Thread: Creative jobs in Finland for foreigners

It's extremely hard to find any sort of job in Finland. Good luck. At the moment we're pretty much full on computer/I.T./graphics design employees. Many people from Estonia are coming in to work those jobs for half what everyone else is paying. If you have no knowledge of Finnish then you wont be able to use almost all of the computer systems that are in Finnish and require quite a bit of technical language know-how. If you have a degree you might find work even if you can't speak Finnish, but if you only have a diploma then you probably wont find a job at all. Anyone with better qualifications than you (most people) will get a job over you. Finland doesn't really hire diploma students because they are still considered to be 'studying'. I have a diploma in networking but my qualifications don't stand up at all to anyone here with a degree. Getting a diploma in Australia takes 2 years of the easiest work ever. A degree is pretty serious work, a diploma doesn't help you with anything in Australia except possibly finding work more easily because you have the paper to back up your statements. If you have a degree you will always be hired over someone who has a diploma. Getting a diploma isn't really 'graduating' either.

My advice would be to go back to Uni and get your degree. Try and get your honours and maybe stay in school. Try coming to Finland as a student instead of trying to find work, you'll have a better time if you try and get your skills up a bit so you can actually compete with the rest of the country. This way you can say that you have been in Finland studying for some years so you know your way around and at the same time you can pick up some Finnish which will seriously help you eventually find a job. After that apply to work here or something.

Simply walking in with a diploma and a portfolio in the most competitive job hunting time of year for Finland and no knowledge of the native language has only the slimmest chance of succeeding.

Either way welcome to Finland. Don't forget to bring your visa. All the best

´Zept

Well I suppose that helps

Still I think you need better qualifications before you can go overseas job hunting. People come to Finland with PhDs, Honours, Masters and they find it hard to get work. Some people ask why they would leave a high paying country like America or Australia for a minimum wage country like Finland :/

If you think about it, many people love Scandinavia like yourself. Including me if we all feel the same way and we all need work, they're going to sort us through somehow.

Those who speak fluent/native Finnish with high qualifications get first pick
Those who speak Finnish with moderate qualifications get second pick
Those who speak Finnish with low or none qualifications get third pick
Those with No Finnish and high qualifications get fourth pick
Those with No Finnish and moderate qualifications don't get picked

See what I mean?

Jobs are so important in Finland and so are apartments that people who put them up on the market or who say they are looking for employees. They always take their pick of whoever they like because people just come running for those jobs, and they always hire native Finns over foreigners. Unless they want foreigners for some reason or unless that foreigner has extremely high qualifications and lack of Finnish wouldn't be a problem.

Well anyone with a western-looking first or last name is really probably going to lose their opportunity to someone with a Finnish first or last name on their resumé.

Not only that but any foreigner even if they speak extremely fluent Finnish (0.15% do) is going to lose over a native Finn who speaks in the same dialect from the place he is trying to find work at. This is just 1 way that Finns distinguish natives from non-natives, but there are 100 other ways.

So even if you did speak extremely fluent Finnish and you weren't Finnish you're possibly going to lose to someone who is a native. Either you'll be told (We'll call you, (classic friendly denial tactic)), or they will take someone who has been interviewed before you etc. It's hard to give you an example but it depends on what you consider 'qualified'.

A degree or higher, is a qualification. Without a degree you pretty much are still considered a student in Finland. A diploma doesn't count for anything, especially not in Europe when people can easily graduated in 'certain' places. Take a friend's husband of mine who 'graduated' with a degree in economics in Uganda. The UK laughed at him and told him to go back to school in the UK to get a 'real' degree. Their own words, not mine.

It depends on where you got your qualifications and it of course, also depends on how well you speak the native lingo. If you're someone who just wants to come to Finland to work and hasn't made any effort to learn the native language then people are just going to take one look at you and say 'next!'.

Most people with a western-looking name on their resumé just have their resumé thrown in the bin and aren't even considered. Simply because:

• They obviously don't speak any of the required language
• Person is privately racist against an influx of foreigners
• They like to keep their shop run by natives for the nation/etc
• Their own personal preference

You get the picture.

So depending on what you call qualified, depending on how well you present yourself, how well you dress, how good your people skills are, how official your documents look, how many stamps they have, how well you speak Finnish, if you even speak Finnish at all, if you have your interview in Finnish, if you have ever been to Finland before, if you have worked previously doing the same thing before & a million other things. Well yeah, it's pretty easy! Considering all of those things (not). Job hunting overseas is always harder than doing it in your own country. You might be qualified in your home country but you could be heavily under-qualified in Finland. I've heard that a 'masters degree' is what Finland generally considers 'qualified' of course this isn't the case nationwide but it depends on what job you are going for. Tons of people are lining up to work here.

To throw another spanner in the works, Finland doesn't hire people who they think are overqualified as well, simply because they wont be able to pay you what you think you are worth. If asked what you are worth then you probably wont get the job. People here are still worried about underpaying people who, overseas, could be making much more.