Key Relationships for International Student University-to-Work Transitions

Abstract

International student research predominantly focuses on the initial and middle stages of their sojourn. Our research, however, specifically addresses how relationships support international students to successfully navigate the late-stage transition from university to work. In this qualitative study, we interviewed 18 international students from diverse cultures, ages, and professions with an emphasis on their last year of university and 3 years post-graduation. We found six major themes: (a) building strong friendships supported the decision to stay, (b) career decision making is a group effort, (c) relationships with supervisors and mentors led to career opportunities, (d) establishing relational networks helped with finding first job, (e) developing connections early in their programs helped in the transition, and (f) mentoring from international alumni would provide role models. We discuss the importance of key relationships for international student success and how relationships are embedded in career decision making. Finally, we provide recommendations for career counselors.

Keywords

international students transition and adjustment relationships late-stage sojourn qualitative biographical research career counseling

The literature on international students has primarily focused on the initial and middle stages of cross-cultural transition, when students are adjusting to the demands of the host culture and their subsequent efforts to navigate life in the new environment (e.g., Kuo & Roysircar, 2006; Popadiuk, 2009, 2010). Less attention has been paid to the stage of cross-cultural transition when students are completing their international learning experiences and preparing for plans post-graduation. Available research has focused on the reentry process and the experience of returning home (e.g., Christofi & Thompson, 2007; Leung, 2007). However, many international students express the desire to stay in the host country and pursue the possibility of securing employment and permanent immigration. Research based in the United States suggests that approximately 70% of international students reported that they would like to remain in this country permanently post-graduation (Spencer-Rodgers, 2000). In Canada, approximately 30% of international student graduates change their immigration status to gain additional employment experience (Centre for Educational Research and Innovation, 2011). As students consider their options for employment, career counseling might be helpful in reviewing personal, cultural, and systemic influences on their decision (Arthur, 2007; Shen & Herr, 2004).

The current study examined relationship influences on international students’ decisions to pursue employment and permanent immigration to the host culture, specifically in the transition from university to 3 years post-graduation. International students are in a unique situation in terms of family and relational networks established in their home country as well as new partnerships formed while in the host country (Popadiuk, 2008). This research attempts to strengthen knowledge about the post-graduation experiences of international students by taking into account the influences of relationships during this transition process.

International Student Adjustment and Ongoing Learning

Research on international students has predominately focused on their problems of adjustment, including intrapersonal, interpersonal, and language and academic issues (Arthur, 2008; Johnson & Sandhu, 2007; Lee, Koeske, & Sales, 2004; Mori, 2000; Popadiuk & Arthur, 2004). Extensive discussions of international student adjustment issues have been offered by Arthur (2008), Singaravelu and Pope (2007), and Pedersen (1991), which commonly fall in domains such as language proficiency, academic demands, loneliness, establishing a new support network, gender role expectations, and values conflicts. Less attention has been paid to the topic of international students’ career development and the later transition phase of the university to employment transition (Arthur, 2007, 2008). In doing so, we wish to emphasize caution in assuming the uniformity of experiences, given that international students represent a heterogeneous group of learners from a multitude of countries and backgrounds. What they share in common is the experience of navigating new learning in relation to both home and host cultures.

Although many students deal with cultural differences at the beginning of their sojourn, it should not be assumed that cultural learning is limited to this time frame (Singaravelu, White, & Bringaze, 2005). The research needs to account for experiences throughout the duration of their time studying and living abroad, including their transition experiences post-graduation (Arthur, 2007; Arthur & Flynn, 2012). Minimal research is available about the experiences of international students in the final stage of their educational programs, although some studies have examined reentry issues back to the home country (Christofi & Tompson, 2007; Leung, 2007). In the literature on reentry, it is generally recognized that the transition process incorporates leaving the host culture and student role, while preparing for plans at the end of the international transition (Arthur, 2007; Leung, 2007).

The literature on school-to-work transitions has primarily focused on the preparation of local populations, ages 15–24, for entering the work force. Emphasis has been placed on how youth develop skills through education and training to support their future employment and preparation for becoming productive members of society (World Bank, 2012). For many students, the school-to-work transition is not a linear process, with trends showing growing youth unemployment, underemployment, periods of temporary work, and returning to training or education at a later age (Quintini, Martin, & Martin, 2007). The school-to-work transition may also be an extended process for several years as students pursue higher education.

