his paper reports on a longitudinal development of organizational commitment among administrative and production workers in a U.S. MNC operating OEM facilities in Mexico. This study examines the relationships between demographic variables, work satisfaction, leadership behaviors and perceived organizational effectiveness as they relate to organizational commitment in a host national environment. To date, few empirical studies on organizational commitment have been conducted longitudinally and in host national environments, although their numbers are increasing. Generally, studies seem to be either cross sectional, nonlongitudinal measures of commitment or comparisons between cultures. For example, Haar and Spell (2004) examine program knowledge and the value of work/family balance in relationship to organizational commitment in New Zealand. Yingyan Wang (2004) compares commitment in cross sectional analysis in state and privately owned organizations in China. Al-Qarioti and Al-Enezi (2004) explore commitment among managers in Jordan, and Glazer, Daniel and Short (2004) compare commitment effects in the US, UK, Hungary,and Italy. Finally, Bishop, Scott, Goldsby, and Cropanzano (2005) compare commitme nt across About : Douglas K. Peterson, Ph.D.The University of TampaTampa, FLORIDA 33606 575.545.8408 , Email: [email protected] different team environments. Fewer studies comment empirically on the dynamics of organizational commitment and the artifacts that predict changes in affective, behavioral or continuance commitment over time. Among studies of that type are Laschinger, Finegan, Shamian, and Wilk's (2004) exploration of workplace satisfaction and empowerment, and Wasti's (2003) article on commitment, turnover intentions and cultural values in Turkey.

This article fills a needed research hole that addresses a dilemma in which HR professionals are caught; how to address the motivational and commitment needs of host country nationals over time. To date, culture is often presented in a reductionist model where cultural typologies are created (Hofstede, 1984) and cultural clusters are derived (Ronen and Shenkar, 1984). The most widely used measures of culture differences employ a method of validated regional affiliation and present the idea that national differences on a set of variables can serve as a proxy for cultural differences (Lenartowicz & Roth, 2000). Culture, and cultural differences, is then presented as the sum of limited set explanatory variables. When managers attempts to transfer operations across borders, they faces an interactive crosscurrent of norms and values, prescriptions for how to deal with cultural differences, and implicit assumptions those prescriptions will remain valid over time. If culture is unchanging, or if it changes only very slowly, then national culture trumps corporate culture, and HR managers are faced with the task of adapting systems on a cultural/national basis. If those shared understandings that make up national culture are more fluid, and change is readily possible, then HR managers may seek to transfer corporate culture across borders, and bring in the best parts of the home country/company culture. As the entry into a new market invariably requires greater fixed costs and transaction costs, then firms would desire sufficient stability so as to be able to collect rent from their investment. This begs the question of how to solidify cultural change in the host country workplace.

The potential negative effects of these attempted cultural value transfers are well documented (Datta & Puia, 1995). Organizations seeking to enter host country cultures that are fundamentally different than home cultures may find difficulty in managing human resources if they don't alter strategy and human There is a tendency for organizations to look at host country operational culture as either a minor or a major variant of home company operational culture. In the minor variant example, managers may seek to adapt cultural systems to the host country, while leaving the cultural core of the company untouched. While the objective is to create a home-similar company culture that works in the host culture, the outcome may vary in its effectiveness and acceptability to host country employees. The result is a dampening of effectiveness, affect, satisfaction, and commitment. A further predicted effect is an increase in cultural dissonance and conflict. So while the intention is simply to establish a low cost operating system that works, the outcome is to either establish cultural inconsistency, or cultural consistency that becomes dysfunctional in the host country environment. That outcome can have positive and negative implications for productivity and harmony in the workplace

The current research comes from a longitudinal effort to measure the dimensions of organizational commitment as a function of job satisfaction, leadership behaviors, and perceived company effectiveness in the Mexican operations of a U.S. based Fortune multinational corporation operating multi-line manufacturing and service operations in Mexico. The company has taken great efforts to be culturally adaptive, yet, be true to the corporate culture that has created high levels of financial and performanceoriented success in the parent organization.This paper provides an empirical test of the concept finding that there are unintended consequences in attempting to transfer a company's culture across cultural borders. While in fact positive cultural change (as defined by the parent company) may occur, there is little empirical support to support and suggest company will not also simultaneously transfer its cultural weaknesses.

