I wanted to share a very real and in-depth account of my journey on how I landed my first job and started my career in Switzerland as a fresh graduate from America with no work experience aside from internships.
I also wanted to share the various interview processes I went through, which varies from company to company and ranges from casual to highly formal. First though, let me tell you a little bit about my history with Switzerland and background. Gallen in Switzerland, a well-known business school in German-speaking Europe. Me in front of my St. Gallen apartment while attending HSG. This one Swiss university was the only Swiss looking line on my resume when I first started applying to jobs.
All I had as work experience on my resume curriculum vitae or CV in the French-speaking region were a few internships at multi-national companies like NBC and Four Seasons and a student worker job from my university days. Keep in mind that without language skills it will be very difficult to find a job. Europeans are multi-lingual and are brought up being exposed to and learning tons of languages — speaking five languages for a European is very normal. I made the mistake of applying to customer service jobs when I first started applying thinking this would be the easiest to land.
I even faked being fluent to land my second job in Geneva! Fake it til you make it folks. For instance, I went through a phone interview and then a 3 hour in-person interview with 3 different people at Caterpillar, a company that manufactures: construction and mining equipment, diesel and natural gas engines.
Just for a spot in a yearlong graduate program. Graduate programs are for recently or just graduated students and usually last a year.