With the growing emphasis on internationalization in higher education, many students are encouraged to gain international experience as a way of increasing their level of preparedness for working in the global economy. Consequently, students pursue international education with the belief that their academic credentials and experience will provide unique skills and give them an advantage for future employment (Brooks, Waters, & Pimlott-Wilson, 2012). Research must also incorporate the growing opportunities for international students to pursue a variety of employment options (Arthur & Flynn, 2011). Many countries, for example, Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, and France, have shifted their immigration policies to attract international students to stay as permanent immigrants because they are seen as valuable sources of skilled labor (Arthur & Nunes, in press). However, there is little research available on the post-graduation transitions of international students and how they manage their quest for employment in the host country where they have studied. Available research suggests that the decision-making process to stay in the destination country is complex, involving perceived career and lifestyle opportunities in both home and host cultures (Arthur & Flynn, 2011).

Research directed at international students’ post-graduation experiences of school-to-work would support a better understanding of what helps them to be successful and how to overcome identified barriers. Successful integration into the employment market is contingent on the motivations and actions of international students to actively pursue work, their perceived availability of employment options, and the receptivity of employers to hire students (Arthur & Flynn, 2011; Bushnell, 2012). Identified barriers in the limited research on their job search process include language proficiency, networking and interview expectations, and whether or not employers value their international experience (Arthur & Flynn, 2012; Sangganjanavanich, Lenz, & Cavazos, 2011).

Relational Approaches and Career Development

Relational theories in the field of psychology provide a compelling explanation for understanding relational connectedness to psychological health, identity development, and adjustment (e.g., Blustein, Schultheiss, & Flum, 2004; Gilligan, 1982; Josselson, 1992; Miller & Stiver, 1997). Many scholars believe that women's identity occurs within a relational context (Gilligan, 1982; Josselson, 1992), while others discuss how autonomy and relatedness are both required to maintain mental health, but the degree of each is affected by specific cultural mores (Sato, 2001). Relational regulation theory (Lakey & Orehek, 2011) provides evidence that good mental health occurs when people regulate themselves through ordinary social interactions, such as conversations and activities. The theoretical lens for this study, relational–cultural theory (RCT), posits that being in mutually empathic connection with others leads to psychological health and growth, while disconnection from others often leads to alienation, depression, and disease (Jordan, Kaplan, Miller, Stiver, & Surrey, 1991; Miller & Stiver, 1997).

The intersection between relational theories and career development has become an important addition to the career field over the last 20 years (Blustein et al, 2004; Flum, 2001; Phillips, Christopher-Sisk, & Gravino, 2001; Schultheiss, 2003). Many researchers have postulated that relationships must be included in any discussion of work life and career because career is relationally and contextually embedded (Collin & Young, 2000). Investigations into the influence of relationships in the realm of work and career have included studies on the importance of parents, siblings, and significant others on career development (Schultheiss, Kress, Manzi & Glasscock, 2001), adolescent relatedness and identity formation (Flum & Lavi-Yudelvitch, 2002), siblings and relational influences on career paths (Schultheiss, Palma, Predagonvich, & Glasscock, 2002), and a relational cultural analysis of career and migration (Schultheiss, Watts, Sterland, & O’Neill, 2011). Blustein (2001) states that relationships are central to and intertwined with all aspects of our personal and professional lives and that these relationships have a profound impact on who we are and what we do. It is clear from the burgeoning literature that there is strong evidence supporting the key importance of relationships and relational processes in work and career.

This current qualitative study adds to this growing body of literature on career and relationship by examining international students’ decisions to pursue employment and permanent immigration to the host culture post-graduation. Although there are also other influences, we focus on a subset of the overall qualitative findings in this article. Given the limited research on international students’ post-graduate transitions, we elicited in-depth narratives from the students’ perspectives about their experiences. Our study, therefore, aims to understand the role that relationships play in the post-graduation transitions of international students who are trying to establish employment and permanent immigration in the host country.

