Who's in Charge? An Empirical Study of Executive Staffing Practices in Foreign Subsidiaries

Abstract

This study investigates executive staffing practices in foreign subsidiaries of multinational corporations. Grounded in a literature review of the reasons for employing either parent country nationals or host country nationals in top management positions in foreign subsidiaries, a number of factors influencing the choice between these alternatives are identified. Using a combination of an archival and mail survey research method, the influence of each of these factors is empirically tested with a sample of nearly 3000 observations. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.