In this article, I will share how to find a job in Switzerland. There are many reasons why people would choose to work in Switzerland, and one of the main reasons would no doubt be the high salaries. The median income in Switzerland is about 6,500 CHF per month, and that is considered the highest in the world.
There’s also a good work-life balance, considering that unemployment levels in Switzerland have stayed relatively stable even during the COVID-19 pandemic. This article primarily targets individuals who are considering a long-term job move to Switzerland, or those who, like myself, have been in Switzerland for some time and are seeking a more sustainable and long-term career path.
I’m also especially addressing the concerns of people who are considered trailing spouses who have, in the past, like myself, moved to Switzerland because of their spouses or their partner’s job and are looking for a professional restart despite being highly qualified, but you don’t speak French or German in Switzerland.
Have a valid work permit, difficulties in obtaining
Before you go find a job in Switzerland, the first requirement that you need is to obtain a work permit. So there are many different types of permits in Switzerland: the B permit, the C permit, the G permit, the L permit, and many more. Please check the image above for an overview of permits.
In my case, I have the B permit, and how easy it is for you to obtain the permit will also depend on whether you are an EU citizen or a member of the EFTA, which is the European Free Trade Association. The process is generally much harder for non-EFTA citizens because there are a lot more requirements for you to be able to obtain the permit. The employer has to go through a lot of legal and administrative hurdles.
For instance, they have to first prove that no other EU or EFTA citizens can do the job, and you must also be a specialist with highly qualified skills. Thirdly, there are a very limited number of quotas for B permits. So in the case of 2024, there are only 4,500 quotas for B permits for non-EFTA citizens, so you’re fighting with competitors from all over the world for just 4,500 permits, and you’re just going to get one of them, so it’s competitive.
Using us as an example, we are Singaporeans, so we are not part of the EU. Indeed, the employer had to go through a lot of hurdles, and the legal administration process took months before my husband was able to obtain the B permit. In my case, I was a spouse because I was married to my husband. So what happens if you are a spouse or if you are married to someone with a B permit? You will be automatically granted the B permit as well.
This is under the family reunification permit, so whatever my husband received, I got the same permit as well. I think that is something that is quite well done in Switzerland because it’s not the case, say, in Singapore.
If you come to Singapore for work, it doesn’t automatically mean that your spouse would have the same work permit. Sometimes it comes with the case that your spouse will not be able to work. However, if you’re just a partner and you don’t have a legal wedded status, then you will not obtain this same permit status.
Be flexible to Find a Job in Switzerland
My first piece of advice to find a job in Switzerland is really regarding your mindset, which is to be flexible if your goal is to live and work in Switzerland. I would say that for your other job expectations when it comes to things like salary or whether you can work from home, whether it’s something within your professional niche or in your industry, I would say to put this all aside and just focus on getting that first job.
Once you can at least say that you live and work in Switzerland, then you can consider strategies for your next step as to getting that dream job because it gets so much easier once you have your foot inside the labor market, and it just gives you more credentials and you have the level of experience to add to your resume, and that will help on for your second job.
What’s my SALARY for my 1st Swiss job
Just in case you were wondering how much I was drawing for my first salary in Switzerland, it was not very high at all. I was drawing 4,500 Swiss francs, which were maybe about 6,000 plus Sing dollars, but you have to consider that in Switzerland taxes are very high and expenses are very high.
I would say that the minimum salary in Switzerland, There isn’t a minimum wage in Switzerland, but at the very minimum, the most decent salary would be about 4,000 CHF, and I was at 4,500 CHF, but since it was my very first job, I didn’t even like to think twice, like, ooh, is it too low for me? I just took it because that was the only option I had back then, and having a job was better than having nothing.
So it’s been a few years ever since, and definitely, my compensation has increased quite a bit, but just laying it out, for my first job, it was about 4,500 CHF, and I was super happy at that point to land my first job.