Reviews of the commitment research (Mathieu and Zajac, 1990;Meyer and Allen, 1987;Reichers, 1985) reveal that most research relates to the antecedents, correlates, and consequences of organizational commitment. Scholarly interest has been increasing in cross cultural commitment, but that phenomenon is relatively recent. According to Randall (1993), researchers on commitment are entering an international phase where they are beginning to explore, extend, and apply theories abroad.Organizational Commitment is the strength of an individual's identification with and involvement in a particular organization (Meyer and Allen, 1987;Mowday, Porter, and Steers, 1982).

Conceptually, it can be characterized by (1) the strong belief in and acceptance of organizational goals and values; (2) a willingness to exert considerable effort on behalf of the organization; and (3) a strong desire to maintain membership in the organization (Mowday, Porter, and Steers, 1982). Commitment is characterized as an attitude of attachment to an employing organization. Researchers focus primarily on the identification of antecedents contributing to the development of organizational commitment and the impact on job attitudes and behavior that commitment may have (Meyer and Allen, 1987). According to Angle and Lawson, (1993) there are antecedents to commitment that can be split into components of personal characteristics and situational factors. Personal characteristics include demographic variables like gender, age, and employment length.

Situational factors include variables like job characteristics, organizational characteristics, work situations, and work experiences that employees may have.

Literature on organizational commitment predicts that the personal characteristics of age, length of employment, gender, years of education, and occupation, as either line or staff, will predict levels of commitment among workers (Angle and Lawson, 1993). The literature predicts that situational factors like participation, organizational effectiveness and national culture will also predict levels of commitment.

3) Demographic Characteristics Personal characteristics have been investigated in relationship to organizational commitment (Matheu and Zajac, 1990). The most frequent investigation relating to demographic characteristics in the international literature are gender, age, tenure, and education (Randall, 1993).

Mathieu and Zajac's (1990) research indicates that women in the USA tend to be more committed to organizations than men. Explanations for this finding are that jobs are more difficult to find; there are fewer options presented for employment; and that there are obstacles relating to marriage and family that make it more difficult for women to remain organizational members (Aven, Parker, and McEvoy, (1993). Because of this, once acceptable employment is obtained, women tend to be more committed to it. Mexicans (both employers and employees) have a different attitude toward women in the workplace than do those in the United States. This may be due to traditional cultural assumptions relating to women's role in society. Traditionally, Mexican women are primarily expected to play the roles of wife, mother and home-maker (see Heusinkveld, 1994;Kras & Whatley, 1990). As a result, employers expect that women will place less value on their membership within an organization, and will be less within Hofstede's (1980) work on cultural dimensions where Mexican society is typified as masculine, preferring higher power distances, avoiding uncertainty, and showing anti-individualistic tendencies. This is also corroborated in Trompenaars (1996) work where women are characterized as more particularistic, relationshipcentered, collectivistic, affective, and external control oriented. Because of these cultural tendencies relating to women at work, this study proposes that men will report higher scores on commitment instruments than women.

Age and time spent in a workplace tend to be positively correlated with organizational commitment in U.S. studies. It is postulated that as individuals age, their preference for alternative employment opportunities decreases while personal investments in the firm tend to increase. This promotes commitment to the organization (Allen and Meyer, 1993;Mathieu and Zajac, 1990;Mowday et al, 1082;Gregersen and Black, 1992). People in Mexico show cultural attitudes that value age. Older workers are often addressed as "Don or Dona", which is a title that connotes great respect for experience and tenure. It is common for workers to defer to the older employee's wishes, even though younger persons may disagree with their ideas. Nevertheless, age and seniority are highly valuable in the patriarchal and power distant Mexican society. Because age is highly regarded, it does influence interactions in the workplace (Heusinkveld, 1994). According to Harrison and Hubbard (1998), this position of greater respect is expected to result in more positive experiences, and for the worker who is older, greater commitment (see Allen and Meyer, 1993;Schuler et al, 1996).

