Category Archives: Working

Working & Living in Germany – Europass

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This entry is part 1 of 1 in the series Traps & Myths about EU permits

The Europass – What is it really?

The Europass is not (although it might sound like it) a residence, travel or work permit; it has nothing to do with travelling, living or working in the European Union. It is not a document you need to hand in to get a working permit or a residence permit, nor is it a document for acknowledging your qualifications or vocational training.

Thus, the name is quite irritating, although the idea behind the Europass is promising. It is a service to facilitate communication of your skills, qualifications, education and other job application documents. It should provide a platform to facilitate comparison of skills, different university degrees and other qualifications.

Education and training authorities can define and communicate their curricula content, citizens can use predefined forms for e.g. their CVs, language skills.

If done and used by a majority this would enable employers to understand the skills and qualifications of their workforce more easily and comparison would be facilitated and job application rounds in the EU could become fairer and more transparent.

Additionally, it is possible to ask for the “Europass Mobility” document, which records knowledge and skills in other European countries, for the “Certificate Supplement”, which describes the knowledge and skills acquired and is based on your education and training certificates. Further, the “Diploma Certificate” is issued on basis of your knowledge and skills acquired by holders of higher education degrees.

However, these are lot of “ifs”, “cans” and “woulds”. The Europass has still some flaws: it is a platform providing several documents and forms, however they are still to be filled in by the persons themselves and no one has to fill them in. There are no real guidelines to fill in the Language passport or the CV, which makes comparison subjective and not really easier than comparing two different CVs.

It is questionable to what extent the Europass meets its objectives at the moment and how useful it is at the moment. However, it is a good idea and hopefully in some years comparison of skills, qualifications as well as of academic and vocational training is fair and easier throughout Europe. To achieve this, however, we need some musts and guidelines and really comparable documents and grade scales.

BLUE CARD EU – how to apply

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This entry is part of 2 in the series EU BLUE CARD

We are asked very often, “can I apply for Blue card EU electronically?” – Regarding Germany definitely no:

The Blue Card EU is a specific work permit for NON EU people. It is not possible to apply for the Blue Card EU online. Although, there are some differences on the exact procedure of applying throughout some German cities, overall the procedure is the same.

You have to go to the authority in person (at some authorities you even need to make an appointment beforehand). Furthermore, you have to hand in specific documents and forms and therefore have to bring all papers with you to the authority (hint: check gohelpy to know which documents you need and how to prepare them).

In order to save time and money you check if you meet the criteria for the EU Blue Card before applying:

  • You have a binding job offer (on expert level or job of the white list)
  • You have recognition of your professional and vocational training
  • Your salary is higher than € 50,800 (job of white list i.e. IT, Doctor, scientist  € 39,624 per year)

It is only possible to apply for the EU Blue Card if you fulfill all criteria and have all documents with you when applying in person at the authority.

Immigration to Germany

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This entry is part 4 of 4 in the series Authorities

Recommendation: Employers should be proactive in relocating employees to Germany and should initiate the process as soon as possible to not cause unwanted delays. Due to a lack of resources in the German Immigration authorities authorities and an unexpected high volume of resident/work permit applications the current adjudication times are between 8 and 12 weeks.

The problems include the inability of offering appointments on short notice or answering phone calls relating to applications. Especially affected are complex application which require special consultations and often additional training for staff. In order to address the current capacity problems new people are hired, nevertheless regularizing the lack of resources will take some time as the new staff needs specific and adequate training as well as job experience.

Immigration will remain unchanged for companies, which relocate employees to Germany, however guidance cannot be provided by the authorities to do so at the moment. Further additional requests by the authorities asking for provision of additional documents could be experienced by foreigners and their employers. Additionally, inquiries in relation to qualifications, salary rates, benefits and employment conditions could be requested.

 

Startup scene Germany

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New star on Germnay’s startup scene – Hamburg gains impotance

Berlin is the heartland of the German startup-scene: good infrastructure and low housing price. However, one city is catching up – Hamburg. The Hanseatic town is catching up fast and even leading concerning Tech-Startups.

Following a survey Hamburg meet the current trends for choosing a startup location. Founders of young technology-enterprises estimate that the Hanseatic city will gain in importance even further as a study of PwC indicated. Hamburg ranks with 74% best out of 9 compared cities, followed by Berlin and Frankfurt a. M.

At the bottom maneuver, according to the study, Stuttgart, Dresden and Karlsruhe. Not even 50% of the 500 interviewed Start-up-founders believe that these cities will increase their importance in light of the startup-scene. Munich, Cologne and Düsseldorf reach mean values. The study is based on the European Digital City index, which includes all German cities.

Reasons for the assessment are unknown. Hamburg is amongst other a location for media and trading enterprises. More than half of the respondents operates in the sectors of information- and communication technology followed by E-commerce (25%).

Brexit is on the horizon already – first impacts are felt

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A recent case shows that Brexit has its influence on European as well as British citizens already. Uncertainty is immense and still growing among all citizens. A British had to feel this personally: Because of uncertainty a landlord decided to rent his flat to a person with lower income, however a European citizenship, lasting longer than the next 2 years. He valued the security of having a tenant for probably longer than the next year higher than the security of the higher income of the British citizen.