Method

In considering how career decision making and relational experiences intersect for international students, we selected an approach that allowed us to consider contextual and cultural influences on their lives. Consequently, we used the biographical method (Denzin, 1989; Popadiuk, 2004) that allowed us to examine individual biographies to better understand the social and psychological lives of participants (Merrill & West, 2009). This methodology falls within the larger framework of narrative inquiry and has been utilized to explore various phenomena (Denzin, 1989; Merrill & West, 2009). The biographical method was relevant in this study, given that we were interested in creating a cohort-based analysis of participant experiences to highlight insights across the life span, a unique contribution of this research. This meant that we focused on the late-stage transition from various life phases: (a) immediate experiences (e.g., participant in their last year of university), (b) recent experiences (e.g., participant in the 3-year post-graduation phase), and (c) reflective experiences (e.g., retrospective accounts).

Participants

Participants were initially recruited for an earlier study conducted by the first author on international student strengths and successes. Recruitment notices were sent to two listserves (i.e., current international students and alumni) at a mid-sized West coast urban public university in Canada. Due to the high number of responses to this initial call, international students who were living in the host country were asked whether they would be interested in waiting to participate in this study the following year. Prospective participants who agreed were later contacted to inquire about their continued interest in participating, once approval was received from the university ethics boards for the new research. The participants in this study are unique in that they first identified as successful international students and then that they could offer important insights about career decision making.

In total, 18 people (7 men and 11 women) participated in 1.5- to 2.0-hr in-depth interviews. The ages of participants ranged from 26 to 69 years (8 in their 20s; 5 in their 30s; 5 above 40). The countries of origin and corresponding ethnicities of participants included China, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Mexico, Chile, Germany, Ukraine, and the United States. The participants were all considered international students in a regular academic program. Participants reported that they studied in the host country (Canada) from 2.5 years to 10 years (average 5 years) and obtained diplomas and degrees including 13 bachelor’s degrees, 7 master’s degrees, and 2 post-baccalaureate diplomas, with majors or specialties in gerontology, economics, communication, sociology, history, kinesiology, biochemistry, business administration, business, geography, political science, and public policy.

Of the 18 participants, 15 reported no family ties or any other connection in the host country upon arrival. Nine participants arrived single, three came with a partner (common-law or married), and six developed a partnership while studying. Sixteen participants worked post-graduation in Canada, and at time of interview, seven people were Canadian Citizens, nine were permanent residents, and two had temporary study or work permits; all were on an international student visa while at university. Careers included investment advisor and portfolio manager, project and marketing mangers, tariff coordinator, accounts receivable coordinator, administration team leader, case manager, financial comptroller, meteorologist, real estate broker, college instructor, director of research and development, research technician, research assistant, and retired.

We developed a semi-structured in-depth interview protocol by reviewing the literature and drawing upon our previous research and clinical experiences. We focused on five key open-ended prompts, such as “Tell me about your transition experiences from university-to-work” and “Tell me about your experiences regarding employment in Canada.” Each probe had questions to guide the interview, “Who, if anyone, influenced your decision to stay in Canada after graduation?” and “How did your decision to stay in Canada impact other people in your life?”

A research assistant, who was also an international student in the final stages of her counseling psychology master’s degree in the Faculty of Education, conducted the 1.5- to 2.0-hr interviews in English in person or over the phone. Because of her in-depth training as a counselor, as well as her former research training and experience with another research team, she was well suited to conduct narrative interviews. Credibility of the data was ensured during this phase because the first author listened to interview recordings to ensure that the research assistant was following the protocol, engaging the participants in meaningful discussions, and following up on important details. Additionally, the research assistant kept a written audit trail and regularly discussed progress with the supervisor. All interviews were audiorecorded using a digital recorder. The research assistant transcribed the first three interviews to allow her to analyze her own process, and then a professional transcriptionist typed the remaining transcripts.

