour market.
Two services, the networking and the mentoring, were found the most valuable to the expatriate spouses. The Hidden Gems programme has the potential to scale up within Tampere and Finland. Further studies could evaluate the scalability of the Hidden Gems program in terms of talent attraction and retention tool within Finland.
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