[resu]

Other than teaching English abroad, how else can recent grads find work abroad? The article really drops the ball on that one and the meager links provided are useless.

I spent nearly two years abroad in undergrad interning abroad, but even then, finding a relevant (not teaching English) full time job in Asia or Europe when you're in North America is extremely hard.

[seanmcdirmid]

I found a good extremely appropriate post doc in Switzerland, which was completely serendipitous. After I was done in Switzerland, I emailed some manager at Microsoft China out of the blue, and have been in Beijing ever since.

If you have specialized skills, you should be able to find demand for them anywhere. You probably can't start a career here with nothing special in your resume, but you can work for a big corp (e.g. Microsoft) and eventually get transferred to one of their overseas R&D offices. They generally value experience, which might not be something they can get locally.

[w1ntermute]

How do you feel about destroying your lungs by living in Beijing? A friend of mine was so happy to leave after just half a year there.

[seanmcdirmid]

Winters suck. All the other seasons are bearable.

[newbie12]

Yep, I've worked in China and the only way to get to live abroad on a fat expat stipend is to have your existing US or European employer rotate you there. If you try to get a job through local channels you'll be getting a crappy local salary. Do not try to work overseas right out of school-- you are far better off getting solid industry experience and then trying to make the jump. Working abroad is a career-killer too, most of these operations are corporate backwaters.

[seanmcdirmid]

This isn't true.

I'm a LHF (local hired foreigner) in China, and my pay is decent enough. The lack of a package isn't bad if you don't have kids. I also work for a big American corp (but not as an expat), so my prospects are pretty good when I decide to go back. Not exactly a career killer, even if not working at home headquarters always has a disadvantage associated with it.

[newbie12]

Yeah but you obviously have a doctorate and commensurate experience to get hired. With respect to local hiring, I'm sure making less than what you'd earn in Seattle or San Jose is ok, but it isn't the high life that the OP was talking about.

[seanmcdirmid]

The high life is a myth, but I'm not starving. The fact that I can take a taxi to work everyday and not own a car has some savings also.

It would be really hard to get hired out of college into a tech job overseas. But with 3-4 years experience in San Jose, you could transfer to Beijing fairly easily, though as a LHF, not an expat. To get an expat package, you need to be a big shot.

[bane]

In the U.S., a couple options:

Join the military - we have bases all over the world and chances are you might end up assigned to one.

Join a Federal Agency that does overseas work - State, Intelligence Community, etc.

Join a megacorp with a substantial overseas presence, apply only for jobs that are in countries you want to live in. They'll handle all the work visa nonsense.

The good news is that for most of these, there's lots of bonus pay/subsidized housing involved. Working overseas you can save unbelievable amounts of money.

[pwim]

I got a job as a developer in Japan right after I graduated from University. I wrote about my experience here: http://www.tokyodev.com/2011/08/19/finding-a-job-as-a-ruby-d...

Having an in demand skillset (like being a developer) opens up a lot of possibilities.

[resu]

Interesting read, thanks for sharing!

I spent two summers in Tokyo in an investment bank, although I was too focused on having as much fun as possible to find what non-finance opportunities were available. Also, the prospect of working actual Japanese hours were not very exciting. How was the work-life balance at Ubit?

How is the market in Japan for (foreign) developers? If a recent grad were to follow your footsteps, how difficult would it be to find a decent and relevant job now, compared to 2006?

[pwim]

Even though I worked at a Japanese company, I didn't work Japanese hours. 10am-7pm were my typical hours.

Good developers are in demand everywhere! If you're a developer who has some side-project / open source contribution you can show off, I think finding a job isn't too tough.

I can't really comment on now vs 2006. I had no network back then, so that job was literally the only interesting looking one I could find. Now, I know of lots of good companies.