Since the pandemic, expatriates (expats) from all countries have felt increased stress and experienced less success (Mello & Tomei, 2021; Expat.com, 2023; Kelly & Conroy, 2024). In particular, Americans generally lack intercultural insight due to the geographical isolation of the United States, leading to a discrepancy in intercultural competencies compared to other countries’ citizens. This intercultural deficit costs US organizations millions of dollars every year, as American expats have historically had the highest failure rates in overseas work assignments.
American institutions of higher education have attempted to remedy this intercultural deficiency by increasing global opportunities in the curriculum and offering short-term study abroads as part of undergraduate coursework. Avcılar and Gök (2022) highlighted the importance of higher education in globalizing students and preparing them for real-life experiences beyond college, stating that the “intercultural status of university students holds a special place in terms of integration” (p. 531). As such, the study abroad leader’s development and structure of a short-term study abroad likely involves pre-curriculum and intra-trip activities that allow students opportunities to explore and examine the world outside their cultural norms, even if they are uncomfortable and setbacks occur. Study abroads today go beyond basic textbook and classroom learning to integrate intercultural dynamics that participants may encounter in future career assignments so that they can appropriately size up new and different environments and successfully assimilate.
A keynote address titled Enhancing Intercultural Competence: Preparing American Students for European Cultures (In Pursuit of Expatriate Success) was recently presented in the Curriculum and Technology in Global Higher Education track at the 8th World Conference on Teaching and Education at the University of Cambridge’s Møller Institute at their Churchill College.
The conference program can be found here, and the full paper (citation below) can be accessed here:
Bailey, T., & Tanoos, J. (2025). Post-pandemic intercultural development trends among American undergraduate students. Journal of International Students, 15(6), 59-82.
The University of Cambridge is the fourth-oldest still-operating university in the world, boasting 121 Nobel laureates affiliated with the university. Sir Isaac Newton developed his theory of gravity there, and DNA’s double helix structure was discovered there. Fifteen British Prime Ministers are alumni, and it has a 14% acceptance rate, with a £7b endowment.
The International Student Office at Cambridge helps facilitate formal exchange programs with partner institutions, including short-term summer trips, and their “Junior Year Abroad” program is for students from other academic institutions who wish to take a year’s worth of courses at Cambridge. The Møller Institute at Churchill College offers leadership programs to address topics such as cross-cultural communication and global strategic corporate strategy and hosts international student groups and executive delegations from abroad, offering intensive short-term courses in leadership, innovation, and strategy. Here, James Tanoos, PhD, presents the keynote address to colleagues at the University of Cambridge’s Møller Institute at their Churchill College.
The University of Cambridge’s facilities are unlike American universities with central campuses; instead, their academic buildings are spread throughout various geographic locations in the city. Founded in 1209, it grew as the city grew over the centuries, with its colleges established gradually over time, from Peterhouse College (1284) to Robinson College (1977). As each new college was founded, it was built wherever land was available at the time, with 31 autonomous campuses operating today. American institutions of higher education are increasingly adopting this style of collegiate organizational management, whereby each college acts as an independent institution with its own governance and budget.
