By Sean Patrick Hopwood
Riddled with quirky traits and poetic descriptions, the German language is a fascinating one. But why is German called “Das Land der Dichter und Denker”? In this article, we take a look at some wonderful and fun facts about one of the world’s most intriguing languages to explore why it’s considered the language of writers and thinkers!
Das Land der Dichter und Denker
The German phrase translates to ‘The Land of Poets and Thinkers,’ and it’s a common nickname for Germany. German culture ran through the veins of many famous minds that influenced the way the rest of the world reads and interacts with each other.
From Goethe and Schiller to Heine, Mozart, Beethoven, Fred, Klimt, and Einstein, German was spoken by many brilliant leaders and continues to stand tall as one of the most important cultural languages in the world. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, for example, the writer of Faust, is considered one of the greatest national treasures of Germany.
Interesting Facts About the German Language
Did you know that German is among the top 15 most widely-spoken languages on earth? It’s estimated that roughly 1.4% of the world’s population are German speakers. Here are some more interesting facts about the German language that prove that it’s the language of writers and thinkers!
German is a Close Relative to the English Language
German is a West Germanic language, just like the English language. This means that the languages share a lot of similarities and are actually closely related. However, there are many words that look and sound the same, but have totally different meanings!
Proverbs in the German Language Can be Bizarre at Times
Alles hat ein Ende, nur die Wurst hat zwei – Everything has an end; only a sausage has two. What it really means, however, is that all good things must come to an end at some point.
Das ist nicht dein Bier! – That’s not your beer. The meaningful translation would be that it is none of your business.
In German, All Nouns are Capitalized
If you’ve ever read a newspaper in a part of the German-speaking world, you’d have noticed how the paragraphs are permeated with extra-long words that are written in capital letters. That is because they write all nouns in capital letters. And it’s also part of the reason why written German is such a captivating language.
German is Full of Unique Words Describing German Philosophy
One notable aspect of the German language is its ability to create new, super-specific words that help to express life much more accurately than the English language could ever dream of. Schadenfreude, for example, literally translates the kind of happiness that is derived from someone else’s misfortune or pain. Then there’s Torschlusspanik, the word used to summarize the fear that creeps in with old age and the realization that one doesn’t have much time left, and this evokes a sense of urgency to do certain things before it’s too late.
Many German Words are Compounded Nouns
Did you know that many of the scarily-long German words can probably be broken down into smaller nouns? The German language is well-known for building new words from existing ones. A good example is Handschuhe. It combines the words Hand and Schue (which means shoes) to form a new word for ‘hand shoes’ and literally translates to ‘gloves’ in the English language.
It’s the European Union’s Most Widely-Spoken Language and the Heart of German Culture
Aside from being the official language of Germany, German is also an official language in Austria and Liechtenstein. It’s also a co-official language of Luxembourg and Switzerland, and thus, it is one of the most widely-spoken languages in the European Union! However, the dialect isn’t the same everywhere across the German-speaking world of the European Union, and depending on where you are in Germany, you’ll encounter various German dialects.
Nouns are Masculine, Feminine, or Gender-Neutral
All German nouns have genders, but the gender doesn’t comply with the gender of the object; it’s purely grammatical. According to Mark Twain, young ladies aren’t classified as a specific sex, but turnips are definitely female.
German was the Proud Owner of the World’s Longest Foreign Language Word
The supercalifragilisticexpialidocious you were thinking about might be the longest word in the English language, but German history used to top that! The 63-letter Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz, which means ‘the law concerning the delegation of duties for the supervision of cattle marking and the labeling of beef’ was too much for even the native German speakers. The word was eventually declared obsolete.
Germanic Script only Emerged in the Middle of the 20th Century!
German used to be written with the Fraktur script from the Latin alphabet up until the middle of the twentieth century. Gothic calligraphy was introduced to the language in the 16th century and was in use in German Universities until the end of the Second World War.
Wrapping Up
With all its unique quirks, fascinating words, and captivating phrases, German certainly is a wonderful language that can describe life and all its experiences in a very unique way. It’s no wonder the language is considered the best one that poets and philosophers can use to express their ideas!
So while a German citizen might call their language the language of poets because that’s what they were taught, there’s a very good reason why the rest of the world also agrees. German is one of the richest languages on earth thanks to its huge variety of words.
They have words to describe sounds, processes, and even the effects of certain emotional states, and very few other languages can boast of this. And it is in philosophy and poetry where words are armor to keep up the good fight of spreading knowledge!
Author Bio:
Sean Patrick Hopwood is the President of Day Translations, an academic evaluation services provider. He is also a language polyglot and can speak English, Spanish, French, Arabic, German, Hebrew, and Portuguese with varying levels of fluency. Soccer is one of his many passions. It allows him to socialize with his friends and brings him in close contact with people from other cultures. He loves to dance and salsa is one of his favorite styles.