Location matters
Location is another factor to consider when looking for a job in Switzerland.
Most of the companies that hire expats are typically based in Geneva or Zurich. These are the two main international hubs. There are a lot of niche industries in other parts of Switzerland, so for example, in Lausanne, there is quite a bit of pharma, and in another part of Vaud near Neuchâtel, there is a very specific production site for watchmaking.
However, these are very closed industries, and they would mostly prefer locals for the job. So if you are staying somewhere that is a little bit further away from the main international hubs like Geneva or Zurich, I would say that your chances of finding a job would be slightly further away from the main international hubs like Geneva or Zurich.
I would say that your chances of finding a job would be slightly further away from the main international hubs, such as Geneva or Zurich.. I would say that your chances of finding a job would be slightly more difficult, so if you want to position yourself in the cities with maximum advantage, I would say that places like Geneva, Zurich, and Zug would be your best options in terms of location.
Opt for internal transfers
Another common strategy that people use to find a job in Switzerland is to opt for an internal transfer, which is to say that you have already been working for a Swiss company from wherever you’re from, say Singapore, and you apply for an internal transfer, say a couple of stents in Switzerland. That is a much easier way for you because then you would already have the permit to work, and you can then make use of your time in Switzerland to familiarize yourself with the surroundings and also network.
Granted, you have to stay with your attached company for that period, but the fact that you are here gives you a lot more advantages in terms of building up your local networks, learning the language, and having more options to learn more about other companies that are based in Switzerland.
Check out dedicated Swiss job websites
The next tip I have for you to find a job in Switzerland is to check out dedicated websites for job postings.
Some of the websites where you can find a job in Switzerland are:
There are also good Facebook groups that are meant only for English-speaking job opportunities. Some of the groups that I’ve been inside are Women Rock Switzerland and also this group called English-speaking Job Opportunities in Switzerland.
Some of the Facebook groups where you can find a job in Switzerland are:
- Women Rock Switzerland
- English speaking jobs & opportunities in Switzerland
- English Speaking Jobs in Zürich Community
But usually, some recruiters are people that are maybe in smaller companies, and they will just put up their job postings there, and you can respond to the advertisement immediately from there.
Tip to point out: if you’re living on the French side of Switzerland and you happen to see job descriptions that are in French, don’t be put off by it, and don’t give it a try because most of the time these job descriptions might be posted up by junior recruiters and because they speak French themselves.
The job postings will necessarily be in French, but it’s more important for you to look at what exactly the job description says. You should try to look out for key phrases, for example, if they say long to travel anglais, anglais nécessaire, or anglais imperative. That just means that you will be using quite a bit of English for this job, and it’s not 100% necessary for you to be speaking the local language, so that’ll be a good sign for you.
Apply for MNCs with Swiss headquarters
Another great tip I have for you is to apply for companies that are MNCs and happen to have their headquarters in Switzerland; this could also be Swiss companies themselves, for example, Philip Morris, Nestle, Johnson & Johnson, Novartis, and UBS. These large MNCs with a global presence, such as Philip Morris, Nestle, Johnson & Johnson, Novartis, and UBS, are abundant in the market. This implies that their headquarters are likely to oversee their international or regional operations, and their workforce is likely to be multinational.
You won’t be speaking a lot of French or German; instead, English will very likely be your local working language. So that was certainly my case for my current job, where I’m working for a regional football association, and even though there’s no doubt quite a lot of Swiss and also French-speaking colleagues here, English is predominantly my working language, and I’m not required to speak French or speak German for my job.
Learn the local language
This brings me to my next point, which is related to learning the local language. If you are trying to find a job in Switzerland, be it if you’re only looking for an English-speaking job, I would say it’s so much worth your time and investment to learn the local language simply because this will help you so much with your networking and with your daily conversations and communications with your future colleagues.