https://www.instagram.com/p/DMFtIOhuY4D/?igsh=Z3p5bDlzaDRqYjE4
The following are excerpts from the full paper…
The Lack of American Expat Success- Background
“The 21st century is one of unremitting globalization” (Mendenhall et al., 2008, p. 3). As of this writing in 2025, more than 8 million American expats are working outside the US (World Population Review, 2025). However, the US’s geographic separation from the rest of the world has traditionally led to a deficit in intercultural capabilities (Stein-Smith, 2016). Further, many Americans do not often realize that they function within a unique culture different from others, so it’s imperative that they first understand through immersions that other cultures in social behavior and organizational behavior exist. Even if they don’t completely understand the other culture, respecting their differences is vital. As a result of this intercultural development deficit, expats unexpectedly face cultural integration challenges in adjusting to non-domestic norms of behavior (Bader et al., 2016; López Morales, 2023). The cost of a failed expatriate assignment ranges from $250,000 to $1 million. Certainly, time, money, and organizational resources are wasted with failures in these endeavors, leading to an increasing amount of literature devoted to how to best integrate American expats into different global cultures (Jackson, 2008; Moore & Mehlenbacher, 2009; Tang & Chao, 2010; Reish, 2011; Charles & McNulty, 2014; Deardorff, 2015; McNulty & Selmer, 2017; López Morales, 2023; Swanagon & Simpson, 2023; Enatto, 2024). The slide below was presented as the opening slide at the University of Cambridge:
Global travel decreased by 72% during the early months of the pandemic (World Tourism Organization, 2020) and has stayed lower compared to pre-pandemic levels for years. For this and other reasons, young people have felt a sense of isolation in an increasingly digital social world. Real connectivity with the world and new environments outside of their normal comfort zones have become more appealing, as post-pandemic trends continue to indicate that global intercultural experiences are strongly desired by American youth (Baratti, 2021; Harper, 2024; Maurer & Siller, 2025). For Gen Z, the generation who grew up during the advent of the internet, travel has been the #1 activity they hope to engage in since the pandemic. However, like older American expats, when it comes to new environments abroad that require intercultural capabilities, they don’t know what to do, what to expect, and/or how to prepare, compared to their more experienced global peers. The less Americans travel, the more intimidating it can be for first-time global travelers, but experiencing it and new cultural norms is ultimately enlightening and eye-opening. Travel guru Rick Steves told the BBC in August 2025, “A good traveler is someone who will see culture shock as not something you’d avoid … culture shock is a constructive thing as the growing pains of a broader perspective, and needs to be curated”.
Role of Higher Education in Preparing Our Future Expats
Bates and Atef-Rehal (2017) concluded that “higher education practitioners and educators should prioritize intercultural competency education” (p. 43). In efforts to mitigate the gaps in skillsets that cause so many expats to fail, colleges across the United States have initiated immersive curricular programs to address this deficiency. As a result, preparing students to succeed in global environments has increased in salience as US universities have been integrating intercultural curricula into their coursework and study abroad programs in attempts to provide pre-employment opportunities to experience unique international cultures.
Barkley and Barkley (2013) reported that authentic local intercultural experiences are essential for short-term study abroads, while Badstübner and Ecke (2009, p. 41) stated that immersions in study abroads are where “cultural understanding is acquired most effectively”. Numerous other scholars have noted that students can gain true intercultural insight from a short-term study abroad if curricula are embedded appropriately (Chieffo and Griffiths, 2004; Martinsen, 2011; Vande Berg et al., 2012; Stauff and Blondin, 2024). As expat experiences are increasingly made available among US-based organizations, it is more incumbent than ever upon American universities to facilitate globalization experiences to prepare students for employment in an ever-more international world.
Measuring and Quantifying Intercultural Development from Past Trips Abroads
Quantitative tools developed to measure the ability and willingness to connect with people from other cultures have been implemented to gauge intercultural competencies, particularly for Americans, who are less likely to be exposed to nondomestic organizational norms. Today, these assessment tools are frequently used in higher education to gauge student learning and understanding (Herman & Hilton, 2017; Zlatkin-Troitschanskaia et al., 2017; Zlatkin-Troitschanskaia et al., 2018; McConlogue, 2020; Alt & Raichel, 2021) and to measure student competencies in various fields of study. In the context of this study, these tools quantified intercultural competence, or the ability and/or willingness of an individual to communicate effectively, to accept people from different cultural backgrounds, and to integrate into host cultures where norms of behavior are different (Avcılar & Gök, 2022, p. 532).
Two instruments were used as part of pre- and post-study abroad surveys over five short-term study abroads, both before and after the pandemic. The Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) can be utilized to gauge cross-cultural competence and intercultural capabilities (Paige et al., 2003; University of Michigan Center for Research on Learning and Teaching, 2021), while the Miville-Guzman Universality-Diversity Scale (M-GUDS) measures how well a person recognizes and accepts similarities and differences between people (Kegel & DeBlaere, 2014; Viljoen & Els, 2023). The results of these assessments have been used to develop a pre-trip and intra-trip curriculum that fosters intercultural learning at an appropriate skill level. The keynote address refers to the output from the pre- and post-pandemic intercultural assessment surveys administered in conjunction with short-term study abroads to describe the intercultural deficiencies and capabilities of undergraduate American students.
