Factors Influencing Decisions in the International Assignment: A Case from Indonesian Female Employees

The growing number of companies operating in global markets has led to the rising popularity of international assignment practices. Companies that are competing globally require employees to acquire global competencies and therefore international assignment has become a common practice to develop their talent. However, there is still a disparity between female and male participants asthelow level of women's participation is affected by a variety of factors.Given the low level of women's participation in international assignments, this study is aimed to explore factors that influence their decisions to participate in international assignments, especially in the context of Indonesian women. Qualitative data were obtained from 9 participants working in multi-national companies through in-depth interview. The results confirmed previous literatures on some important factors women consider if they were offered an international assignment opportunity, namely family and career issues. Interestingly, the role of female assignees as their “role model” and Management Training program that includes global mobility emerged in this research as the significant factors these female employees consider in international assignment decisions.