Practical Applications and Recommendations for HR and OD Professionals in the Global Workplace_7 pot

Regardless of where she isbased, she will need to have experience with, and work well with,many different nationalities.. So for these reasons—theimportance of getting it right with the

CEO, an American CPO, and a Chinese CFO, and it will be listed

on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange’’ (p 210)

Another reason to think hard about global selection processes

is that there are employees in MNCs who may be based locallybut act globally—that is, interact extensively (beyond just on thephone) with other cultures in terms of both internal and externalclients This may be, for example, the French national who isresponsible for the Southern Hemisphere of an energy companyand spends much of her time on the road She will deal extensivelywith Asians, South Americans, and Africans, including many ofthe different cultures in those regions Regardless of where she isbased, she will need to have experience with, and work well with,many different nationalities

Clearly, this will require significant travel Indeed, Welchand Worm (2006) indicate that the issue of IBTs (InternationalBusiness Travelers) has been under researched They quote anAustralian executive as saying: ‘‘On average, I would go to Asiafor two weeks and come back, go to the U.S for two weeks andcome back, go to Europe for two weeks and come back And thenext time I went to Asia [I would] probably go to a differentpart of it I guess I was away—if you accumulated it—for 8 to

9 months of the year’’ (p 283) Such a lifestyle will certainlyinvolve dealing with other nationalities and cultures on a regular,

if short-term, basis One of the authors worked with a directorwho manages a country in Asia by flying from the United Statesevery two weeks to spend two weeks ‘‘in country.’’ This went onfor years

Aside from the IBTs, however, there are people in many, if notmost, MNCs, who travel routinely and are thus required to dealwith many different cultures In regions like Asia where countriesare relatively close to each other, traveling from one country toanother for a meeting is relatively common for a growing subset

of employees For those who do not travel, moreover, the use ofvideoconferencing is growing, which enables nearly anyone in thecompany to interface with counterparts in different offices Many

of these are expatriates who have been living in the region for

a relatively short time but are required to routinely interact withmany different cultures

Employees will certainly need intercultural skills as the worldgrows ‘‘flatter’’ and labor pools begin to flow into each other,creating what might be termed the labor ‘‘ocean.’’ At present, it isnot unheard of to search globally for a key position, though this

is probably more likely for quite senior-level positions This trendwill likely continue and intensify in the future as more positions areopened to international competition As Lowe, Milliman, de Cieri,and Dowling (2002) put it: ‘‘The traditional factors of production(capital, technology, raw materials and information) are increas-ingly fungible, with employee quality the only sustainable source

of competitive advantage to developed country multinationals’’(p 46) MNCs are seeing this as well A representative of Procter

& Gamble said in 2003: ‘‘PnG feels that changes in candidatedemographics and skills as well as their mobility are creating moreintra-regional staffing issues that they must address Companiesthat do not address these changes will lose out on the global talentpool being created In some ways, PnG feels that they have littlechoice in becoming more global’’ (Wiechmann et al., 2003, p 80).Some dispute the notion of a growing number of transnation-als (TNs) Forster (2000) holds that even the traditional expatriatewill become a rarity in the future, given better technology andthe high costs of those types of postings Moreover, he notesthat they are realizing that they don’t necessarily get better jobswhen they come home and often have trouble readjusting In fact,

he says, the requirements for globe-trotting international agers are so harsh that very few even have the psychological vigor

man-to deal with ‘‘the personal and professional disruption that ular international relocations would entail’’ (p 138) The result

reg-of all this, he claims, will be shorter postings, more encing, and less need for the ‘‘old type of continual ‘hands-on’assignments’’ (p 138) Although the expats of the future will beendangered, he holds, TNs are already so rare that they may noteven exist

videoconfer-However, nine years after this study was published, thenumbers of expats are higher than ever and there is indeedevidence that their presence is still required (Brookfield GlobalRelocation Services, 2008) In Hong Kong, though the numbers

of expats dropped from a high of 9.6% of the total population

to 6.7% in 2001, they are again rising, reaching 7.1% in 2007

(Kingsbury, 2009) The dips in the early 2000s may reflect boththe economy at the time and the fact that ‘‘hardship postings’’have decreased—companies are less willing to pay large amountsfor expats to move to countries that are no longer considereddifficult to live in, such as China (Brookfield, 2008) It is clear,however, that the trend is toward more, rather than fewer expats.

