Working in Turkey as Foreigner, Personal Point of View - P2

Unusually people like to write about a stage of their life personal or Professional after they pass it, now I feel it is late if I wait till that moment, what I will be sharing here is a fact in huge part of it and is sum up of around 80 – 100 job interviews most of them were always to understand the markets, the sectors, the demands and make a projection form y career.

?t all start when I had my 1st interview where I was quiet satisfied with the job I had already, so I was free and took my whole time to ask all questions, I came and I had this HR specialist, a young pretty lady in her thirties, she asked what I would like to drink and as usual if the interview is in the morning I am asking for a black cup of coffee to put all pieces together in my mind, if it is afternoon I am asking for fresh cup of Turkish coffee, I don’t like in my nature to say No for someone trying to offer anything, and I think in interviews it is not the prefect beginning to start with, with the lady there was a?HR Manager, a man in his late forties with a suit and some colors not very well thought off. I had my black coffee and put my notebook in front of me. The classical questions, nothing new and was easy to take both to the social space breaking those protocols that are obviously are made up. I found myself asking as if I am the one who is asking to hire them, avoiding of course the unnecessary deep diving questions. Since that day and I just started liking the way every interview is adding something to your vision, your character, your knowledge and even your simple posture. Since then I started honestly doing this asking myself I know many companies are posting jobs not to hire this year or the next one or at all, if the companies have right to do that we too as candidates have the right to do probably for the same purposes they are doing it.

I know I have an attractive CV but yet scaring CV, Masters in different even opposite fields, experiences in different sectors and different places, things I thought of all at the very beginning when I decided to draw my career in sales and international marketing and business, it was form e the field where Mathematics meet literature and both of them meets communication and media studies in a perfect harmony. I didn’t regret that choice and has been always harvesting its result. The attractive and confusing CV allow met o attend as much as I want of job interview from food sector, construction, cosmetics, machineries, automotive, home appliances, furniture, infrastructure, Technologies …

As almost everywhere, in the beginning of every interview I had to give a geographic lesson about where Mauritania is located and the fact that Mauritania and Mauritius are different so most of the people who called for interview they didn’t even bother to research where do I come from? Mars or Uranus but yet they ask in details what I know about their companies, after I should justify for most of them why I chose Turkey over France, Canada or USA and trying simply to say I love the country and explaining what I thought of 10 years ago when I arrived to this country. The fact that I am African and Turkey those days was trying to build a bridge to Africa and Middle East with its European part all of it makes from it a place where the non existing opportunities now may just explode. That unknown potential trigged me and attracted me with the feeling I had for the country, may be my choice was emotional more than pragmatic and on another hand it was kind of revenge of a visa demand that I had in French embassy for 3 months waiting after I got my university approval there and everything.

So after where is Mauritania? Why Turkey? And the classical questions of Professional experience, education and languages, sometimes I bother to explain everything but at the end of the day the quantity of information I give will be almost the same of the one I take, the question about what do you know about us, sometimes I bring to the company its history not just what they put in their website, the companies I car effort more this is an opportunity for me to find out more about them, so I know sometimes about them more than the ones in front of me, sometimes I say I didn’t get time to find out much about you? To see how much that affect you during the interview.

There are a lot of anecdotes, when the interviewer told me, I worked in this position for 10 years now and I am not getting the salary you are asking for now, and I replied : well life put us where we felt comfortable to settle sometimes, I remember Managers I had interviews with and stil we meet having coffees, playing football sometimes and it was a beginning of a friendship, I remember when one who suggest form e to go back home and become the president of Mauritania, I remember some HR who called me later asking met o do business together and found companies,

As a qualified foreigner in this country, sadly they look at you in 2 ways:

-?????????Came from Africa, so take advantage, he will accept already whatever you give him, I came across couple of companies and people in this level of thinking and to starting to locate your profile of their broken scales, so they start diminishing your career and experiences, so I felt so free to get the questions back to them : what experience did you have to get into this chair, what school did you go to, moreover I was free to cut the interview and telling them: this was waste of time but anyway thank you for your time. This kind of people even don’t give themselves a chance to think about any sentence in the CV. I feel pity for them and their companies, most of the company you decide about how are they from the language of their HR and the managers you meet, even when you get in from the door, the atmosphere of the company say sall about it.

-?????????The 2nd way, well he is a foreigner and he speaks Turkish very well studies in one of our best universities worked for companies leaders in their sector but yet he is not white coming from England or France, most of these companies the one sitting in front of you put in his profile on LinkedIn MBA somewhere just name it in England or USA and when you search that MBA it was one month there as a part of program they paid for it in a university here in Turkey or it was a couple of months exchange program but yet no hesitation to write MBA. The managers of this company they believed their MBA till the level that when they talk to you the separate themselves and turkey and Turkish but yet for them you are someone who made wrong choice whatever the reason and wont mind working for what we offer. The best feeling is to have that interview and you know nothing there to lose.

The company with clear KPI, bonus system, vision that is clear to every single worker from the tea maker to top management, environment that is prepared to maximize your productivity and creativity are few in Turkey and they were almost 10% of the small group I met.

What I gained from this experience so far, is to have an idea about most of sectors in Turkey, the work philosophy, salaries range and more importantly with those the interviews went in the correct proper professional way, they become a network that I meet in fairs, in airports and even in the restaurants in Turkey and abroad.

Turkey doesn’t seem especially with the latest changes to be the ideal place to find a job for a skillful expats, but I still think it is just a matter of time for the companies to understand the importance of having a multicultural background team with different languages, cultures, philosophies and business approach and get to be sure of the fact that to be global brand you need diversity as core value. Salary is not a brush painting all workers at all level with, you decide the team you want and the salary you are willing to give is essential in that decision making process. s the companies most of them do not want to accept what it takes to be a global brand or to be competitive at global stage, and all these interviews just proved for me what I thought, this is a country with companies that produce well but they have long way to go to get to the global marketing and branding competition, that doesn’t mean that there are no companies and brands who made their way globally in very proper and professional way but they are so few to be mentioned. ?