What’s in it for me? Local employees’ anticipated career opportunities derived from firm internationalization

Local employees have different perceptions of the career opportunities they can derive from firms’ internationalization when compared to the senior managers who manage this process. We argue that perceptions of internationalization-related career advancement opportunities represent a perceived fit between employees and organizations. We examine this fit within a sample of 845 local employees from eleven Latin American countries. Our findings suggest that the degree of firm internationalization is negatively related to local employees’ anticipated career advancement opportunities. This relationship is positively moderated by perceived firm international competitiveness, but not by the extent to which the employee has a global mindset. These results suggest that local employees may feel threatened by their firms’ internationalization, as they perceive they may systematically be exposed to outside competition. This threat is attenuated by their firms' capabilities but not by individual characteristics such as an employee's global mindset, suggesting that firm characteristics are more influential in predicting local employees’ reactions to internationalization.