Data Analysis

A second research assistant who was a master’s student in School and Applied Child Psychology in the Faculty of Education conducted the data analysis under the direct supervision of the second author. This student had received training in NVIVO qualitative software and had prior experience working on other qualitative research teams. She initially read the transcripts and made notes about the types of codes that would be relevant (Saldana, 2009), which became the tentative structure for the highest or most encompassing first-level nodes. Next, she went through a second round of open coding to create second-level nodes. At this point, another trustworthiness check was engaged when the research team met and discussed the coding accuracy and comprehensiveness as well as possible discrepancies and uncertainties. The research assistant reviewed the coded transcripts a third time to ensure that new insights were integrated and that nothing was missed, that is, accidently not coded. In a fourth and final coding cycle, the research team further differentiated and defined codes. The research assistant kept a written audit trail regarding coding decisions made and ideas generated during team discussions to enhance trustworthiness and credibility. The principal investigators engaged in an iterative process to develop interpretations of the data. The researchers’ biases included a humanistic counseling psychology perspective based on their extensive experience teaching and counseling international students and noticing that relationships were typically a central theme in these discussions. We were interested in examining how relationships were implicated in the transition.

Results

From the data, we developed six themes to answer our research question, In what ways might interpersonal relationships influence international students’ decisions to stay in Canada: (a) building strong friendships supported the decision to stay, (b) career decision making is a group effort, (c) relationships with supervisors and mentors led to career opportunities, (d) establishing relational networks helped with finding first job, (e) developing connections early in their programs helped in the transition, and (f) mentoring from international alumni would provide role models. Given our social constructionist perspective, we did not count numbers of responses to the importance of a theme but rather focused on quality of responses.

Building Strong Friendships Supported the Decision to Stay

In this theme, participants discussed the importance of meaningful personal relationships in making a decision to stay in the host culture. They spoke of friendships that they had developed while studying and that having this new sense of community made it easy to stay. The following quote exemplifies the importance of relational connections: “Well I think all my friends [in Canada] wanted me to be here and I appreciated that.” The participant discussed her sense of belonging and articulated that she wanted to stay because of her close friends and their expressed desire for her to remain with them; she felt like she belonged. Another echoed the importance of friends: “I mean I had a lot of friends here. I still have a lot of friends here and you create your own community and then—I don’t know, I didn’t really have any barriers about staying here.” He suggests that his strong network of friends opened up possibilities for him to stay in the host culture that might not have otherwise been possible. Friendships remove barriers to stay—he is not alone, there is mutual caring, and he feels authentically connected. Similarly, another reported a direct association between establishing close friendships with people who became her new family and the ease of her decision to stay in the host country: “Being able to establish friendships here; it’s made, it has made it so much easier to stay here and almost to build my own family.” These examples demonstrate one of the key factors in making the decision to stay in the host culture is meaningful friendships, mutual connections, and a strong sense of belonging. Participants expressed that close friendships and romantic relationships created a sense of stability, connectedness, and enjoyment that supported their decision to stay.

Career Decision Making is a Group Effort

Given that ideas of individualism and autonomy are highly valued, it might be natural for advisors and counselors to work with students one-on-one and to privilege individual ways of working. In our research, it was clear that international students made their decision to stay in the host culture by consulting with a variety of key people in both the home and host cultures. This relational decision-making process was not only common but also preferred. A participant from a community-oriented culture engaged in a long process with everyone she valued in her life, “I definitely consult with friends and colleagues and my boss and people who might know my circumstances a little bit better in terms of my options.” She spoke about the importance of engaging in discussions with a wide variety of people who knew her in different roles and contexts, and she integrated the feedback of peers, family, and supervisors into her decision. Another participant stated the same process:

Either I go back to China to find a job there or I stay here to try to find a job here, work a few years … combining all the discussions with my family and friends—well it turned out—the most supported idea was still to stay [in the host culture] at least for a few years.

She speaks of “the most supported idea” suggesting that her process might have been more about numbers of important people who believed that she should stay, which indicates weighing input from others and taking the majority perspective. A slightly different angle from another participant was how “Canadian-born friends [were] influential” in her decision-making process. She believed that this group could provide a more realistic analysis of her job prospects and ability to live and work in the host culture than many of her family and friends back home. Overall, participants emphasized the importance of gathering the opinions of others, in both personal and professional realms, and that these opinions weighed in heavily in their decision. Perhaps not surprisingly, input from others appeared to be equally valuable and salient whether participants came from a more collectivist or individualist cultural background. This theme is defined by the focus on key stakeholders (e.g., family, friends) as well as on the process (e.g., integrated information to make the best decision; went with the majority vote).

