Although a “look-see” trip gave you a glimpse of your new digs, it’s a completely different ball game once you’ve landed for good. Most of us approach situations with our eyes and ears wide open. We notice things big and small, and this pays off as we begin to settle in. Without knowing it, many of us who have worked overseas leveraged the traits common to women and successful internationalists that we identified in Chapter 1.
Keep these traits in the forefront of your mind, and tap into them to help you adapt to your new environment faster and more successfully. Reiterated here, they are adaptability and flexibility, ability to communicate well, skill at building teams and relationships, patience and persistence, and curiosity and open-mindedness. One of the many things that can test at least the first four, if not all five, traits is your arrival.
Some arrivals go smoothly, with company- arranged transportation, five-star hotel accommodation, and a helpful team in the office. If yours goes this way, the odds of your success are higher, according to HR experts. If your first two weeks are rocky, the rest of your term may suffer.
Getting off to a good start requires some on-the-ground assistance, so be sure to have a plan of action to ensure some stability upon arrival. It will make a big difference. It’s not necessarily doom and gloom if you get started on the wrong foot, but bad first impressions can make you want to run screaming back home or to the airport!