August so far has been more of a summer than the “Summer of ‘69”. Random song references are my thing now, and that makes sense because the #RockMeRetreat was never about “Rock’n’Roll Music” or “Jailhouse Rock.” “We will rock you!” so that no stone will be left unturned once you start on this journey of self-discovery with your Coach “Angie.”
Still, my dear, fall is here. We can still have a glass of “Summer Wine,” but the days are as short as the “Itzy Bitzy Teeny Weeny Honolulu Strand Bikini.”
Rose petals sprinkled over my neglected Zen Garden, sunflower fields turned brown, and you have started to turn on the lights in the morning again. When you get home from work, you don’t want to sit outside anymore as it is dark, but you might vaguely remember this feeling you had as a kid when you were playing hide and seek at this time of the year, and it was just a notch better because it got dark at dinner time.
Apples are ripe for harvest, and the smell of onion pie and early wine hangs in the air. How do you remember the early fall, back when we were in high school? I remember a particular moment going down the stairs from our horrible grey concrete school building of the 70s, thinking, “This is great! I love being back at school!” I swung my newly acquired pepita jacket across my shoulders and closing my leather school bag with a sense of accomplishment.
Do you miss those times where you felt like the world was in order and that you had all the opportunities ahead of you? You know when you feel like a “Rockstar” sipping champagne in a limo, with your Bono hat on, driving through “New York” with a bass drum pounding similar to the headache you will have the following day?
Is this the life you want to have, without limits, without regrets, and certainly without the need to have a “boss” tell you what to do, as you know best how to do your job, how to build your contribution to the world and how to achieve your goals in work and life?
If you want to get to this focused and productive life level, you can start with building weekly practices and adding them to our RockMeApp. Last week I already spoke about seven easy-to-implement steps to help your body adjust to a new culture or new environment. This week, I would like to dive even deeper with these seven deadly rituals for focus and productivity
1 – Start Your Week with Monday Wishes
Starting your Week with Monday Wishes is a powerful way to start your week. Use your Have-Done-Diary (journal) to write down your wishes for the week without limiting yourself. Even if you end up re-writing your to-do list, just brain dump everything you wish for the week. The list should include fun stuff like “a bunch of flowers,” too.
2- Craft Your New Morning Ritual
I believe we should all have a morning ritual, and you can design yours around your needs, lifestyle, family, and pets. For example, you can think about, which order you ideally go through your morning to have a happy and productive day ahead. Pro tip: Don’t check your mobile phone during this time of the day.
3 – Finish with Friday Reflection
If your workweek closes on Thursday or Friday, use the last hour of your day to clean up your desk, sort paper or emails, write a task list for the week ahead, and then go through our four reflection questions on the RockMeApp. Here’s a helpful virtue of separating the workweek from the weekend. I’ve talked about taking 90 minutes on Saturday to finalize open tasks instead of working late with a few of you. Test this; for me, it works well.
4 – Plan a Digital Detox Day
Taking a real break from Social Media, especially those funny videos on Facebook, isn’t easy unless you have a plan on where you can hide your phone for 24 hours. You might be a parent and need to be reachable for your children. Using my uncle’s strategy to have an elementary mobile phone to remain reachable over the weekend for essential clients and family can pay off. Alternatively, you can try to apply willpower (just kidding). Turn on the “Radio GaGa” and listen to unexpected songs, hear the news without images and enjoy that wonderful feeling.
5 – Weekly Practices You Can Do Anywhere
Weekly practices are a vital element of our programs. They help with sanity maintenance and make you a happier person to be around (as opposed to your inner Mr. Hyde, who is also a corporate zombie.) If you are struggling to define what practices are helpful to you or haven’t even started, I encourage you to define weekly goals that you can achieve no matter where you are. Examples could be daily walking targets and relaxation exercises or keeping your space clean of clutter.
6 – Consider my Productivity Hacks
If you feel you have maxed out your productivity already, please test this: If you can implement one of these seven productivity hacks (1- Have-Done Diary, 2 – Pomodoro Method, 3 – Eisenhower Matrix, 4 – Pareto-Principle, 5 – Peace Island, 6 – Repetition Checklists, 7 – Outsourcing Housework) and you notice any changes you might still have potential to improve, and there’s always space to learn and get better at tools. Also, to let you in on a secret, I used to waste a lot of time with mundane tasks such as looking for the correct passwords or making sure I had the right document version. A year ago, I often needed to follow up on team tasks and could not always rely on them. We now use password managers, a few master spreadsheets, and SLACK for team communication. I cannot say that this has increased our productivity. Still, my stress level is lower as now everything is well organized and accessible from anywhere and all team members.
7 – Revisit Your Weekly Planner
When you started working with the weekly planner (we usually hand this out at the end of all programs), you might have noticed an increase in productivity right away. Now, with a bit more practice, you might see that you could make optimizations or you could change your meal or exercise plan for the fall. I recommend that you keep the general structure and only optimize what doesn’t work well yet.
How about you practice one virtue for eight weeks and let me know what happened? I would love to hear from you. If you wish to further work on your purpose, performance, and productivity, I recommend joining our RockMeRetreat. Sign up here to be invited, and we’ll set up a call to discuss this further.