So from my experience for my first job, when I was working for a startup because the nature of the job was so international, I was working for companies that were based in the Middle East and Africa, so I wasn’t required to speak French for my first job, but for my second job, which was a Swiss-based company in Geneva where a lot of my clients are speaking French, I felt that I needed to be able to read and understand the emails that were coming in French.
It was also helpful that at least I could join in some of the conversations with my colleagues because most of the time their daily conversations are all done in French, even during meetings. They try their best to speak English for the meetings, but a lot of times they just switch back to French because it’s just so much more comfortable, and for my part, I just felt that okay, I’m the minority here, and I should just try to integrate and learn as much as possible.
So I think that was the time that I improved a lot for my French simply because of the context of my environment that I really wanted to fit in, and I just wanted to be able to understand what the hell was going on at work.
Apply at startups
If large international companies are not suitable or you just don’t like the idea of working for a large bureaucratic organization, then a startup would also be a good option to consider and apply for, and that was certainly my case for my first job in Switzerland.
So for the first three months, when I first arrived in Switzerland, I was spamming applications everywhere, and then I realized that it didn’t seem to be working out, so I tried a different route by applying for this smaller startup; there were no more than 10 people at that point. It was a really small company that was in Lausanne, but it was still in my field within education and e-learning, and I just thought, Why not give it a try soon enough?
I got this first job mainly because they weren’t looking for anyone local or Swiss; it wasn’t necessary for the job. They just really needed someone who has the niche and the specific skills to do program development and content development for e-learning, and I happened to fit the bill, despite not speaking good French at that point back in 2019.
I managed to get my first job, and that was by going through the startup routes, also because smaller startups don’t have that rigorous HR process and screening; it’s a lot more informal and casual. Usually, it’s just like a meetup with the founders, and you know, there’s not so much like an interview process like stage one, stage two, and stage three; it’s a lot more casual, like how it was for me: just a meetup with the founder and a quick presentation on my past works, and then I just got the job.
So I felt that, at least for the startup route, you don’t have to be so stressed over the whole recruitment process; it’s usually a lot more relaxed and casual. At least that was my experience.
Pursue a Master’s/ take an internship (Vince’s experience)
The next tip I have for you is to not just consider working the full professional route but also consider the education route, like if you ever thought of taking a master’s program in Switzerland. I think this would be a good chance to do so while you’re in search of a job because, more often than not, internships are the best way for you to enter a company and just get a leg up in terms of your networking.
So I know at least two people within my social network who got their jobs through internships, and the best example was my husband, Vincent. So what happened was that he was still at that point back in 2018; he was taking a master’s at NUS, and there was an exchange program that allowed him to work and study in Switzerland.
So he was studying at EPFL in Lausanne, and at the same time he was interning for a Swiss company because he did so well in his internship that it gave him this opportunity to network with colleagues there to at least let HR know who he was, and after six months of him working, it gave them more confidence to invest the time and opportunity to hire him.
As I said earlier, there are a lot of administrative hurdles for the company to go through to hire this person, and they need to be sure that you are doing a good job for them to want to invest in you, so that is where internships give you so much more advantage as compared to a person who is just applying through the normal route because the internships already give you a good experience and familiarity with your hiring manager.
I have another case of another friend who, after arriving in Switzerland, kind of realized that her professional qualifications from her home country were not as well recognized, even though she had already completed her bachelor’s and master’s degrees and a PhD.
She decided to retake a master’s, and that turned out to be for the better because, after two years of taking the master’s, she managed to get a full-time job in Switzerland. I felt that that was a good investment of her time because, had it not been for this master’s, I think she would maybe have had a lot more difficulty trying to find a job using the normal professional route.
NETWORK
The next important tip is to network, and networking is so important in the case of Switzerland. You would not realize, but 80 percent of the job market in Switzerland is hidden, that is to say, there are no jobs that you will see online and even most of the time, the job postings that you see on the websites are just posted up there for legal reasons.