Results of Intercultural Assessment Tools & Introduction of 2025 Collaborative (US/German) Coursework
Significant or marginally nonsignificant results were found for six questions based on likelihood ratio tests (more information can be found in the paper). Taken together, the positive impact of experiences during the trip suggests the utility of short-term study abroad experiences in influencing student behavior. Specifically, these trips abroad impact students’ interest in participating in diverse social and cultural activities outside of their usual norms and customs, which is the spirit of studying abroad and traveling in general as they move ahead in life.
Some outliers in the data included students who were not able to successfully integrate into the local cultures and/or who became homesick towards the end of the trip. Anecdotally, the last few days on these trips are especially likely to elicit homesickness for a small minority of participants, though most express their wish to continue exploring other nearby cultures. This was a small minority, but those who wish to experience fewer activities outside of their comfort zone during the trip may not be good candidates for future expat assignments.
Patterns of intercultural competency indicate that specific areas of intercultural development skewed more positively after returning from the trip. Especially for these students, expat work assignments would be possible avenues for expat experiences. Organizations considering sending US employees on assignments abroad might look into immersing potential workers in other cultures for projects with short durations in advance as an experiment. This could act as a filtering process before any firm decision is made about a long-term international assignment that necessitates more organizational resources. The IDI determines differences in theoretically or hypothetically venturing outside of usual norms and instead actively participating in diverse social and cultural activities, so a filtering process similar to this method, along with a short-term assignment abroad, should be utilized by organizational supervisors and decision makers so that the best possible expat success can be determined in advance. Like traditional job shadowing and job rotation experiences, this process will help companies better identify employees who are more likely to be successful in new assignments abroad.
Further studies should assess which American expat jobs in particular are most impacted by the need to have intercultural development. Chat GPT states that a conservative estimate of current American expats working in supply chain positions abroad stands at about 100k employees. Since bottlenecks during the pandemic were often brought on by miscommunication, it’s important that these expats in particular are successful.
The Ultimate Goal: Continuous Improvement in Study Abroad Curriculum
Continuous improvement in the development of study abroad pre-trip curriculum and intra-trip curriculum should be a continuous improvement process when trips are developed and delivered, and should be derived from assessment data, course evaluations, and anecdotal information from past trips. For example, over the past few years, pre-trip discussion boards on topics related to global supply chains, industry 4.0, and organizational change for German automobile factories have been included in pre-trip curriculum. In my courses, students are required to write and post daily posts/reflections on jimtanoos.com (“students’ posts” tab), even if they are just a few sentences. These posts are helpful within the inter-trip formative assessment process, such as when a student describes awkwardness or discomfort with their cultural surroundings, which can be addressed and resolved before those feelings manifest over multiple days.
In pursuit of best practices towards intercultural development, an activity called the “Circle of Identities” was introduced as an icebreaker before a collaborative workshop between students from Purdue University and HM Hochschule München, partner institutions of higher education. In May 2025, Purdue undergraduate students enrolled in a short-term study abroad that visited the campus of HM Hochschule München to collaborate with MBA students in efforts to address a case dilemma. The case, which was on the topic of the global supply chain in the railway industry, integrated the core areas of Strategic Management, Marketing & New Business Development, Sales & Customer Value Management, Financial Accounting, Controlling, Investment, Finance & Risk Management, Cost Accounting & Performance Metrics, & Business Law & Economic Policy. Per Dr. Andreas Reiger, faculty leader for HM Hochschule München, since the German MBA students learned English as a second (or third) language, their level of analysis was on par with the Purdue undergraduate students since the workshop and case were in the English language.
Intercultural Icebreaker: Circle of Identities Exercise
Teams of 5-6 students from both institutions of higher education were convened. Before the case was administered, students filled out the Circle of Identities intercultural development exercise and discussed their responses with teammates. The exercise itself (see below) is designed to uncover what individuals most identify with at their core.