Further Reading
https://teachings.eckharttolle.com/path-to-liberation-resisting-and-demanding-nothing/
https://www.greenhomediy.co/love-your-home/
5 Things Highly Productive People Do Every Sunday That Most Others Don’t
https://positivepsychology.com/benefits-of-journaling/
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/benefits-of-journaling-_b_6648884
https://www.thespruce.com/decluttering-your-entire-home-2648002
Temperatures are at summer highs, we try to stay outside as much as possible, help our children through the end of the school year work, exams, and other fun events, and before you know it, we will have reached the Swiss Recruiting Summer Slump.
From Mid July to Mid August, Switzerland seems to fall asleep. This year might be different, though; considering the continuing swiss economic recovery, along with the “Great Resignation,” a phenomenon coined by Anthony Klotz, recruiters are desperate to hire! This summer, recruiters might shorten or postpone their holidays to try to fill the vacancies for the businesses to be able to continue functioning. You can also find a summer job easily right now in the restaurant business as well.
However, I am still expecting the “summer slump” very soon. Decision-makers aren’t around to take interviews, and your chances of finding a job over the summer holidays are usually lower than in busy times. So if you haven’t signed a contract by now, I bet you won’t sign one within the next four weeks. Yes, I will invite you to a Cheeseburger if you prove me wrong.
With the start of international and Swiss school holidays, you notice fewer people on the trains and motivation to work is generally a bit lower than usual. This is the time to take overtime compensation, go home at decent hours, and get out of the country for a while. It’s also time to jump into a lake near you every evening after work.
That said, even if there is a recruiting dip during summer, that doesn’t mean there are no interesting opportunities. In fact, contract-to-hire positions are abundant during that season, and many job-seekers decided to take the summer off, which is a considerable advantage if you keep job hunting. There is another factor that is definitely encouraging this year: Swiss businesses, despite all their efforts, can’t manage to hire all the needed workers. This is partly due to this Great Resignation and to Switzerland’s healthy economic growth over the last few months.
These exceptional circumstances might help you find a new job in the next few months. Due to the significant shifts in the labor market landscape since the pandemic, a considerable proportion of workers want to change jobs. That, in turn, creates thousands of job openings. The Swiss job market presently has over 100’000 job vacancies (1st quarter 2022, that is +60,4% in a year, according to the Federal Statistical Office), mainly in the industry and service sectors. As a result, staff shortages have reached record levels (Jaberg, Swissinfo, 16 June 2022).
So now is the time to jump at the opportunity: Work on your brand, nurture your network and in between, take the time to take care of yourself!
If you are looking for a job right now, you probably feel late to the game. The most common reaction I see from clients is to stop all efforts over the summer. But, of course, doing this would be counter-productive; you can use this time for your job search by following these six critical steps for finding a job in Switzerland (and maybe elsewhere too). We also encourage you to plan your time to spend more time outside (you know you will need that extra vitamin D in a few months!). Starting this week, we recommend you work on a special “Summer Schedule” from 7 AM to 1 PM like I do – or try to -, and then you can spend the rest of the day in the “Badi” of your choice, reading, listening to podcasts, and enjoying life!
1) Start Your Summer Schedule with a Beauty Ritual
Before you get your headshot taken, plan time to pamper yourself during the summer. Georgina Georgiu runs an English-speaking day spa in Zurich. The Pure Beauty Spa team is highly professional, and the products are amazing. It’s the perfect way to start your “summer schedule*.” You will get 20% off your first treatment when you mention “Angie Weinberger” in your booking.
2) Have Your Headshot Taken
You might also want to revisit why a personal brand is essential and how it links to your seven work principles (these are the seven work principles you chose during the HireMeExpress program, based on values that are important to you). If you are looking for a photographer, we recommend Carmen Sirboiu, owner of Carmen.Photo. All our members and clients are eligible for a unique discount for a Premium LinkedIn and Personal Branding photo session with Carmen. If you use the code ‘’Global People,’’ you get the session at the Special Price of 150 CHF (value 230 CHF).
3) Build More Personalized Professional Relationships Outside of the House
Summer is an excellent time to build new relationships and catch up with current contacts. Most busy people might feel less pressure than usual. Encourage them to enjoy the nice weather and spend time outside. So why don’t you take them for ice cream in the sunshine after work? Why don’t you request an early morning walk by the lake while enjoying a cold coffee? Or you could offer to take over their recycling runs as you have enough time on your hands at the moment in exchange for half an hour of them sharing career tips with you. A personalized request is key here.
4) Develop a Weekly Practice for Meeting your Contacts
Set yourself a weekly practice for meeting at least one contact. Ask them if they can introduce you to three more professional connections in your field. If you are hesitant, you probably have not yet written down your networking purpose. Write down your networking purpose, send it to me, and add a weekly practice to your RockMeApp.