But they are already internally filled up by internal connections or by internal transfers, so that’s a cruel reality, but this is how it works in Switzerland. So I say this with so much certainty because this was exactly what I did to land my second job in Switzerland, so I don’t think a lot of people know about this, but there was a period that I was unemployed for a whole nine months, so that was during the pandemic back in 2020 and 2021.
I can’t remember right now, but I just decided to leave my first job because of a toxic work environment, and that kind of explained why it took me so long to find my second job; it took a long time, and I was sending in so many applications without receiving any response, so it was a very, very difficult time for me back then, and I was so discouraged.
But it was sometime in December 2020 that I just decided to. I saw the website of this company that I admired a lot, and I felt that why not just submit my portfolio and my resume? They were not hiring; there were no job postings.
I just decided to send a spontaneous application, and then the boss actually replied to me, and then I met up over coffee with her, and during the first session, I still wasn’t hired. It was just like a catch-up, like a meetup session, like a casual coffee session, and after that, I kind of forgot about it, but a few months later, my future boss called me back for this project for an English assignment meant for e-learning in Geneva.
Most of the jobs that you get in Switzerland are not done via the official route; they’re usually done over more informal meetups, sessions, and coffee chats. The more you get to know the people in the labor market, the more you speak to them, and the more connections you make, it’s much easier for people to be reminded of your skills and your competencies and to give you that chance.
Start your own passion project/business
The next tip I have for you is to use this free time that you have to build up your projects or do something that you have an interest in, be it a passion or a hobby. I’m speaking from experience, because this is exactly what I did during my nine months of unemployment.
I must admit that during that time I was feeling very discouraged because I felt that my whole identity was centered around my work and having a job, and when that was taken away from me, I felt quite lost, but thankfully I was also able to use this free time.
I decided, okay, why not? Since I was already in Switzerland and I could still do some travel around, why not? I just documented my time, and I also enjoyed writing. I also wanted to; I was already doing a lot of filming and video shooting.
So I thought, why not just start a YouTube channel? This was how this whole YouTube thing started because I was unemployed, and yeah, this led me to right now today, where I’m creating content for you guys about Swiss travel, so it all started because I was too free.
I had nothing to do, so I guess what I’m trying to say is that I don’t have to see this as a be-all and end-all that I have; I need a job for my life to be complete. No, instead, you could use this time to just explore for yourself, whether you’re someone who is suitable for freelancing or being a self-made entrepreneur to set up your own business. There’s so much more creativity and options for you to explore when you’re not tied down with a full-time job, so don’t cancel yourself out and give yourself this chance to experiment with what works best for you.
It gets better with time!
My last piece of advice for you is to trust yourself, and it gets better with time. I just want to show you the whole trajectory of my career in Switzerland. You understand how things really just got better, so for my first job, it took me three months to find a job, and then for my second job.
I was working in Geneva; it took me nine months, but for my third job after I left my second job, it took me just one month to get my job offer, and I got it even before the last day of my second job, so it just gets progressively easier and easier once you have your leg in the market and once you’ve acquired the relevant experiences.
I would say don’t give up, understand that this will take time and that it’s not your fault if you don’t get what you’re looking for. Sometimes it’s just the condition of the labor market, sometimes it’s just the number of quotas that they have available, and that’s all I have for today’s article.
I hope that you found this information here useful, and I want to send out all my best wishes to those of you who are in similar situations where you are here residing in Switzerland and you have been facing difficulties finding a job. I know the whole process; I’ve been through it myself.
I know that it’s not easy at all, and I just want to send you a lot of hugs and encouragement and tell you not to give up because there will eventually be light at the end of the tunnel, and you just need to have faith in yourself if you need someone to talk to or if you just want to have some more tips and advice on how you can find a job in Switzerland. Don’t hesitate to reach out to me via email or through my Instagram. I’ll be happy to share more of my stories with you. Thanks so much for reading. I will see you in my next one.
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