Researchers have found education to be inversely related to commitment in U.S. firms (Mathieu and Zajac, 1990;Mowday et al, 1982). It is posited that workers possessing high levels of education may have higher expectations, and may then be more committed to their professions than to any one organization. Since these workers may have a greater number of alternative work opportunities, they may not develop high levels of commitment to their organizations (Matthieu and Zajac, 1990).This study anticipates a positive relationship between commitment and education in the organization studied. Since the educational system in Mexico doesn't provide opportunity for specific skill training that would qualify them for alternative work assignments, workers covet the opportunity to train in their organization (deForest, 1991).

Situational factors are the second component of organizational commitment and are identified as antecedents to commitment. Typically, situations that affect commitment are those that are related to characteristics of work, characteristics of an organization, and experiences that workers have while on the job.

Job characteristics that are related to commitment are those facets of a job that affect individual affect and job attitudes. One controversy in the literature relates to the role that job satisfaction, as measured through job characteristics, has on commitment in the international arena. Only three empirical studies on international organizational commitment have focused upon Mexico (Harrison and Hubbard, 1998;Peterson and Puia, 2000a;Peterson and Puia, 2000b). There is some literature on Mexico that suggests that satisfaction with work itself (McKinniss and Natella, 1994) affects loyalty and retention in organizations in Mexico.

This study postulates that job satisfaction will be positively correlated with commitment in Mexican organizations.

There are several organizational characteristics that are positively related to commitment (see Mowday et al, 1982). Organizational effectiveness seems particularly relevant because of the focus on how well an organization is doing. The more effective an organization can make itself in its achievement, the higher will be the level of commitment. The relationship between organizational effectiveness and commitment may be changing. Harrison and Hubbard (1998) postulated a negative relationship between effectiveness and commitment in Mexican organizations. DeForest (1994) and Schuler et al (1996) suggest that as firms become more efficient workers in Mexico develop lower levels of commitment because they perceive they are working harder for fewer rewards.

If there is a connection between effectiveness and commitment on the part of Mexican workers, it is probably due to the notion that firms who are perceived as being more effective are known as "better places to work". This essentially splits the concept of "effectiveness" into "efficiency and effectiveness".

An additional situational antecedent of commitment represents those work experiences that occur while an employee works with an organization. Researchers have cited leader behavior and participative decision making as having significant effects on commitment (Glasson and Durick, 1988; Mathieu and Zajac, 1990;Randall, 1993).Leadership behaviors generally are characterized in terms of initiating structure and consideration, both of which show positive correlation with organizational commitment among North American workers (Mathieu and Zajac, 1990). Initiating structure includes behaviors concerned with productivity, planning, coordination, discipline, clarification, and problem solving (Yukl, 1981). It is anticipated that these behaviors will be correlated with organizational commitment in Mexican organizations because employees want to be closely supervised (deforest, 1994) in a paternalistic manner (Morris and Pavett, 1992;Schuler et al, 1996). Consideration includes behaviors concerned with supportiveness, consultation, representation, and recognition (Yukl, 1981). It is expected these behaviors are correlated with organizational commitment in Mexican organizations because employees become loyal and hardworking when they feel they are appreciated by supervisors who are human relations oriented (Kras, 1989;McKinniss and Natella, 1994;Schuler et al, 1996).

The research has been conducted in several stages over four years. Each stage involved a series of interviews with managers, focus groups with employees and the administration of standardized surveys with known reliabilities. The parent MNC was committed to developing organizational commitment in its host operations similar to those of the parent company. As part of this commitment, the parent undertook a series of data based organizational assessments, the results of which have been reported elsewhere. Based on these assessments, the firm recognized that the set of antecedents of organizational commitment extent in the literature where also present in their firm. Based on this assessment, it was the sense of the parent management team that by reinforcing these antecedent conditions, the host unit would develop an organizational culture more similar to the parent; in essence, the host would become more like its "American" parent. Interviews with managers in the parent organization suggested that there while organizational commitment at the MNC was high, there were other "cultural" characteristics of the parent organization that they might not desire to transfer. Specifically, interviews suggested an increased concern with pay satisfaction and personal ascension (the opportunity for raises, promotions and increased responsibility and the procedures associated with rewarding performance).

Based on a review of the literature and focused interviews with the firm's principals in the parent and host countries a set of research propositions relating to cultural transfer was developed.

The literature suggested that the parent company's focus on worker commitment, and its active management of the antecedent conditions noted in the literature, would stimulate the host unit to adopt programs and practices from the parent. This transfer would likely take place even if practices were contrary to traditional norms and culture.

