Coming Full Circle to Embrace Shanghai As Lisa drove home from John Campbell College having resigned from her job earlie

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Coming Full Circle to Embrace Shanghai
As Lisa drove home from John Campbell College having resignedfrom her job earlier that day, she turned on the car radio andlistened to a BBC World Service program in which well-known authorand publisher, Robin Pascoe, was being interviewed about her newlyreleased book on ‘Global Nomads’. As Ms Pascoe recalled her life asa foreign service spouse, raising two children in four Asiancountries during the 1980’s and 90’s, and spoke of the many timesshe had reinvented her career as a journalist, author, publicspeaker, and now publisher, Lisa was struck by how common globalcareers had become, and by women no less. Although she herself hadat times felt somewhat alone in her own journey as a trailingspouse, Lisa nonetheless knew that international mobility wasinevitable for many employees as talent management became criticalfor multinational firms. She and Lachlan were no exception to thisphenomenon: they may not have intentionally set out to pursueglobal careers a decade earlier, but once they had arrived on theinternational labour market it made sense that they remain there.They had benefited immensely by doing so, despite the many personaland professional hurdles she had overcome, and even thoughrepatriation to Australia had been an ongoing talking point foryears over the dinner table, somehow it just never seemed to factorinto any of their plans. Lisa now clearly saw for the first timethat moving to China signaled an important change in their familydynamic: the MacDougall’s had acquired the relatively rare skill of‘family mobility’ and she instinctively knew that it was a skillsetlikely to be highly sought after by many global companies. Their‘united nations’ global family was, in reality, a valuablecommodity. Although she had always had the opportunity to return toa relatively comfortable and stable ‘north shore life’ in Syd neyhad she wanted to, Lisa had never really seriously considered it anoption; instead, she knew now that she and Lachlan would probablypursue global careers in one form or another for the rest of theirlives, as would their children. As MS Pascoe continued to tell herstory on the radio, Lisa began to slowly let go of her fears and toonce and for all embrace the Shanghai opportunity. And then shebegan to wonder retaining their Singapore permanent residencystatus might not have been necessary after all, given that therewere so many other cities they could move to when the Shanghaiassignment was complete
1. In what ways does the MacDougall family represent a rare andvaluable resource to a multinational firm? (20 marks) (600word)
2. Reflecting on Lisa’s dual-career trailing spouse journey, howwould you have approached the situation differently? (20 marks)(600 word)