An International Career – Pros and Cons

An International Career - Pros and Cons

I have read through the article "A race won by the swift and strong" by Richard Ernsberger. The article discusses the advantages and disadvantages with a global career. Vincent Wauters tell us about his experience with jobs that have "need to be able to travel a lot" in the job description.

He has a family, a wife but no kids. I think the issue with the kids having to change school each time the father applies for a new job in a different country, or a subsidiary, otherwise can be quite tiresome. A global career is a good choice for an individual who doesn't have strong roots and bonds to a specific place or country, it can otherwise e hard to "pack your bags and leave" each time your employer need you in another subsidiary. A global career is about exactly that. The employer offers premiums like a really good salary, free travel or akin, in return for your utter flexibility.

It's of course not possible to get an International job, entirely based on your flexibility. You need to have knowledge and experience that the corporations need. Telecom, computer and consulting are hot industries right now, so if you have education in any of that, you would have a great advantage on the International labor market.

Vincent Wauters primary employer has been "La Redoute", a French catalog retailer. He has lived in many European capitals but finds "everywhere equally interesting", as long as it's an European capital. Wauters have a doctors degree in history, and his language skills and flexibility to pick up and leave anytime needed, helped him get his job on "La Redoute". The telecom and computer industries are growing and hiring as I said previously, but there are still hope if you don't have education in any of this and still desire a Global career. The maybe most important qualification is to know languages. English are of course primary, but depending on in which part of the world you want to work, different languages can be essential. In Latin America, knowledge in Spanish is an absolute necessity.  French and German are languages important in Europe, and if you want an international career with EU, the European Union, at least French is essential.

If I were to have an International career and would try to find the biggest cons and pros, I think the paramount advantage would be to be able to travel to new places, get to know new people and always find new thrilling things. A big d...