Proposition 1: The organization in the host country will adopt corporate cultural characteristics of the parent firm's culture.The parent company began their Mexican operations nearly 6 years ago. They have had ample time to develop and implement processes for the formal transfer of cultural values, such as: selection, training, and reinforcement through management action and compensation.

Proposition 2: sychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by the number of years a worker spends on the job. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by job tenure, between home and host organizations will converge over time.The parent has focused primarily on policies that would increase worker commitment and satisfaction. This action was taken in the belief that they would be able to transfer pieces of its corporate culture to the host rather than transferring its culture whole. Proposition 3: Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by the educational level a worker possesses. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by education, between home and host organizations will converge over time.

Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by gender. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by gender, between home and host organizations will converge over time.

Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by subject age. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by age, between home and host organizations will converge over time.

Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by perceived organizational effectiveness. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by effectiveness, between home and host organizations will converge over time.

Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by leadership behaviors of initiating structure and consideration. A corollary argument is that IV.

This study was conducted among subjects in a subdivision of a Fortune MNC with headquarters in the United States, operating manufacturing and management facilities in several locations in the interior of Mexico. This is a non-maquiladora operation.

Measurement was conducted on site on four separate occasions over a four year period of time, using a testretest research design. All workers could choose whether to participate. Workers completed questionnaires during their shift with the assistance of the researcher and his assistants. Questionnaires and conversations were held in Spanish. This was done to ensure clarity of communications while creating an environment where employees would not feel threatened. In all measures, approximately 90% of workers who represent both line (69%) and staff workers participated in the research. In total 227 employees participated. 151 workers were confidentially tracked in all surveys. The typical subject was a 28 year old female, these samples averaged 60% female, with a high school education and average employment tenure of about 48 months. New hires were excluded if they had less than 6 months of service. Descriptive statistics for the respondents are in Table 1. There were two methods of collecting data. First, there was a questionnaire consisting of recognized instruments with high reliabilities. These measures were designed to assess organizational commitment and its antecedents. Specifically, the 15 item OCQ, the Job Satisfaction Index, the Organizational Effectiveness Questionnaire, and the Directive Conduct survey were used. Instruments were translated via the backtranslation method as prescribed by Triandis (1980).

Prior to measurement, focus group interviews were held, in Spanish, at all facilities with the researcher and his assistants. The purpose of the interview groups was to ascertain nuances involved in worker motivation and to check the content validity of previous research. Questionnaires were coded and summarized according to the literature. Correlation tables between major variables are presented in Tables 2 through 5. In each year, regression analyses were conducted in order to predict commitment and its components from the independent variables. The analysis typifies the approach taken in the empirical tests of commitment. The results, in tables 6 through 9, illustrate changes in the prediction of commitment over time. In period 1, which is a time when the facility is new, and the employees all have relatively short tenures, only behavioral commitment (as predicted by leadership behaviors, initiating structure, and consideration) and continuance commitment (as predicted by organizational effectiveness and educational level) were significant. V.

The purpose of this research was to investigate the predictors and dynamics of organizational commitment among workers in Mexico. The use of widely accepted instruments provides generalize-ability and adds insight to the growing knowledge base of international employee attitude formation. A discussion of the research propositions follows.

Proposition 1: The organization in the host country will adopt corporate cultural characteristics of the parent firm's culture.

There were a number of instances where host country nationals did in fact adopt characteristics of the parent culture. Evidence for this exists in at least three formats. First, focus group interviews over time show evidence of host country nationals gaining significant knowledge of the home company's culture and processes. Second, observation of employees shows increasing awareness of collective bargaining tactics that are common in the home situation. Finally, empirical measures show an increasing number of salient job attitude predictors of organizational commitment. An explanation of each of these follows.

The research agenda here was multi-trait and multi-method. Among the data collection techniques utilized were the focus group, the questionnaire, and the direct observation. As mentioned earlier in the paper, focus groups were conducted in each measurement period to (1) align the conceptual space of satisfaction, job attitudes, and commitment as being and remaining germane. Of additional interest in focus group, was information provided relating to work, and the special conditions workers face. Among issues that were frequently heard, were:

? That the home company required ongoing employee development for workers to maintain production certification. ? That overtime was frequently used to meet a production quota, without the typical overtime pay that United States' based employees earned. ? That tools and safety equipment, while used, was getting old and needed to be more frequently replaced.

