Country image effects on employer attractiveness

A recent trend is changing the global business environment. An increasing number of emerging markets multinationals (EMMs) based in developing countries are expanding their businesses in the developed economies. This trend has opened up new research areas because there is little or no research available on the country-level factors that affect recruitment initiatives. It is imperative for companies to accurately assess how the image of their country of origin is perceived for recruitment purposes because human resources are a source of competitive advantage. This thesis investigated this new avenue of research by drawing on the literature on marketing and management to understand country image effects on employer attractiveness to potential employees. The existing literature on recruitment has largely focused on the factors at job and organisation levels that attract jobseekers. Three new constructs – country image, jobseeker ethnocentrism and industry expertise are investigated in this thesis. The last two constructs are theorized and introduced with measurement scales for the first time by this thesis. The main research findings are that two country-level factors- country image and industry expertise-are the key predictors of employer attractiveness. Further, jobseekers in developed and developing economies show a higher preference for EMMs from countries which have industry expertise. This thesis has identified the significant effects of country-level factors on employer attractiveness. By theorizing and introducing two new constructs with measurement scales, the thesis also increases our understanding of the constituents used by jobseekers in the evaluation of local and foreign employers. The cross-national investigation provides results which have higher validity and generalizability.