In addition, indirect evidence for the growth in numbers ofTNs can be found in the observation that many people do not

do well when they return home (see Forster, 1994) This suggeststhat staying abroad might be the antidote to the reverse cultureshock experienced by some expats If they lack the challenge andexcitement they had when abroad, why go home?

It is clear, then, that expats will be a continuing (and likelyincreasing) part of the global economy So for these reasons—theimportance of getting it right with the HIPOs, strong socialnetworks, the increasing diversity of employees, the need forthose willing to travel and work among different cultures, andthe increasing fungibility of labor, it will be ever more important

to do effective global selection as time goes on And this usuallymeans selecting for those who are able to deal with more thanone culture, among other competencies

Types of Global Selection

Perkins and Shortland (2006) break international careers intothree different types The first is the ‘‘Parent’’ (as in ParentCountry), or the typical expat role, where the employee is deployedfor a time in a different country but eventually returns to thecountry from which she left The ‘‘Domestic’’ is someone whomay leave the home country for a quick project or two but largelystays in the home country ‘‘Transnational’’ staff, however, arethose who join the MNC from any given country and ‘‘whoseprofessional skills may be used in a variety of markets; who acceptthat their next posting location cannot be predicted, take this as

a condition of employment, and have no preconceptions aboutwhere they might conclude their career’’ (Perkins & Shortland,

p 88) Perhaps the most valuable of these transnationals arethe ‘‘gold collar’’ workers—those who are ‘‘highly skilled andhighly sought-after employees with advanced degrees from other

countries who’ve done research in technical fields’’ (Briscoe &Shuler, 1995, p 233) These are the ‘‘new, global manager—onewho can do more than one job, in more than one language in morethan one country or culture’’ (Briscoe & Shuler, p 232) It should

be clear that TNs are also expatriates in the traditional sense, asthey live outside their home country However, only a subset ofexpatriates are TNs, as most expats go home after one overseasassignment, whereas TNs go on to further overseas assignments,possibly throughout their careers Suutari (2003) notes that theircareers often involve short stays at home in between internationalassignments and that these managers often were interested ininternational careers from the early stages of their working lives.Given these differences, global selection may be different fromthe more straightforward expat selection In the latter, a person

is selected from the home country to spend a limited time period

in the (single) host country (Caliguri, 2000) after which she isexpected to return to the home country An employee is sentabroad for a variety of reasons Caliguri and Paul (2010) notethat this can be for: (1) filling a technical skill gap in the hostcountry, (2) development of high potentials where the goal is todevelop not only technical, but also intercultural and professionalcompetencies, and (3) strategic or executive assignments wheresenior leaders are sent to the host country to either fill a functionalgap, such as running a joint venture, or to further develop them

as global leaders

With these goals in mind, narrowing the field of candidatesfor expat roles becomes relatively easy For the first issue, alltechnical experts in the parent company should be considered.For the second and third reasons, the pool of candidates to choosefrom should be fairly circumscribed—companies generally haverelatively few HIPOs and senior executives, as noted For eachgroup, those who have no interest in going abroad can quickly

be weeded out Once the pool is narrowed to a few candidates,targeted selection measures can be implemented

The selection for TNs, however, may be more difficult.although there is some overlap between expatriate and transna-tional employees (for example, both go overseas and both arerequired to deal with other cultures) there are real differencesbetween the two Cerdin and Bird (2008) point out that expatriate

experiences are usually a one-off period in a given career.Transnationals, by contrast, ‘‘have pursued a large portion oftheir careers in an international arena’’ (Cerdin & Bird, p 208);Expatriates have been studied extensively, but TNs are relativelyless well studied, though they have grown in numbers recently(Cerdin & Bird, 2008) Adler and Bartholomew (1992) summa-rize some of the differences between the TN and expat manager

in Table 6.1

Caliguri and Tarique (2006) point out that the literature

on expatriate selection suggests that there are three ways this

is usually done—realistic previews, self-selection, and candidateassessment Vance and Paik (2006), on the other hand, suggest apsychometric approach, an experiential approach, and a clinicalrisk assessment approach

But for those who are needed as TNs, the selection processwould seemingly be more difficult Beyond what would be required

Table 6.1 Differences Between Expat Managers

and Transnational Managers.