Upon completion of the forms, the instructor asked the students to identify the percentage of the descriptive terms that would be considered closely associated with part of the “American” culture for American students and the percentage of the descriptive terms that might be considered as part of “German” culture for the German students (which was about 40%). Not surprisingly, the American students reported back as having more verbiage (65%) associated with their national culture compared to their German peers (35%). This discrepancy illustrates how Americans perceive themselves as being and existing as part of a broader US environment. For example, Americans have cultural phenomena around the American flag, such as prominently displaying it via the national anthem before sporting events, outside the home or on clothing, the commonly recited Pledge of Allegiance, etc., whereas other countries do not often display their flags except in rare circumstances like the Olympics or the World Cup. The Purdue students were reminded that Americans often expect their cultural norms to be adopted elsewhere, not realizing that these norms are their own intercultural customs that others don’t necessarily adhere to (e.g., Americans expecting free ice water at restaurants).
Next, the groups were asked to share with each other their answers to the following question: “Describe the culture at your university by characterizing: tuition costs, living situation, average number of classes per semester, number of tests per class, and assessment of grading.” The responses further solidified the differences between the two countries’ national cultural norms. For instance, tuition is free for German public institutions of higher education, and students freely drink beer in German classes.
The responses further solidified the differences between national cultural norms between the two countries. For instance, tuition is free for German public institutions of higher education, and students freely drink beer in German classes.
Conversation then segued into more specificity involving organizational culture, in that American expats working abroad are not often aware that culture and business practices are unique and not necessarily American-like in other countries. The instructor helped participants connect their own identity awareness to intercultural competence development, such as how noticing identity differences supports empathy, perspective-taking, and adaptability, and how identity shapes intercultural interactions in intercultural workplaces. For example, those in the Czech Republic are mindful that their national culture is unique, with more of an emphasis on seniority, such as their policy at the Škoda automobile factory for 30+ year employees being offered supplemental pay for emergency health leave, which is not necessarily utilized in the Netherlands. However, Americans are not often cognizant of their unique social and organizational environment which is invalid when collaborating abroad. For Americans doing business globally, knowing the other culture is helpful but not expected. However, it is vital that Americans recognize that this organizational chasm does exist. Hopefully, this exercise hammered that home.
While the students were given a break before the workshop reconvened for the case analysis, many of the American students experienced a firsthand example of a unique facet of German higher education culture, when they learned about the student lounge next door, whose fridge stocked with complimentary beer soon became a student area of focus.
Case Dilemma and Presentations:
The following case was selected by Dr. Reiger and distributed. Students were tasked to address the “dilemma” facing the Indian protagonist Mr. Reddy at the end of the case.
The teams were given a 3-5 minute period to collaboratively describe how national organizational culture impacts the decision-making of the leaders in the case, along with questions to consider such as “How would the decision-making be different and/or the same if this multinational organization was located in India, Germany or the United States?” These case dilemma questions were associated with the 5th level (of 6) of Bloom’s Taxonomy (“Evaluate”), a hierarchical framework for categorizing educational learning objectives.
The instructors selected the best solution, based on the rubric below, and the team with the highest scores (below) won the competition.
The Success of American Expats: Concluding Remarks
These applied methods of intercultural learning, as outlined in the paper and delivered through intra-trip activities, are intended to challenge the attitudes of the American students to get them out of their comfort zones. Rick Steves said to the BBC in 2025 that “When we travel, we realize that we learn a lot about our home by leaving it and looking at it from a distance.” This mindset is especially applicable to new organizational cultural norms when American expats do business abroad. But the American higher likelihood expat failures can change. Remedies exist which can help remedy these expensive mistakes from being made. The slides below were presented at the end of the keynote session at the University of Cambridge:
The American economy is increasingly affected by the success of its expats, but their likelihood of success depends on their ability to integrate into new norms of behavior abroad. With less likelihood but more willingness of Gen Z to travel, American academic institutions should continue to prepare them for an increasingly global world, where they can succeed for themselves as well as for their country’s economy. Not only is it important for them to adjust, but it’s also incumbent on their employers to identify employees who are likely successful before assignments abroad are determined.
Thanks to Purdue University’s Global Partnerships and Programs Department and their Global Impact Fund International Travel Grant for facilitating the logistics of this endeavor and to Purdue’s CILMAR for the intercultural development curriculum.
Students who wish to engage in intercultural learning can learn more about the trip duration, location, and curriculum that best fits their needs at Purdue University’s study abroad portal here:
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