Post-traumatic growth and global management competence—Enablers of retention after risk exposure in international assignment experiences

Military organizations are state owned enterprises that offer a valuable source of human capital with global experiences. It is important to understand how military can retain its international personnel for subsequent deployment as veterans experience high level of risk exposures in overseas combat deployment. Post-traumatic growth and global management competence may play important roles in military retention. This research shows that although risk factors have significant negative impacts on post-traumatic growth, global management competence, and retention intention, post-traumatic growth and global management competency do have positive impacts on retention intention, which offsets the negative effects of risk factors. High retention intention of internationally experienced personnel leads to subsequent international assignments. Insights from the military retention can contribute to international human resource management of crucible international assignment experiences.