Competency Expat Manager Transnational Manager Global

perspectives

Focuses on a single country and manage relationships between

HQ and other country

Understands worldwide business environment from

adaptation

Works with people from given foreign cultures sequentially

Works with people from many cultures

simultaneously Cross-cultural

interaction

Adapts to living in a foreign culture

Adapts to living in many foreign cultures

Collaboration Uses cross-cultural

interaction skills when

on assignment

Uses cross-cultural skills on

a daily basis throughout his career

for an expatriate, TNs are expected to stay abroad for long periods

of time— some for their whole career It is rare that a youngmanager would say, ‘‘Yes, I not only want to move abroad for oneyear, but I’d love to go abroad for many years and perhaps onlyreturn home permanently when I retire.’’ How would he knowthat he wants to go abroad for so long when really, he barelyknows his job at home! One way that companies get aroundthis obstacle is to send young managers and technical specialistsabroad early in their careers, for shorter periods Perkins andShortland (2006) note that this has long been done among oilcompanies This helps acclimate the managers to traveling andgets them acquainted with the challenges of managing acrosscultures For some, this will prove harrowing and they will want tostay home after one trip or, worse, cut their assignment short Forothers, the experience will be exhilarating and they may spendlonger and longer periods abroad until they do not come home

at all between postings or perhaps until they retire

This de facto self-selection is similar to Caliguri and Tarique’sdefinition of self-selection (2006), but they note that a more formaltechnique may involve a self-assessment method where the can-didates assess their own fit for an international assignment based

on aspects such as personality, career and family preferences, aswell as their own characteristics Many people know whether theywant to go abroad and whether they would be willing to bravethe challenges they would face; a more formal self-selection helpsthose who do not have their minds made up

Candidates for transnational positions would certainly have

to think about all the issues considered by an expat, such as theimpact of constant travel on their careers, their families, and theirpost-work life In addition, beyond what expats will have to face,TNs will have to deal with a multitude of nationalities as they movefrom country to country as noted above and must fit into eachcountry well enough to manage the locals (that is, host countrynationals) and expats (who may be from the same or differentcountries from that of the TN) This would put additional strain

on the family as well as the person himself For example, movingbetween countries every few years makes it difficult for the children

to fit into schools (particularly when there is a language gap andinternational schools are unavailable) and for the trailing spouse

who has to adjust the household to new cultural mores, possiblywhile finding a job himself In addition, if the TN has to traveloften from the host country, the comings and goings can upsetthe rhythm of the family life.

When selecting TNs, instead of approaching it from the tional HRM way of seeing who will ‘‘make it’’ over there withoutfailing and coming back early, it might be worthwhile to considerwho will bring the most value back Cerdin and Bird (2008) out-line three types of knowledge generated through international

tradi-careers: knowing how, whom, and why Knowing why refers to

understanding the reasons the organization has made key moves

in the past (such as locating a factory in one country versus

another) Knowing how and knowing whom are both aspects of the

employee’s experience that the organization can take advantage

of as a return on the investment of sending them abroad ing how refers to gaining capabilities, such as learning how the organization works globally Knowing whom refers to gains in social

Know-capital as the expatriate manager (or TN) makes many new tacts both in the home country and the host country This giveshim more access to information among other benefits, which, ifused effectively, can significantly help the organization

con-With this in mind, it is clear that the organization will requireemployees who are sent abroad to have competencies in learning

in general and in socializing in particular As Atul Vashistha, theCEO of a consulting firm that helps U.S organizations outsource,says, ‘‘You have to be skillfully adaptable and socially adaptable’’(Friedman, 2005, p 239) Both expats and TNs will need theseskills, but TNs will need them at higher levels They will have

to adapt to more cultures successfully enough to be able to

socialize effectively with people from those cultures and bring

that knowledge to bear on making the organization run moresmoothly In fact, if the TN candidate is not interested in sharingher knowledge with others upon returning (or when questioned

by others) then she should not be selected This adds anothercompetency to the mix—a coaching orientation These criteriafor selection suggest that there are other aspects that must beconsidered for TNs, beyond what some have suggested are keyperformance indicators (KPIs) for expats Expat KPIs include, forexample, completion of the assignment, cross-cultural adjustment,

and job performance (Caligiuri, 2000) For TNs, we should add:higher levels of a learning and coaching focus, a strong interest insocializing, extraordinary adaptability, a very clear self-knowledge,and strong language skills.

