Family issues critical to overseas relocation.

• Author: Marshall, Jeffrey
• Position: INTERNATIONAL - Survey - Brief article

Family factors are twice as important as any other reason for employees to refuse overseas relocation assignment, according to global relocation company Cartus. As a result, and because overseas assignments of all types continue to surge, Cartus believes the very face of the overseas assignee is to change--by getting younger and progressively more female.

The finding was a key conclusion of Cartus' annual policy and practices survey. It also revealed that the number of companies offering language and intercultural services to families has doubled in the past three years, a sign that cultural and family issues are getting serious attention from corporations.

In fact, family or personal circumstances was cited almost twice as often (90 percent) for employees turning down relocation assignments as career concerns (48 percent) or compensation (46 percent).

Among other key findings:

* An emerging preference for short-term assignments. In the past three years, 68 percent of companies responding said short-term assignments were up, compared to 50 percent for long-term...