5) Enjoy the Holiday with Your Family
Summer is also the best time to be away from Switzerland if you are looking for a job. You will probably not miss much, and in emergencies, companies could also interview you by video call in your holiday home. I would advise that you charge your batteries and get out of the city for a minimum of two weeks. Your children and partner/spouse will probably love that you have time for them.
6) Practice German and Prepare for an Exam
You have now been in Switzerland long enough to have at least started with German lessons. Ensure that you have one exam in your pocket and the certificate in your application file. While the summer is a great time to enjoy your time off, it also has rainy days. Join Heike Reinhart or Yvonne Herrmann-Teubel for a trial class and work on your German.
Join the Next HireMeExpress Program
Commit yourself to a schedule by working with us. The next HireMeExpress program after the summer break is open for sale from 5 July 2022 and will close on 14 July 2022. The program will start with the first group session on 26 August 2022, and we will release Module 1 on 19 August 2022. Let us know if you want to join our free workshops by replying to this email.
Wishing you a lovely summertime and see you again at the end of August.
Kind regards,
Angie & Team
References:
Coffey, Patty. In Forbes, 28 May 2021, „7 Reasons To Keep Up Your Job Search This Summer.” Retrieved 25 May 2021, from
Federal Office of Statistics, 27 May 2021, „Employment barometer in the 1st quarter 2021, Employment in Switzerland fell in 1st quarter 2021 for the fourth consecutive time – but outlook is positive.” Retrieved 25 June 2021, from
Federal Statistical Office, Employment barometer in 1st quarter 2022: Sharp rise in employment and vacancies in Switzerland in 1st quarter 2022 (press release), 30 May 2022,
https://www.bfs.admin.ch/bfs/en/home/news/press-releases.assetdetail.22604259.html, retrieved 17 June 2022.
Jaberg, Samuel. Swiss Firms Struggle With Staff Shortages, 16 June 2022, https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/swiss-business-short-of-manpower/47676212, retrieved 17 June 2022.
Kelly, Jack, in Forbes, 26 May 2021, „How to Attract the Attention of Recruiters as We Head Into the ‘Great Resignation’ and People Look to Switch Jobs.” Retrieved 25 June 2021, from
Picture this scenario: a leading multinational company must select somebody with the right skills to establish its first overseas division and has two equally strong candidates. Alice just got married and, in their best intentions but without consulting her, leadership decides that she would not like to go on assignment as she is likely to be starting a family. The opportunity is therefore offered to George.
What do Alice and George think twelve months later?
Alice and her husband wanted to get the wedding out of the way so that she could pursue her dream of going on an international assignment. She was shocked about not even being consulted. But it all worked out for her: she is now working overseas for one of their competitors and is very happy in her role.
The company’s decision came at the worst time for George. He and his wife were about to announce their first pregnancy to their families. But he still said “yes” to the opportunity and eventually convinced his wife to give it a try. It was, however, very tough on her: She was sick throughout the pregnancy, and when the baby was born, she had no support network. This situation also impacted George’s performance which was disappointing compared to his pre-assignment performance. For this reason, the company decided to bring him back.
I bet it’s not the first time you have faced this scenario. Wrong assumptions and stereotypes are, in fact, one of the reasons why women continue to be highly under-represented within the expat population.
Though we have to mention a few positive developments that make the prospect of the rise of women in Global Mobility look somewhat brighter. Take policy and awareness, for example. In 2011, only 12% of CEOs saw poor retention of female talent as a key business challenge, and only 11% were planning policy changes to attract and retain more female workers (PwC’s Annual Global CEO Survey). Yet, only five years later, 64% of CEOs worldwide confirm that they finally have a diversity strategy, and 13% plan to adopt one over the next 12 months (Pwc, 2016a).
What’s to Celebrate?
When we look at data, it’s essential to break it down. For example, even if it is true that the percentage of expat women swings between just 14% and 25% (Mercer, 2017; PwC, 2016a; PwC, 2016b), we cannot bypass the significant differences between regions and industry sectors. For example, while expat women in the energy and high tech sectors are only 8-11%, the percentage for the life science sector is 23%. Companies in the service and retail sectors also tend to have a higher rate of women expats.
Other research provides an even more optimistic picture, showing us how the proportion of expat women grew slowly but steadily from the 1980s onwards.
Continuing on the bright side, among those employees who have already had an international experience, 47% of the female and 53% of the male respondents confirmed they had completed more than one international assignment. In addition, based on their most recent international experience, 84% of women said they would repeat a similar experience, and 93% said they would recommend an international assignment to a colleague (PwC, 2016a).
And last but not least, 73% of women working in Financial Services believe they have the same opportunities as men to undertake international assignments at their current workplace (PwC, 2016b). This percentage is encouraging compared to the 50% of women taking part in the previous year’s millennial survey who believe that promotion is biased towards men (PwC, 2015).
Despite rejoicing over these good news, we shall keep in mind that these variations don’t influence the overall conclusions: we are still decades away from seeing the percentage of female assignees rising to 50%. In the best-case scenario, the predictions estimate this will be reached only around 2050 (Mercer, 2017).