Mesmer-Magnus and Viswesvaran (2008) review a number ofcharacteristics that have been researched regarding success

of expats These include the Big Five factors of personality,views of the host country managers, and general mental ability(GMA) The latter is expected to be more important as jobcomplexity increases—as an expat position is likely to be muchmore complex in terms of the variables to consider for successthan a similar domestic position For a TN, the complexity should

be greater, given the higher number of cultures to navigate, so it

is likely that TNs will need a higher level of GMA as well

Selecting Transnationals

In terms of the processes needed to select TNs, several erations must be noted First, when considering selection for aparticular role, considerations of what special skills that role mightentail should be investigated This can be done through a job anal-ysis or competency modeling process Job analysis is defined byGatewood and Feild (2001) as ‘‘a purposeful, systematic processfor collecting information on the important work-related aspects

consid-of a job’’ (p 269) It should be noted that one consid-of the authors’experience in Asia is that very few companies do job analyses in theregion The process is either not understood, not valued, or seen

as taking far too long for jobs that may change at any moment.Currently even in countries where the utility of job analysis as it

is now practiced is being questioned, the issues are around thechanging nature of jobs and the increasing need for aspects such

as teamwork or personality variables (Gatewood & Feild, 2001) It

is recognized that for lower-level jobs such as manufacturing linepositions, job analysis may be relevant But as one goes up themanagerial ladder, jobs are harder to quantify in job analysis terms(Gatewood & Feild, 2001) In fact, for international jobs, this may

be even more true It is hard to capture every KSAO (Knowledge,Skills, Abilities, and Other) characteristic necessary to be a sales-person in another context Should one include KSAOs for tasks

such as ‘‘drinking with customers’’ or ‘‘dealing with bribes thatare offered’’? In some cultures, these are realistic situations thatemployees must deal with effectively.

A more acceptable (to companies) approach in Asia, at least,

is the concept of the competency model The use of tency models is becoming more accepted in the region and iseasier to understand from a manager’s perspective Moreover,they are more flexible By identifying general constructs thatall managers need (leaving aside technical competence) it is amore efficient way to measure and select candidates Lievensand Thornton (2005) point out three advantages of competencymodeling, including aligning job performance with clear orga-nizational goals, broadening the definitions to include job setsrather than individual positions, and gaining acceptance fromsenior managers and executives Though some may say that this

compe-is closer to Puerile Science than Pragmatic Science in Anderson,Lievens, van Dam, and Ryan’s typology (2004), it is certainly betterthan nothing, which is what some organizations (generally local

or SME ones) present with when asked on what they base theirselection process

The second consideration when selecting TNs is that theassessors must be aware of cultural differences The same Shellmanager quoted previously states that the company ensures thatthey have a diverse set of assessors who can understand behav-iors they see from different cultures Some organizations requestoutside contractors from different regions to assist with globalassessment processes as a way to show their employees that there

is at least an awareness of the need to represent different culturalgroups (J Stempfle, personal communication, August 6, 2009) Inany case, the assessors must be able to interpret behaviors based

on cultural context and ensure that those selected will be able tosuccessfully deal with people in a number of different cultures.Third, the tools must be cross-culturally relevant and fair(Sparrow et al., 2004) The following section will focus on develop-ing and using tools that fairly assess competencies across cultures

Designing Fair Tools—Testing

Although there are a variety of activities that can be used to assessand select TN candidates, from sending them to the host country

to doing a clinical assessment, to talking with their families (seeVance and Paik, 2006; Briscoe and Schuler, 2004; Perkins andShortland, 2006), we will focus here on two methods of selection,standardized testing and assessment centers The reasons for thisare twofold: both are used extensively as part of internationalhuman resource consulting firm selection systems, and each hasbeen shown to be valid in domestic contexts through voluminousresearch over the years.

Testing, first of all, is used widely as a selection method AsOakland (2004) puts it: ‘‘Test use is universal Tests are used invirtually every country, with newborns through the elderly ’’(p 157) Oakland estimates there are some 5,000 standardizedtests in use today

There have long been guidelines for creating and using tests,with the bar being set by the standards for educational and psy-chological testing, created by the American Educational ResearchAssociation, American Psychological Association, and the NationalCouncil on Measurement in Education (Oakland, 2004) Some ofthe more interesting issues around test usage are highlighted byBartram (2001) in a case study below This is just one example;there are probably many cases like this all over the world