? That supervisors, while friendly, tended to demand a great deal more production than the typical production job.

Empirically, the predictors of organizational commitment increase on an annual basis. In the first year, there were five predictors of behavioral or continuance commitment. In early stages, leadership behaviors (consideration, initiating structure) predict behavioral commitment and organizational effectiveness and educational level predict continuance commitment. There is a plausible explanation for this. In this particular instance, the home company was establishing new operations in Mexico. Since this is a multinational corporation in the automotive industry, and a valued addition to the employment base in the regions where it opened, employees were looking for cues regarding how to behave, and reasons to like or not like the company as an employer. In this regard, general commitment isn't predicted, however, behavioral commitment is predicted from leadership behaviors. It is leadership behaviors like consideration and initiating structure that give employees cues regarding how to act in a multinational corporation, or in their eyes, a "good company", which is a phrase that came out of focus interviews.

The next question, what predicts continuance commitment among workers in a new organization? In this case, it is educational level (the more education, the better) and company reputation as an effective organization. Essentially, education gives employees the background to anticipate the work environment; corporate reputation gives employees the hope that the "good company", will be better than other employers. This addresses a key issue that dominates international OB research, namely the global-local question. The question concerns how multinationals can or should balance the pressures to develop globally standardized policies with the pressures to be responsive to the peculiarities of the local context. The trade off is in behavioral and continuance commitment.

Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by the number of years a worker spends on the job. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by job tenure, between home and host organizations will converge over time.

The development of psychological work attitudes in relationship to organizational commitment in this case are moderated by the number of years a worker spends on the job. In fact, over time, commitment levels and predictors converge where Mexican employees develop approximately the same predictors of commitment as home country nationals do. If we examine measures over time, please see Table 10, there are five predictors of commitment in year one. In year two, there are ten. In year three, there are fourteen; and in year four, there are twenty two. The portfolio of predictors (please see tables 6-10) rounds out from a prediction of behavioral and continuance commitment early to prediction of overall commitment, affective commitment, behavioral commitment, and continuance commitment later on. Year four measures mirror aggregate commitment measures in domestic operations for the home company. In essence, the Mexican employee becomes more like the employee in Iowa, Wisconsin, Indiana, or California the more time is spent. How would one explain this? One could use a maturity explanation, and indicate that the more time one spends employed, the more one learns and acts in manners consistent with corporate culture. This is an interesting argument for the multinational manager. If their plans are to utilize a host country workforce and assume that productivity will stay the same, due to cultural reasons, even though pay doesn't differ, those plans may have to be re-examined. In this case, commitment is a "moving target", and that higher rents from cultural differences only last for a period of time, predictable by the state of the culture, the relative dynamic and cross cultural influences going on, and the reliability of the measures. This Alpha, Delta, Sigma model tell us that cultural change, environmental dynamics, and stability are all predictors of the relative effectiveness, and long-term positive outcomes of management. In this case, the parent focused primarily on policies that would increase worker commitment and satisfaction. This action was taken in the belief that they would be able to transfer pieces of its corporate culture to the host rather than transferring its culture whole. The expected outcome was that the positive parts of culture would transfer and mesh with positive parts of Mexican culture.What happened, was the unintended consequence, of losing the Mexican-ness of employees in favor of creating a for unified workforce, held together by parent company culture. Proposition 3: Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by the educational level a worker possesses. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by education, between home and host organizations will converge over time.Educational level predicted continuance commitment early. The predictive ability of educational level fell out of the equations in years two and three, and came back in year four as a predictor of overall commitment, and continuance commitment. Please note however, the relationship and directionality of this predictor. Educational level predicts overall commitment in year four. The higher the educational level, the more committed the workforce was overall. This is explained in focus interviews, where over time, employees realize that the employment relationship isn't that bad, and feel overall that they are committed to the organization.

