Abstract

Psychological contract dimensions of expatriate employees in Chinese transnational enterprises

Author(s): Zhang Shi-bin, Zhao Yong

Study on what the psychological contract dimensions of employees are in overseas Chinese enterprises is till a blank. To clarify dimensions of employees’ psychological contract in Chinese transnational enterprises would provide theoretical support and practical guidance for the innovation of human resource management of overseas China enterprises and has important significance in the aspects of both theory and practice. Using a sample which consists of 233 overseas staff from 8 Chinese transnational enterprises in South Africa and Zimbabwe, this paper studies the substance and construct of their psychological contracts. The results show that both enterprise’s obligations to employees and employee’s obligations to enterprises in psychological contracts of expatriate employee’s abroad, consist of transaction obligation, relation obligation and development obligation. The relations between employees and their corporation, and the relations among employee’s obligations are different from the employees’ psychological contract in Chinese local enterprises, which are discussed in detail