An Italian applicant is assessed at a test center in France using an English Language test The test was developed in Australia by an international test developer and publisher The testing is being carried out for a Dutch-based subsidiary of a U.S Multinational The position the person is applying for is as a manager in the Dutch company’s Tokyo office The report on the test results, which are held in the multinational’s Intranet server in the United States, is sent to the applicant’s potential line manager in Japan, having been first interpreted by the company’s outsourced HR consultancy in Belgium [p 43]

Along with being an argument for the increasing ‘‘flatness’’ ofthe world, these issues include cultural concerns around test devel-opment and administration, data ownership, and interpretation

of test results, among others

Further guidelines for test usage were published by the national Test Commission (2000) These guidelines cover ethicsand good practice when administering tests, but do not coverhow to create the tests With so many tests already developed and

Inter-being used, often with the wrong clients, in the wrong way, and

in inappropriate settings, it is worth assessing the current state ofthe art in developing tests

In a personal conversation with one of the authors in March

2009, a seasoned test development expert for an MNC testing firmdescribed the steps he takes to develop a test, along with some

of the pitfalls he faces The following passage is based on thisdiscussion (S Keely, personal communication, March 22, 2009).Typically the first step in developing a new test is to determine the goal Often that will be to develop a test for an MNC that wants to select 20 entry-level managers in 14 different countries These managers should be able to eventually advance in the company, possibly even out of the country, so they should be relatively equivalent to each other when selected Making the test equivalent across cultures is the challenge, so the following steps should be considered:

1 Write the test in English (the MNC is based in an speaking country, but as English is spoken by more managers across the world than any other language, this is the norm anyway).

English-2 Translate the test into the local languages for each country, verbatim.

3 Revise the test to fit the local culture with the aid of an HR sional and a psychologist from that culture Since there are many differences between languages and cultures, there are always problems here First, some terms do not exist in some languages Even figuring out the Mandarin characters for words like ‘‘exec- utive coaching’’ was difficult a few years ago when the term was not common Also in China, mentioning a personal checking account in a numerical test will confuse people, so this terminol- ogy must be avoided Second, some concepts are simply under- stood differently across cultures For example, there is no such thing as a ‘‘good loser’’ in Italian—a loser is a loser Thus, a scale measuring competitiveness may need revision to reflect that.

profes-4 Back-translate the test Using a bilingual (and ideally bicultural) translator, translate the test back into English This is best done with a local psychologist, but one different from the one used in the previous step to ensure there is no bias As there are fluent English speakers available in most countries, including those who have been educated in English-speaking countries, this is not a

problem Usually the search for the appropriate person begins at

a local university’s psychology department.

5 Obtain norms for each country This can also be done in

conjunction with the local university psychology department Standardizing the test and producing means and standard deviations is done in this step Note that just because an ethnic group in two countries has the same language (and dialect) does not mean that they will get the same norms For example, Chinese people in Mainland China tend to do better on

analytical reasoning tests than do Chinese outside Mainland China Norming is thus done for each country separately Cheung (2004) echoes the necessity for doing this step, noting that ‘‘If interpreted directly according to the original norms, test scores of Asian respondents [on personality tests] may be misjudged to be deviant’’ (p 180).

6 Validate the test for that population This step is not always done Most local governments do not require it and it is costly and time consuming One way to get around this is to do concurrent valid- ity studies These are easier and less resource intensive for the organization and can provide acceptable approximations for pre- dictive validity.

7 Do equivalence studies It is nearly impossible to have the same cut-off scores for two different countries on the same test How- ever, doing this for validity generalization to establish a worldwide norm sometimes works The goal is to get the group to a reason- able number for selection purposes.

These steps are summarized in Table 6.2

Some of the problems faced when going through this processinclude:

1 Technical problems—the script requires special programming

on the computer (for example, it is read up and down versusside to side, or right to left, or it is created in characters orscript different from those of English)

2 Equivalence in dialects—is the MNC interested in CentralAmerican Spanish or Spanish spoken in Spain? Kuwaiti or SaudiArabian Arabic? Traditional or Simplified Chinese characters?Each dialect requires a different norm to be created as it cannot

be said that the speakers of that language are equivalent acrosscountries

Table 6.2 Steps for Developing Culturally Valid, Standardized

Selection Tests.

