WHEN IT'S TIME TO COME HOME

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 474.

D Complete the sentence

Use an appropriate word or phrase from Exercise C to complete each sentence.

1. At the end of every month companies usually …reimburse… employees for travel expenses.

2. Some people welcome an ………………… because they learn more about the world.

3. In most democracies, companies and large interest groups ………………… Members of Parliament to try to influence government policy.

4. In tropical countries it is important to ………………… diseases such as malaria or yellow fever.

5. Most large multinationals operate on a ………………… scale, with activities in almost every country.

6. Most urban transport projects such as metro systems or light railways receive ………………… from central government.

7. We had to ………………… ten international managers last year due to family problems.

8. Lack of confidence can be a big ………………… to success in most careers.

Overseas postings can leave you out of touch with changes at head office, warns Joanna Parfitt

In 1992, Paul Richardson was delighted to be sent to the Middle East by his financial services com­pany, with his wife and their new baby. The opportunity to be a gen­eral manager seemed too good to be true. He would be able to exer­cise his talents, implement new strategies and use his outgoing personality to make the company lots of money out of local businesses. Five years later he had achieved just that.

So Richardson came home. “My achievements abroad count for nothing now,” he complains. “I am now a divisional manager and work as part of a team. Being a tiny fish in a huge pond makes me feel really frustrated. My career has regressed.”

Richardson blames himself. His success abroad had made him arrogant, and he ignored the need to network and research the new job back in England before he returned. “I wish I had been less naive and had thought ahead more,” he says. “Two years down the road I am still unhappy.”

Andy Spriggs describes a very different experience. He decided to come back to England in 1997 after spending ten years abroad with Shell. He had been finding the expatriate existence “shallow”. Integration with a local community was extremely difficult and he realised that there was “always an underlying background stress”.

Anne Isaacs, a director at Executive Action, a career devel­opment advisor to senior man­agers, believes strongly that time abroad should be considered care­fully and worked into the career development strategy.

“Try to go away for no more than two years, or else you risk losing touch with new developments and your vitally important network of contacts,” she says. “Unless you maintain contact in your home country you will find it really diffi­cult to readjust and reintegrate on your return.”

From The Independent on Sunday