Relationships With Supervisors and Mentors Led to Career Opportunities

Academic supervisors and professional mentors were noted to be key relationships, and some participants reported that these people had literally changed the course of their lives and careers. In some cases, professors helped by encouraging them to consider an area of study that they felt suited them, by giving them a position in their lab once they graduated or by helping them network with others outside the university. The defining characteristics of this theme are that a particular person of professional status (e.g., academic supervisor or professional in the field) took a special interest and assisted them to remain in the host culture:

I think the importance is really the professor that you have especially towards the end of your degree. The professor really had an impact on my life: [The professor], he was the one who helped me to secure a spot in the MBA program and that helped me to think through carefully if I had make the right decision. Well remember, if he didn’t write me the letter to the MBA program, I would have gone into economics and probably can say it would have been totally different.

This participant spoke with much warmth, care, and respect for the professor who took the time to talk to him about his future degree and plans. In this case, he retrospectively reflected upon the impact of his experiences that had happened to him decades earlier, noting the long-term impact that this professor had on his life.

Similarly, another spoke of the impact of his professor on his career trajectory:

My supervisor knew that I wanted to try to stay and so at that time, he was talking with a company in Winnipeg and he said, “If the position comes in, you are welcome, you will have it.” It was a matter of—like he decided—so I felt a lot of support from him.

The professor supported this participant emotionally first and then used his connections to help the person stay in the country. Although many participants spoke about professors who influenced them to remain in the host country, some spoke about the impact of professionals whom they had met in the field, “When I graduated, my mentor had been very helpful to me and actually gave me a job eventually—that really kick-started my career in Canada. Actually that was the only job offer I got at that time.” This professional had taken a special interest in the participant and had provided her with advice and support. Overall, the influence of professors and professionals in connecting international students to work cannot be underestimated and highlights the importance of specifically nurturing these kinds of relationships. Professors might be surprised to learn how much of an impact they have on the long-term trajectories of international students.

Establishing Relational Networks Helped in Finding First Job

Studying at the university provides students with relatively easy access to potential places of employment either directly, as in on-campus positions or research positions, or indirectly through co-op programs in the community. Although 12 of 18 participants cited this theme as important, only a few people utilized the university career or counseling services as the major pathway to employment. Rather, many participants in this study gained their first job through connections with people in a university department or workplace. This theme is different from the previous one in that the focus here is how participants gained employment through ongoing contact or work with people in a department, while the previous theme focused on individual professors and professionals. To highlight this difference, one participant stated “one of the [first] positions after my graduation was working for career services.” She reported that she had used career services throughout her degree and knew the services and some people who worked there. She reported that the relational connections with the group of people at career services landed her a job working with them. Similarly, another spoke of the positive working relationships with colleagues and supervisors in his co-op workplace. He reported that these relationships provided a direct route to work:

I think it was easier for me to make that decision [to stay in Canada] because I had a job already. Because I did co-op program and it was with the same company. So they just agreed that I was able to stay full-time, permanent after I graduated.

It is evident from the data that it was often difficult to obtain a job post-graduation, but that their relational connections were primary ways of obtaining that first job.

Developing Connections Early in Their Programs Helped in the Transition

Participants identified the need to think ahead and intentionally develop authentic relationships with people well before graduation. Building relationships with others early and throughout their sojourn was key to their success in their transition from university to work. Although some made connections throughout their studies, others found out the hard way that building relationships over time was critical and leaving it until the final year was often too late. One suggested that the university should develop a mentorship program with professionals in the field from early on (e.g., first year), so that students can develop ongoing relationships and be able to seek advice along the way, “In some ways the person that I just described, the vice-president [of an outside company], became my mentor in a way.” This focus here is on developing professional networks early and sustaining them over time. One participant reported that she spoke to other students about how to be strategic in developing relationships that might be helpful by graduation:

Every time I talked to students that were international students I told them to go do co-op, go to career services, go talk to people, go make connections. You need to start knowing people if you want to have full-time employment once you graduate.

Another was clear about both the pragmatic and moral implications of networking, noting that he believed in the need to develop authentic relationships over time and not to “use” people to meet his needs at the time of graduation. He stated that students had to meet others “right at the get-go—that’s the thing, right. You can’t think, ‘Oh my god, I’m in my fourth year so now I need to go make connections.’ No one is going to want to make connections with you and then you are going to be more stressed out.” Participants saw the value in developing long-term relationships with people in order to build authentic networks. They wanted to avoid being left with no one to turn to during their last semester or using a new relationship to fulfill their own needs.