1 Write the test in English This is the global language of business

2 Translate the test into the

local language verbatim

Usually with the help of a local HR professional or translation vendor

3 Revise the test to fit the

local culture

Usually with the help of a local HR professional or psychology professor

4 Back translate the test Using a (different) local HR

professional or psychology professor

5 Obtain local norms for the

country

Often with the Psychology Department

of a local university or an assessment vendor with experience in that country

6 Validate the test for the

3 With senior managers and executives, testing is not always used,except for personality questionnaires

4 Verbal reasoning tests do not work when translated into ent languages; thus, this is not done

differ-Since in this company’s experience it cannot be said thatany test is equivalent to the same test translated into anotherlanguage, testing is considered to be done locally only For theMNC mentioned above, the company would try to establish cutoffsthat were meaningful but this would have to be done on acountry-by-country basis Thus, the MNC might not get completeequivalence if it was trying to get the top 20 scorers among alltest takers They may end up with five people each from threecountries, two from another country, and one each from threeothers Thus, among the 14 countries from which they wereselecting, the top 20 candidates may come from only 7 Butwith the difficulties of getting equivalence across borders, the

7 countries that were not represented may contain some of thebest candidates—they just did not do as well on the tests Thoughthere is no easy answer on how to address this problem, anothertool that may help is assessment centers.

Designing Fair Tools—Assessment Centers, Context

and Culture

As testing is generally used for lower-level managers or entry-levelcandidates, other tools are generally used for more senior can-didates Or, when testing is used, it is part of a larger process—often an assessment center An assessment center comprises

a number of different activities, usually including testing, aninterview, and various simulations The simulations may include ameeting with a direct report, a work group, a customer, or a boss,along with an ‘‘inbox’’ or series of e-mails and memos to dealwith as part of a case study (Fisher, Schoenfeldt, & Shaw, 2003;Gatewood & Feild, 2005)

The issues with transporting an assessment center across tural lines, largely involve the cueing for behaviors that either donot exist in the second culture or behaviors that do exist, butare evinced differently, as alluded to in the section above Forinstance, expecting negative feedback in a direct report meeting

cul-in a Western, cul-individualistic society is not out of the ordcul-inary Aneffective manager in that scenario will give the negative feedback,even if it is the first time she has met her ‘‘subordinate.’’ If sheshies away from doing that, it likely indicates a lack of managerialskills But to expect the same behavior in an Asian context, such

as in China, is to look for behavior that does not often appear

in real life One of the authors has gotten consistent feedbackwhile assessing hundreds of managers in Greater China that thefirst few times one meets a direct report (or just about anyoneelse for that matter) the focus is on getting to know that per-son and establishing a relationship, not changing their behavior

In fact, in such a setting, it would be impolite and unnatural toaddress shortcomings in behavior Thus, an assessment center that

is developed around Western ideals may not work as intended in

an Asian context and may actually select for those who would not

be effective in the local culture

Similarly, in a leaderless group discussion (LGD) mixing nic groups does not always work Having a few Thais among a group

eth-of Americans and Germans will likely result in the Westernersrunning the meeting and the Thais, from a more reserved andless masculine culture (Hofstede, 2001), being nearly invisible.This gives little data regarding the abilities of the Thais and wouldnot work when selecting for local positions in Thailand Moreover,even if the LGD were conducted with all Thai candidates, otherproblems would appear, such as deference to the highest-rankingperson in the room If the goal is to select for local leaders, theLGD would provide some useful information but might still maskthe capabilities of the lower-ranking people in the room At thesame time, it would not provide information on how the selectedlocal leaders would interact with those from headquarters in aWestern company

With an inbox (IB) simulation, the same problems may appear.With a reserved culture, few confrontations will occur and seriousproblems may not be addressed However, the most commonproblem is generally one of language Because the IB requires thecandidate to sort through a few dozen e-mails of varying lengthsand deal with the problems therein, all within one to one-and-a-half hours, if the IB is not in his local language, the candidatewill have problems even finishing it Again, this results in lessdata available for assessment and generally a lower score on theexercise And even if he does finish, the recommended actionswhich may work in an Asian culture may not make sense (andtherefore receive lower ratings) to Western raters It should benoted that in some cases, where it is obvious that the candidate hadproblems with the language, the IB can be judged on the quality

of work done, even if it is a small amount This can somewhatmitigate the issue of the lack of data

The interview may be problematic as well Assuming the guage ability of the candidate is good enough to answer thequestions, an unfamiliarity with the process may hinder him fromgiving useful answers to behavioral questions This will likely disap-pear as the use of behavioral interviews becomes more widespread.However, the problem around appropriate behaviors for the cul-ture may still remain; because the questions are written and scored