How Can You Benefit From Having More Expat Women?
1 – You Will Facilitate Better Assignment Selection With a Broader Talent Pool
One of the leading mobility cost drivers is a direct consequence of the limited choice of candidates ready for assignments. Inviting more women to the club creates more options for your company and indirectly helps control costs better. The more good candidates you have, the better your selection will be and the higher the chances that you don’t have to sell an incredibly overpriced assignment package.
2 – You Will Record a Higher Assignment Success Rate
The When Women Thrive report highlights that women are perceived to have unique skills that are particularly relevant for expatriation, including flexibility and adaptability (39% vs. 20% who say men have those strengths); inclusive team management (43% vs. 20%); and emotional intelligence (24% vs. 5%.). In short, women tend to build cultural bridges better than men and work more sustainably.
3 – You Will Not Only Attract but Also Retain Talent
Female demand for international mobility has never been higher, with 71% of female millennials wanting to work outside their home country during their careers. Also, 64% of women interviewed said that international opportunities were critical in attracting and keeping them with an employer (PwC, 2016).
To successfully attract and retain female employees, you need to have a talent brand with international experience as a core element of your employee talent proposition.
Are you not yet convinced that more expat women add immense value to your company? In our previous post, we give other proof of how having a more diverse expat population makes you a more profitable and valuable company.
Seven Obstacles to the Rise of Women in Global Mobility
1 – Strategy
Like most international organizations, you too might be currently challenged with a lack of alignment between Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, and Global Mobility. You should work on solving this crucial issue as soon as possible. When goals and data are discussed with Senior Management, Global Mobility Managers must have a seat at the table.
2 – Policy
Many Global Mobility policies were initially developed for male assignees with children and a “trailing” spouse. It’s 2022, and this needs to change. Make sure your policy addresses the issues of expat women and new types of families – single parents, for example (the vast majority of them being female), or same-sex couples, for example.
3 – Nomination Process
As we mentioned in our previous post, there is still a lack of transparency over who is assigned and why. Companies often don’t have a clear overview of their employees’ willingness to be internationally mobile. And like in Alice’s and George’s stories, unconscious bias still plays a considerable (yet invisible) role in the selection of the candidates. Because of the prevalence of stereotypes that associate women with family, female employees are usually not even asked, even if they are willing to consider an assignment abroad. I’ve been there too. If you would like to take a short journey into the unconsciously biased HR world, look at this insightful article on gender decoding.
4 – Non-Diverse Host Locations
This is probably not a big issue in reality (apart from a few critical war zones and dangerous locations). The problem is rather the assumption that expat women won’t be accepted in their new role abroad because of the fixed gender roles men and women have in the host location. In fact, expat women in India automatically have a higher status than local women. And in some Muslim cultures, as long as you wear a ring implying that you are married, you can be seen as highly respectable and will be treated accordingly.
5 – Representation
While Global Mobility Managers are often female, women don’t benefit from the same representation rate at the upper levels. This means that Senior Leaders and Executives in Global Mobility are mainly men. As a consequence, lack of awareness at the Senior Management level is an issue, and this is especially true in traditionally conservative countries.
6 – Lack of Visible Assignment Opportunities for Women
65% of female employees (Pwc, 2016a) are still unhappy with the little transparency their companies offer over the availability of opportunities for overseas assignments.
It’s time that you make opportunities readily accessible to all, including underrepresented talent groups!
7 – Lack of Human Touch
The lack of Human Touch and/or previous bad Expat Experiences might stop women from actively seeking opportunities for international exposure.
HR and Global Mobility teams are often too busy focusing on the many operational aspects of the mobility program and fail to design a human-centric Global Mobility program for their expat population.
If you haven’t started yet, do it now. Talk openly about diversity in your policies and encourage internal discussion on this topic. Communicate about role models and success stories.
Six Potential Solutions for a More Inclusive and Diverse Global Mobility Program
1- Set Clear Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Goals for Global Mobility
Global Mobility, together with DEI teams, need to set realistic yet challenging goals for increasing the number of female assignees AND female department heads in Global Mobility. According to KPMG (2018), only 41% of the organizations surveyed had clear DEI objectives. Without specific targets, nothing will change!
2 – Allow for More Flexibility by Having Different Assignment Types
New types of assignments and flexibility are making things easier for women and employees with family responsibilities to go on assignment. As I reiterate in The Global Mobility Workbook, Global Mobility should not systematically be synonymous with traditional Long-Term Assignments. Even if those remain the preferred assignment type by both genders, women favor 6-to-12 months assignments more than men (37% vs. 29%). We can say the same for assignments shorter than three months (10% vs. 5%) as well as frequent business travels (36% vs. 32%) (PwC, 2016a).