In fact, educational level takes on increased predictive ability as the years go by. The explanation for this is that for overall commitment, early, the jury is still out in terms of commitment. Later on, however, educational level takes on salience.Note, then, that the directionality of continuance commitment changes over time. Early on, the more education a person had, the more continuance commitment they had. This is explained through focus group where more highly educated persons more willing to "wait and see" what transpired before they formulated a judgment regarding job satisfaction and workplace happiness. Four years later, the same persons were more willing to recognize there were other opportunities in the environment. The more education they had, the more likely they were to indicate they would switch jobs if the right opportunity came along. This may also reveal some differences with literature (Harrison and Hubbard, 1998). In the earlier work, Harrison and Hubbard indicated that Mexican nationals were loathe to switch jobs. This clearly isn't the case here. Is it because Harrison and Hubbard were wrong?

That's one explanation, but probably not the right one. Harrison and Hubbard measured in a cross sectional measurement. This is longitudinal. Given more time, perhaps a similar measure would emerge elsewhere. What's interesting, however, if Harrison and Hubbard are correct, and there is a tendency for Mexican employees to not change jobs, then there is a potential cultural artifact here that indicates employees are adopting work attitudes that are different then the literature suggests. Is this a cultural change in society? In the workplace? More research is needed in turnover, and turnover intentionality in the host and home national literature.

Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by gender. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by gender, between home and host organizations will converge over time.There were not significant predictions based upon gender.

Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by subject age. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by age, between home and host significant predictions based upon age.

Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by perceived organizational effectiveness. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by effectiveness, between home and host organizations will converge over time. This actually is a very interesting measure. Of all the measures, longitudinally, the organizational effectiveness measure is uniformly the most predictive of overall, affective, behavioral, and continuance commitment. There is an importance of corporate reputation in motivating employees in developing countries. Very little has been done in this area, however, the power of corporate culture and the importance of working for a "good company", one of which an employee can be proud seems a reasonable explanation. The question, however, is "where does reputation end, and corporate culture take over?" Reputation may be the predictor of early commitment in many organizations. However, later on, "reputation" becomes "realistic job preview", where reputation impacts become part of the corporate culture transfer.

Psychological work attitudes of organizational commitment will change over time and will be moderated by leadership behaviors of initiating structure and consideration. A corollary argument is that measured levels of psychological commitment, as predicted by leadership behaviors, between home and host organizations will converge over time. Group interviews largely reinforced the notions that supervisor behavior, organizational effectiveness, and job satisfaction were important among workers. While the Constitution of Mexico guarantees employment, it was reinforced that it is important to work for a "good company". Employees in Mexico like to feel that their company is doing well because of their efforts. Of unique interest, however is the report from employees that strongly desire individual achievement recognition, promotions on merit, participation, and strong policies on sexual harassment. This is counter to the notion in Hofstede that Mexican workers are collective, power distance accepting, masculine, and uncertainty avoiding. While it may have appeared this way in the first measure of satisfaction, it certainly changed for the second measure when more people were included, and where employees had greater opportunity to become acculturated to the company.Further research may want to the changing nature of employee satisfaction as it applies to different cultures. Further, one may want to explore how corporate culture affects employee perceptions and standard outlooks that are provided to them from their unique and valuable culture. At stake, is quicker adaptation and better training of managers who are entering the expatriate relationship. Workers in Mexico, when they're committed to their workplace say "Yo tengo la camiseta" (Peterson, Puia, and Suess, 2002), which means "I have the shirt on". To get to that place, however, managers must realize that commitment is much more of a moving target in expatriate relationships and in host national commitment than previously was thought. In this case, since the Spanish word for "commitment" is "Compromiso", which is instructive to the English language speaker since it has a basic interpretation of "compromise". In fact one may say compromise, on both sides, is important. A stage further, however is the phrase, "compromiso es una blanco móvil", which means, that commitment, is a moving target, and it is this moving target, and the changing nature of cultural influence because of the work relationship that makes achieving commitment, "Dificilito", or "a wee bit difficult". The results suggest that culture as a construct in much richer and more inter-related than indicated in the common validated regional affiliation model. Culture appears perceived and received as a whole. While the parent firm was successful in transferring certain desirable norms and values, it also inadvertently transmitted values that might lead to lower worker satisfaction or higher worker dissatisfaction.

The findings have important implications for multinational practitioners. The results suggest that while managers should determine the relevant factors that contribute to employee satisfaction and commitment and focus upon those, they must also be aware of how their entire culture is perceived by the host workforce. Clearly, practitioners need to develop rigorous and systematic approaches to gathering and interpreting feedback in both their home and host settings.