Why Do They Work in Laos? A Case of Indonesian Workers in Laos Mining Companies

Abstract

Laos is one of the countries where the numbers of foreign direct investment increase every year. Howerver, the government cannot provide the qualified skill worker from the domestic. Therefore, the empoyers have to import the skill workers from other abroad to contribute in the specific working area. As we can seen from the foreign direct investmenet trend in from 2005 – 2015, the main investment sector in Laos were mineral and energy business, these firm required many skill workers and recruit foreign worker to contribute in their project. Also the main foreign workers came from Indonesia. In the same time, from 2013-2018, the IndonesianEmbassy in Laos have the record of the decreasing of the Indonesia Worker in the mining sector average 16,7 percent per year. As recently, the trend to motivate the employee that has a different background in the organization is one of the most important tasks for the employer, because the overseas worker in the mining companies plays the important role to develop the local staff in the various fields.

The objective of this paper is to explore the motivations and the challenges of the overseas Indonesian workers in the mining companies in Laos. The study uses a qualitative research methodology for the analysis. Data was collected by interviewing ten (10) overseas Indonesian workers among the different mining companies in Laos.

This research has undertaken some main themes that describe the perception of the overseas Indonesian workers in the mining companies in Laos about their motivations and the challenges in their work. The factors that motivated the overseas Indonesian workers to work in the mining company in Laos has appeared into four factors as employee compensation and benefits, career opportunity and development, friendly working environment, and national factor. Besides that, the challenge factors faced by Indonesian workers such as the language barrier and religion practice.