Mentoring From International Alumni Would Provide Role Models

Mentoring arose as an important component in the transition from university to work. As described above, many students had an academic or professional mentor who became a key person in their career development. However, participants mentioned the lack of connection to international students who had successfully graduated and made the transition to living and working in Canada (i.e., role models of advanced peers). An expected and unique finding was that 9 of 18 participants spontaneously discussed the need for a mentoring relationship with students who had already succeeded:

If they can find international students who have actually worked and stayed in Canada afterwards, being able to succeed in staying in Canada and set-up that mentorship between those already out there working in Canada and those who want to stay in Canada after their graduation.

It is clear that having an international student as a role model would have been helpful for this participant in making the university-to-work transition. Another shared a similar sentiment about how an advanced peer working in the same field as her would have been helpful, “Having more mentorship with programs with international students that have made that transition from student to being in the workforce.” The idea of having an advanced peer to learn from seems to be an excellent one, but participants in this study did not report knowing international students who were successfully living in the host culture and working in their field. The following highlights the importance of both professional and peer support:

From peers who have had the experience … who can share their experiences with the new students, probably would be more helpful. I felt that I had teachers and counselors to fall back on, to talk to, but not in terms of finding a peer that I can talk to, who’s walked my path before me.

This participant differentiates between professional support (e.g., teachers and counselors) and advanced peers (e.g., international students a few years ahead), and how she really needed both types of connections. Overall, participants discussed the need for advanced international peers who were successful and working in their field. None of the participants reported formal or informal opportunities for this type of key relational connection at the university, and no organizations in the field, who might also facilitate this kind of mentorship (e.g., Chamber of Commerce), were mentioned. It was clear that participants believed that the university could better support them by creating ways to connect students to successful international alumni in their own fields.

Discussion

In their analysis of the literature on the career counseling needs of international students, Crockett and Hayes (2011) introduce the importance of familial and community ties for international students’ career planning and decision making. Research from the United States has suggested that international students from a range of countries and cultural backgrounds incorporated family influences more so than local students, and fathers were particularly influential for career decision making (Singaravelu et al., 2005). Familial and community influences, such as obligation to parents and desire to make a contribution to one’s home community, often influence the decision to return home (Shen & Herr, 2004).

The results of the current study emphasize that relationship influences are not bounded to the home country. Similar to other research (e.g., Popadiuk, 2008), we also found that international students’ experience of relationships in the host country weigh heavily in their evaluations of whether to pursue opportunities there post-graduation. The results of the current research also suggest that key relationships figure strongly in successful transitions from university to work. Relationships were important in helping international students envision success in securing employment in their fields and to remain hopeful about their future. International students who were further ahead in the integration process were viewed as possible role models and also as a source of information and encouragement. Key relationships opened up opportunities for international students through contacts and referrals to employers. Previous research has suggested that some international students may not understand the value of networking as an essential aspect of the job search process or hold cultural misunderstandings about the value of making contacts to further their job search (Spencer-Rodgers, 2000). The availability of mentors, such as faculty members and academic supervisors, to facilitate contacts with employers appears as a key relational support for international student success (Arthur & Flynn, 2012). Relationships that facilitate authentic networking over time also help students to understand the cultural nuances of the job search process, while helping them to make valuable contacts with potential employers.

In summary, relationships in both the home and host cultures appear to be critical for supporting international students to make successful transitions from university to employment. The international students in this study showed a similar pattern of support from their family for the decision to stay in the host culture, although they tended to talk more explicitly about the here-and-now relationships directly related to obtaining work in the host culture. Although there was variation in the individual experiences of the international students in this study in terms of their employment integration, they all reported on the importance of relationships at home, on campus, and in the local community for fostering their success.