3 – Identify and Understand What the Real Barriers are
Do you know what the real barriers to inclusive mobility are for your workforce and organizations? If you’ve never measured how your current policies hinder women’s mobility, you should act NOW. Stop simply assuming the barriers to gender inclusiveness and understand better where the actual issues lay. That’s why I recommend intercultural training for all Global Mobility Managers.
4 – Give More Visibility to Female Role Models
While 68% of men feel that there are enough male role models of successful expats in their organization, only 48% of women feel the same about female role models (PwC, 2016b). This negatively impacts companies’ wider female talent pool and Global Mobility programs. Therefore, if you want to help fill the gap, take active measures to drive awareness of the positive experiences of successful expat women within your organizations.
On page 24 of this PwC report, you can read a short and inspiring testimonial of a Tax Partner and Expat Woman role model.
5 – Use More Gender-Inclusive Language
Too often, Global Mobility policies still refer to their globally mobile workforce with masculine pronouns. And quite logically, the consequence is that they would make you assume that “trailing” Spouses should be female. Well, it’s 2021, and this is not the case anymore. If you want to make your program more inclusive, start by addressing your talent differently. The UN has recently published new guidelines that will definitely be useful when updating your policies too.
6 – Foster a Supportive and Inclusive Culture
It is critical for your company to move away from the restrictive gender stigmas of the past if you wish to unlock your full global workforce potential. Your ultimate challenge is to create a culture where all your employees are on board with diversity and recognize its value.
Our message is clear: Global Mobility strategies that do not fully include women will simply not deliver to their full potential.
How We Can Help you
If it all makes sense to you, but you don’t know where to start, we’re here to help. Here are four ideas on how we can do that.
- We deconstruct your expat nomination process and review your existing policies for inclusiveness.
- We improve the language you use in communication to make them gender-inclusive, and we also help you sprinkle them with “Human Touch.”
- We analyze your Expat Experience and identify unveiled barriers for female expats and their spouses.
- We facilitate transition workshops with expat women in the host country and prepare female candidates for potential expat assignments through our exclusive 1:1 Executive coaching program, RockMe!
PS: I have two more tips for you:
- If you are looking for a board member mandate in Switzerland, check out VRMandat and Stiftungsratsmandat. Check how they can support you.
- Look up these two links above if you’re trying to expand your board of directors.
Resources
https://stiftungsratsmandat.com/de/
https://dorothydalton.com/2016/03/11/gender-de-coding-and-job-adverts/
https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20160929-where-are-all-the-expat-women
https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/hr-topics/global-hr/pages/women-expatriate-workforce.aspx
References
KPMG. (2018). Inclusion and Diversity in Global Mobility. KPMG. https://assets.kpmg//content/dam/kpmg/xx/pdf/2018/06/global-mobility-inclusion-and-diversity-how-gms-can-help-move-the-needle.pdf
Meier, O. (2019). The path to diversity. Mercer. https://mobilityexchange.mercer.com/insights/article/the-path-to-diversity-women-on-assignment
PwC. (2011). 14th Annual Global CEO Survey. PwC. https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/ceo-survey/pdf/14th-annual-global-ceo-survey.pdf
PwC. (2015). Female millennials in financial services: Strategies for a new era of talent. PwC. https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/financial-services/publications/assets/pwc-female-millennial-report-v2.pdf
PwC. (2016a). Modern Mobility: Moving women with purpose. PwC.
https://www.pwc.com/gr/en/publications/assets/modern-mobility-moving-women-with-purpose.pdf
PwC. (2016b). Women of the world: Aligning gender diversity and international mobility in financial services. Pwc.
https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/industries/financial-services/assets/women-of-the-world.pdf
“We need to take a stance and stand up for minority and female talent now.” @angieweinberger
Are you a Senior Manager, often managing globally mobile talent in your company?
How many times have you had the realization that your company’s Global Mobility Program is not diverse enough? Are you concretely working to achieve your company’s Diversity and Inclusion (D&I) goals, and do you foster more inclusion within your team?
Let’s see how you can actively help fill the current gap in diversity common to so many organizations.
What Is a “Diverse and Inclusive Organization”?
An organization is diverse when it encompasses all aspects of the employees, from age, gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation, family status, and background. However, an organization is only inclusive when minority groups are allowed and encouraged to participate in the decision-making process and to contribute to breaking the career glass ceiling. Besides being meaningless, diversity without inclusion does not drive team performance (Czerny and Steinkellner, 2009). To quote the Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau, “inclusive diversity is a strength.”
Why Isn’t There More Minority and Female Talent in Global Mobility?
A KPMG survey highlighted that most Global Mobility Programs do not have specific Diversity and Inclusion objectives as part of their department’s strategy. Why is that?
According to 59% of the respondents, the reason is that candidates for international assignments are chosen by you and not the Global Mobility Team. This is true. However, this does not explain why you are not being more inclusive of minority and female talent in your selection.
Could you not challenge your promotion and selection decisions more often?
