Exploring employer attitude towards migrant workers. Evidence from managers across Europe
| Date | 22 November 2019 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/EBHRM-04-2019-0040 |
| Published date | 22 November 2019 |
| Pages | 18-37 |
| Author | Ali Dehghanpour Farashah,Tomas Blomquist |
| Subject Matter | HR & organizational behaviour,Global HRM |
Exploring employer attitude
towards migrant workers
Evidence from managers across Europe
Ali Dehghanpour Farashah
The School of Business, Society and Engineering,
Mälardalen University, Västerås, Sweden, and
Tomas Blomquist
Umeå School of Business, Economics and Statistics,
Umeå University, Umeå, Sweden
Abstract
Purpose –Migrants play an essential role in economic and societal outcomes of the host society, both as
members of the workforce and as citizens. However, integration and finding employment after migration
remain critical issues. The purpose of this paper is to employ an evidence-based quantitative approach to
identify migrant workers’most important qualifications from an employer perspective and to explore factors
that influence employer perception of migrants.
Design/methodology/approach –This study uses European Social Survey data that contain responses
from managers in European countries in 2014 (n¼2,828) and 2016 (n¼3,014). Confirmatory factor analysis
and structural equation modelling are used to analyse the data.
Findings –For managers,migrants’commitmentto the host country’s way of lifeis more important than their
job skills, educational level and language proficiency. The effects of managers’individual characteristics,
including demographics, expectancies and personal values, on their general attitude towards migrants are
also quantified.
Practical implications –The study’s outcomes can assist migrants to develop the qualifications most
valued by employers, and allow policymakers to integrate the organizational perspective into policies and
initiatives for integration of migrant labour.
Originality/value –Through HR practices, organizations significantly affect migrants’career outcomes.
Yet research on migrant workers from an organizational and managerial perspective is limited. This study
identifies migrant workers’most important qualifications from an employer perspective. It also explores
which individual characteristics most influence organizational decision-makers’perception. Utilizing a cross-
cultural and longitudinal data set provides a unique opportunity to generate generalizable findings.
Keywords Personal values, Migrant worker, Attitude towards migrants, European labour markets
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
The need to fill skill shortages in certain occupations in developed countries (Cerna and
Czaika, 2016), political and economic instabilities in some regions and the globalization of
products and services (Nguyen et al., 2015) have led to a sharp increase in the number of
migrants.Finding proper employment is a sustainableway for migrants to integrate intotheir
host society, but despitethe efforts, migrant’s employmentremains a challenge that concerns
migrants, employers and policymakers. Research that takes an organizational perspective
on migrant employment is at an early stage (Cao et al., 2012; Fernando et al., 2016).
Evidence-based HRM: a Global
Forum for Empirical Scholarship
Vol. 8 No. 1, 2020
pp. 18-37
Emerald Publishing Limited
2049-3983
DOI 10.1108/EBHRM-04-2019-0040
Received 17 April 2019
Revised 14 August 2019
2 October 2019
Accepted 21 October 2019
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/2049-3983.htm
© Ali Dehghanpour Farashah and Tomas Blomquist. Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This
article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may
reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article ( for both commercial and
non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full
terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode
This research was supported by Swedish Research Council for Health, Working life and Welfare
(FORTE) under grant Dnr: 2017-00285 and Per & Eivor Wikström Foundation.
18
EBHRM
8,1
This study explores the role of managers and organizations in shaping migrant workers’
employment and car eers.
After migration, most migrants experience a decline in their career outcomes
(Tharmaseelan et al., 2010). Attitudes and other individual characteristics of decision-makers
involved in hiring and promotion can influence migrants’career attainment. As key
decision-makers in HR processes, managers determine evaluation methods, set
assessment criteria, and interpret the information acquired through resume and job interview
(Arvey and Campion, 1982). How managers perceive migrant candidates can, therefore, affect
the results of selection and promotion processes (Horverak et al., 2013).
Managers’perceptions and attitudes are susceptible to decision errors. Examples of such
errors include the “similar to me”effect, referring to the more favourable evaluation of a
candidate whose mind-set, personality traits, or nationality is similar to the evaluator’s
(Almeida et al., 2012), and stereotyping, referring to generalization and evaluating candidates
based on gender, race, appearance, dress or accent (Murray and Ali, 2017). Managers have a
more complex task when assessing migrant job applicants (e.g. managers are not familiar with
the migrant’s previous employers and educational institutes; culturaldifferences and language
barriers canlead to lower level of communication) and, therefore,are even more susceptibleto
decision errors in this context. Due to the higher level of complexity a new line of research is
requiredto examine how organizational decision-makersperceive and assessmigrant workers.
While the effects of organizational processes on workplace inequality have been
investigated, little is known about how managers, in particular, may shape the employment
outcomes of migrant candidates and employees (Castilla, 2011). Managers are agentic actors
and their attitudes and beliefs significantly affect HR practices. The existing literature
documents and empirically verifies that managers’attitudes towards particular groups can
influence the selection prospects of candidates belonging to those groups. For instance,
evaluation of groups such as disabled persons (Hernandez et al., 2000; Jackson et al., 2000),
migrants with specific home countries (Stangej et al., 2018) and individuals of a certain race
(Pager and Karafin, 2009) can be affected by manager’s attitude. Assuming that managers’
attitudes can bias selection decisions, we aim to explore the determinants of these attitudes.
Such research should help organizations to formulate a more inclusive hiring process, and to
identify and remove unfair managerial attitudes. The results should also help migrants
understand organizations’assessment criteria, thus helping them to develop better career
management strategies for advancing their careers in the destination country.
The next section presents a brief overview of migration in Europe. Then, hypotheses on
determinants of manager attitude towards migrant (ATM) worker are presented. Using data
from the European Social Survey (ESS), the role of managers’values and demographics in
their ATM is investigated. Using two data sets, the effect the recent influx of refugees is also
examined. The theoretical and practical implications of the findings and the limitations are
discussed at the end.
Migration in Europe
The European Union’s (EU) internal market was established in 1993 with the Maastricht
Treaty. The EU created the concept of common European citizenship, which has also
promoted and facilitated the movement of workers across the borders of European countries
(Damay and Mercenier, 2016). The addition of ten new central and Eastern European
countries in 2004 and 2007 further increased the scope of intra-European mobility (Dobson,
2009). Europe has also been a primary destination for immigrants and asylum seekers from
non-EU countries, mainly due its economic prosperity and quality of life. While refugee
flows have been a favoured subject of discussion for politicians and the media, other routes
of entry into Europe have diversified the migrant population. People with a diverse origins
and migration motives are settling in Europe. For instance, many international and
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Exploring
employer ATM
workers
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