Implications for Counseling

It is important for career counselors to assess the degree to which international students prioritize family and other connections in their career decision making (Arthur & Popadiuk, 2010; Singaravelu et al., 2005). The influence of collectivistic worldviews and values is an important consideration for career counselors to avoid emphasizing individualism and autonomous decision making (Arthur & Popadiuk, 2010). Counselors need to be mindful of the underlying assumptions in the theories and models of career counseling that are used to guide their practices (Flores, 2009), because they may impose their ideas on clients about how to make a decision and ignore primary considerations for those whose decision making is more relational. Counselors are encouraged to explore the strengths of international students and avoid labeling them as having deficits as a result of their preference for interdependence (Leong, Harkin, & Gupta, 2010). The career decision making of many international students is bounded by their cultural orientation, and career counselors are encouraged to be open to multiple worldviews.

When working with international students using relationship as a guiding construct, career counselors might find themselves thinking in entirely new ways about the student’s emotional states and sense of well-being. In our research, there is strong evidence to suggest that the presenting story does not always match a more important underlying personal reason for staying in the host culture. In other research, students reported staying because of a romantic partner (Popadiuk, 2008). In this study, an undergraduate from Japan shared her desire to stay in Canada to work as a way of using her newly learned knowledge and skills in an overseas experience. However, after deepening the conversation, she disclosed that her primary desire to remain in the host culture was to continue her common-law relationship with her Canadian boyfriend and to avoid returning to her own family that was rife with conflict. Thus, career counselors with a relational focus need to go beyond initial presenting stories in order to assess the relational connections and disconnections that might be underpinning their decision. Finally, post-secondary counselors need to evaluate the programs and supports in place for international students. One idea regarding programming that many broached as important was a type of mentoring program at the university that spanned the entire degree and included advanced successful international peers. This programmatic idea goes beyond the traditional peer support programs that are common across many campuses. Evidence from this research suggests that a multilayered mentoring program would be important in supporting the transition to work. Specifically, we recommend that programs run throughout the academic year, target international students in all years of their studies, and include regular connections to successful advanced international peers. The program should also include professionals who work in the specific field of individual students as well as interested and engaged professors from the university. There are many creative ways in which this kind of program could be designed and delivered through partnerships between student services and academic departments.

Conclusion

This study clearly provides evidence for and highlights the importance of key relationships from both the home and host cultures in the university-to-work transition. Our focus on the late stage of the transition provides a unique perspective in the literature on how international student lives are constantly reviewed and reframed about whether they made a good decision. The evidence from our study demonstrates that the quality of international students’ lives revolves around relationships here and at home. It is critical that researchers and career counselors foreground this construct as a more integrated aspect of the experience. This transition is an ongoing process beyond graduation and is based on the quality of their relationships and sense of belonging.

Future researchers might continue our work and focus on the final stage of the sojourn during the university-to-work transition, given the paucity of literature in this area. More research on this late-stage transition will be increasingly important because of the need for skilled labor and the shift in immigration policies for international students in many countries. Another research question of interest is whether decisions to stay in the host culture change during different stages of life and changes in family functioning, for example, a sibling back home starts a family or aging parents who need extra care. We would also encourage researchers to focus on different contexts and with students from a wider range of backgrounds.

A strength of this research was our focus on the late-stage transition from university to work, a neglected area in the field. This is promising, given that international students often go on to pursue employment and permanent immigration in the host culture. Our study also added a life span perspective to the body of knowledge by using the biographical method and including a range of current and retrospective accounts. By conducting research across multiple generations, we addressed the transition to work, the long-term personal and professional outcomes, and gleaned new insights about relationships and career issues over time. This unique contribution helps us to better contextualize how decisions and relationships impact people’s lives throughout the life span.

One of the primary limitations of this study is that it utilized a single interview. Therefore, future researchers are encouraged to conduct longitudinal studies to track international students over time. Most international student research has addressed one specific point in their academic and personal development but a more holistic view would add greatly to our understanding. Another limitation of our study was that participants were a very particular self-selected group who initially identified as successful international students. There are likely many who do not fall into this category, because they are unable to secure employment or immigration documents, and thus, this should be a focus of future research. However, the focus on successful international students provides insight into positive examples and role models.

In conclusion, international students may be pursing work, friendships, and life in a new country and new culture, but they never really leave their relationships from home behind. Relationships in all their forms—new and old friends, casual acquaintances and best friends, academic and professional mentors, family and partners—are key considerations for international student decision making during the late-stage transition from university to employment.

Footnotes

Authors’ Note

This research was supported by the Social Science and Humanities Research Council. The authors contributed equally to this study.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.

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