Another 31% consider the movement of people to new countries and cultures as diverse and inclusive by its very nature and do not think that further DE&I goals are needed. We believe this is too short-sighted and a biased view of the world. Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at this stage still need affirmative action (also called positive action in the U.-K.), that is to implement policies and guidelines to correct tendencies due to bias against women or any form of minority.
You and I need to push actively to integrate more minority and female talent into our expat populations.
What you consider a minority will depend strongly on your home base country, usually the country where your HQ is based. However, I recommend that you consider more second-generation immigrants, People of Color, and refugees.
Only 41% of the respondents say they have DE&I objectives as part of their Global Mobility strategy.
You indeed have acknowledged that meeting these goals is not easy. Here are the common challenges faced by most Global Mobility Programs.
1 – There’s a Data Gap on Most Aspects of Diversity
Apart from gender and gender identity, there is a scarcity of mobility-related data on most demographics (KPMG, 2018a). This makes it difficult for Global Mobility Teams to identify problem areas and find solutions related to disability status, religion, ethnicity, academic, professional, and socioeconomic backgrounds.
2 – There Are Still Too Many Biases and Stereotypes
As you can easily guess, this issue particularly affects how women are represented within the international mobile population. Currently, women only make up 20% to 25% of it (PwC, 2016; MacLachlan, 2018), which shows how much more work is needed to fill the gap.
The good news is that 88% of the women (PwC, 2016) feel that they need international experience to advance in their careers. The bad news is that there is a strong perception that women with children don’t want to work abroad. To make it worse, traditional mindsets still typically associate men with international assignments.
Interestingly, however, data shows that women don’t let that impede on their career plans: 66% of women would be happy to work abroad at any stage of their career (vs. 60% for men), and only 17% of women cited the well-being and education of their children as a concern preventing them from embarking on an international assignment (vs. 22% of men).
How many times have you consciously or unconsciously assumed that someone would not be able to perform their jobs effectively due to the situation in host locations? Or that they simply would not want to go on assignment due to family constraints, for example? Before assuming, just ask.
3 – There’s a Lack of Transparency Over Who Is Assigned and Why
Let’s look at gender again. The data speaks loud and clear, and it’s worrying.
According to 42% of women (PwC, 2016), organizations don’t have a clear view of what employees would be willing to be internationally mobile. This means that you may be choosing from a narrower pool than necessary.
What’s more, only 13% of women who have been on assignment said that their employer has a program that positions Global Mobility as a core part of an employee’s career plan.
4 – There’s a Lack of Flexibility in Assignment Choices
You might not know that shorter and more flexible short-term assignments are notably more popular among women than men (PwC, 2016). In particular, women tend to give favorable consideration to frequent business travel based in their home country, fly-in/fly-out commuter assignments, short (6-12 months), and short-term assignments. Therefore, if you expanded the list of available options, you could match a more comprehensive variety of business demands.
5 – There’s a Lack of Diversity Among the Pool of Candidates
In heavily male-dominated types of work, such as construction and mining, casting a wider demographic net may be impossible. Likewise, some candidates may not go after mobility opportunities because they feel out of place. This explains why, for example, women, older workers, and people with disabilities may not raise their hands for relocations to oil rigs or construction sites. At the same time, minority groups may feel discouraged because they lack role models. But why not ask those unlikely candidates? Maybe that is all it would take! So, like Sundae Bean advises in her podcast discussion with Cathy Heyne, managers should be mindful of their assumptions and simply chose the best candidates for the assignments (not the ones they think want to take the assignment).
6 – External Factors Pose Barriers Too
The definition of family has expanded to include same-sex couples for most mobility teams — rising from 17% in 1999 to 70% currently (KPMG, 2018a). However, attitudes and laws in many countries have not kept pace. Most countries still don’t allow same-sex marriage, and homosexual acts are illegal in at least 69 countries. According to the Human Rights Campaign Foundation (2021), there are still seven countries where homosexual conduct is punishable by death. There are still ways you can support your LGBTQᐩ employees. Discuss potential assignment destinations with them and their partner, make sure you and the employee understand the legal situation in order to plan accordingly, and ensure having good support in the host country.
How Can You Benefit From Being More Inclusive?
Even though it may seem that the global business case for boosting Diversity and Inclusion is clear, the reality is still shockingly stuck in the last century. I have even observed that we have gone back three steps to supporting minority and female talent in the past 25 years.
If you want to expand your global competitiveness, you need to be a pioneer of equal opportunities, promote acceptance and understanding, and highlight the value of your employees. You need more than unconscious bias training for managers. You need to establish facts. And that can only be achieved with data. Here are the four main reasons to develop D&I goals for your Global Mobility Program.
1 – You Tap Into a Bigger Pool of Resources
Establish concrete goals for sending minority and female talent and persistently work towards achieving them. You will then automatically broaden the talent pool from which the mobile population is drawn. This way, you will also help ensure that the executive pipeline reflects your customer base, developing a more diverse group of future leaders. Finally, report the data regularly to your Senior Management. Without data, nothing will change.
