Travels, Tribulations, and Training: How Might Academics Be Better Prepared for Working Overseas?

It has long been recognised that overseas sojourners are likely to encounter what has been termed culture shock if they find themselves living and working in environments which are markedly different to their own. In the corporate world, one of the ways in which companies have tried to lessen the potentially negative consequences of this is by providing their employees with cross-cultural training. Although corporate cross-cultural training programmes are now very well-established, despite the ongoing expansion of academic mobility, they continue to remain noticeably absent from most academic contexts, with the majority of such sojourners simply being left to fend for themselves. Drawing on the author’s personal experiences, both as an international sojourner and corporate cross-cultural trainer, this chapter questions whether more should be done to better prepare academics for working overseas.