2- You Have Access to a Broader Range of Perspectives
It should go without saying that a broader range of backgrounds (considering all possible factors, i.e., gender/gender identity, sexual orientation, culture, language, socio-economic classes, etc.) results in a team having a more comprehensive range of perspectives. That will successively reflect itself in better-stimulated creativity and innovation, and a team ready for all opportunities.
3 – Your Team Will Collaborate Better
It has been proven that women generally have better collaboration abilities. This heightened sense of collaboration is in part due to women’s better ability to read non-verbal cues. Better collaboration will allow improvement in many fields, among which many team processes. Researchers have observed that groups with more women tend to respect speaking turns better and are better at leveraging each team member’s knowledge and competencies.
4 – You Control Costs Better
One of the leading mobility cost drivers is not related to pay packages and policies per se but because companies often have a limited choice of candidates for assignments. A broader talent pool facilitates assignment success and indirectly helps control costs. You depend less on one candidate and can negotiate better packages if you have a broader pool. You probably also have better candidates if you have more than one in the pipeline. Another way hiring minorities and women will benefit you financially is that happy and respected employees tend to be more loyal and easy to retain; that, in turn, saves you time, money and energy in the hiring and training process. Do bear in mind that hiring them is a good starting point, but not sufficient in itself: you have to treat them well and not be afraid to admonish sexism, racism, homophobia, ableism, etc. in the office or anywhere, for that matter!
5 – You Improve Your Brand and Reputation as an Employer of Choice
Nowadays, having international experience is a precondition to reaching top managerial levels within many multinational companies. Employees develop essential skills and build a network that boosts their careers immensely. It’s therefore crucial that you promote mobility as part of your talent brand. If you do that, you will also be advantaged when competing for minority and female talent. Offering international opportunities to minority and female talent will put you ahead of the competition by showing in your reviews. You will become renowned as an “Employer of Choice.”
If you feel you belong to one of the mentioned groups and you might need more support in order to have a breakthrough in your career you can always contact me for individual coaching. We offer several programs and free workshops as well.
The annual RockMeRetreat is for all senior-level professionals who need a boost to overcome challenges in there professional and personal lives. I am really determined to help minorities (of any kind) and women overcome the obstacles they face in their careers and better their journey. The RockMeRetreat will also help you if you need a “pitstop” to think about your current situation, improve your relationships and want to re-energize yourself.
We are offering the RockMeRetreat this year at the Haus der Begegnung, Ilanz, Grisons, from 17 to 23 November 2022. Sign up here to be updated and informed.
Resources and further reading
121: Why Only 25% Of International Assignees Are Women
https://www-srf-ch.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.srf.ch/article/18661443/amp
Murchie, F. (2020). Women on the front line. Relocate Global, Summer Issue 2020, p.13 https://content.yudu.com/web/fiqy/0A3p9yp/Summer-2020/html/index.html?page=12&origin=reader
https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2020/06/three-degrees-racism-america/613333/
References
Czerny, E. J. & Steinkellner, P. S. (2009). Diversität als Basis erfolgreicher Teams. Eine ressourcenorientierte Betrachtung. Unpublished Working Paper, Vienna: PEF Privatuniversität für Management.
Human Rights Campaign Foundation. (2019, Sep. 23). World Report 2019: Human Rights Watch Country Profiles: Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity. Human Rights Watch. Retrieved June 18, 2020, from https://www.hrw.org/video-photos/interactive/2019/02/28/human-rights-watch-country-profiles-sexual-orientation-and
Human Rights Campaign Foundation. (2021, April. 23). World Report 2021: Human Rights Watch Country Profiles: Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity. Human Rights Watch. Retrieved June 04, 2021, from
https://www.hrw.org/video-photos/interactive/2021/04/23/country-profiles-sexual-orientation-and-gender-identity
KPMG. (2018a). Inclusion and Diversity: How Global Mobility can help move the Needle. KPMG. Retrieved May 13, 2020, from https://assets.kpmg//content/dam/kpmg/xx/pdf/2018/06/global-mobility-inclusion-and-diversity-how-gms-can-help-move-the-needle-FINAL.pdf
KPMG. (2018b). Inclusion and Diversity in Global Mobility. KPMG. Retrieved May 13, 2020, from https://assets.kpmg//content/dam/kpmg/xx/pdf/2018/06/global-mobility-inclusion-and-diversity-how-gms-can-help-move-the-needle.pdf.
KPMG. (2021). Inclusion and Diversity in Global Mobility. 2021 U.S. DEI report. KPMG. Retrieved 7 June 2022. , from https://www.kpmg.us/content/dam/global/pdfs/2021/kpmg-us-2021-dei-report.pdf.
Maclachlan, M. (2018; Mar.). Why Female Talent Are the Future of Global Mobility. Learnlight. Retrieved June 18, 2020, from https://insights.learnlight.com/en/articles/female-talent-future-global-mobility/
PwC. (2016). Women of the world: Aligning gender diversity and international mobility in financial services. PwC. https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/industries/financial-services/assets/women-of-the-world.pdf