Uncertainty, especially concerning citizenships, work and residence permits is extremely high, not only on the side of the British citizens but among EU citizens working and living in Great Britain as well. “Will I be allowed to live here? Will I be posted to another country? How long will I be allowed to live here from now? What will happen?” All these questions are going around in many peoples’ heads. And of course not only those directly influenced by the Brexit, but they influence those indirectly affected as well. This group is huge: landlords, hotels, apartment-owners and many more are people being uncertain about the Brexit´s impact on their jobs as well.

Although, nothing is really decided yet on the Brexit conditions the consequences of it are growing and growing as uncertainty rises.

We have to wait and see and hope for the best, for both sides.

Berlin’s top-employers

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This entry is part of 8 in the series TOP TEN

What do Deutsche Bahn, Vivantes, Charité, BVG, Deutsche Rentenversicherung, Siemens and KPMG have in common? – On the first sight: not a lot besides there large company size and being based in Berlin.
However, you should have a closer look at those companies. In times of scarce employees and problems to fill employment vacancies with talented and appropriate people these companies developed programs to enhance conditions of employment and to create a better working atmosphere.

These programs include flexible and individually adjusted working models, family friendliness as well as diversity. Other points are programs and support for health and leisure activities as well as initiatives to improve the atmosphere between the employed and between the different working levels. Outstanding: KPMG provides every employee with the opportunity to take up to 4 hours per month to follow voluntary activities.

 

Germany – a developing country in regards of digitalization?

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Angela Merkel introduced the national IT-summit, which is now renamed into ‘Digital-Summit’. It was designed to create a digital agenda, increase digitalization in Germany and hence to secure Germany’s competitiveness for the future in a digitalized world. However, after Merkel declared the ‘Internet as new ground for all of us’ in 2013 not a lot happened until now. Germany fell back even further: from place 15 to place 17.

Especially, broadband expansion and the low degree of attractiveness of digitalization to the majority of the German middle- and large-scale companies are the problems. The German broadband infrastructure was ranked 28th out of 32 by OECD. Germany risks loosing infrastructure for its industrial locations. Furthermore, most of the large and middle-scale companies in Germany fear the risks of digitalization more than valuing its benefits and improvements. Even if the companies see the benefits, most of the time the decision to modernize and digitalize is driven by cost-saving factors rather than by developing new business models and concepts.

Room for hope: the increased number of start-ups as well as more and more graduates who rather start their career in those more digitalized as well as future-oriented companies than in more stable, though older and more backwards oriented companies.

In light of this Berlin is on the best way. It is attracting more and more startups.

Relocation and Digitalization for migration?

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Relocation is a long and well-known but costly thing. It is more a service offered to highly settled managers and high-end salary earners than a service for average earners. Furthermore, it became dramatically complicated and unclear due to increased digitalization and more and more websites providing information.
How can relocation get clearer again? And how could the process of digitalization be used to increase proficiency of relocation, to facilitate migration from one country/city to another country/city and how could we make relocation available for average earners and the broad population?
Nowadays the main problem is that every city itself provides a bulk of information on its city website, however most of the time in the country’s language only, or without related links or further information regarding specific documents or specific steps one has to take. Not everyone can effort to engage private relocation services and those people have to wander alone through the jungle of different websites, languages and chaotic documents to get the information they need to organize their migration.
The new idea is to combine relocation services with digitalization in such a manner to make it easy and affordable for the vast majority of people moving from one country to another. Online-Portals such as gohelpy provide all the information you need in multiple languages, and most importantly: on one platform! You do not need to search multiple websites or research for hours the specific documents you need for e.g. a renting contract or your registration with the municipality. Those portals provide all information, steps and documents you need and adapt it to your desires and circumstances! Those portals digitalize the old relocation service and develops it further on to another level: away from an upper class, top-salary earner service to a service for everyone!
Try it out now!

New Trend: Professional people sharing flats

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You are not a student anymore but you do feel like a student or miss your good old student times in shared flats? You are single but you do not want to live alone?
Then you should follow this new trend: professional people sharing flats! More and more of these types of shared flats are popping up in bigger cities.
The advantages? – Many!
You do not have to live alone by your own, however if you are professional you might not want to live together with students, having completely different daily routines, and of course a different standing towards tidiness and comfort.
Sharing a flat with other professionals offers you a family of like-minded people. You share a similar daily routine and most of the time you have similar standings concerning comfort, tidiness and house rules.
Professionals do have a higher level of comfort they want to live in, however they also have a bigger budget as they are working already. Students do not have such high-level expectations towards their rooms as their budget is only small and they are not working but studying…and partying (you know you were a student once as well). However, therefore professional sharing a flat with student could cause some trouble. This is the reason why the new trend of ‘professional shared flats’ is rising so fast. Multiple online portals included already the option to search for ‘professional shared flats’ as opposed to ‘student shared flats’ within the bigger cities of Germany such as Berlin, Munich, Hamburg and co.
This might be something for you? Try it out! Find your room in a shared flat and live together with like-minded.

Tallinn – Berlin: a win-win partnership for startups

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A delegation of several different start-up companies from Berlin visited Tallinn, Europe’s heart of digitalization and start-ups. “48h- Tallinn” was a short trip to the Labs and start-up centres of the Estonian capital.
Both sides would benefit immensely from a partnership between Estonian start-ups from Tallinn and start-ups in Berlin. Estonia being the most digitalized European country, providing its citizens with the opportunity to vote online, make their tax declaration online and providing an extensive e-government, the start-ups from Tallinn are technically advanced to those from Berlin. Berlin’s start-up scene can learn from Tallinn’s start-ups and could digitalize faster and more efficient. The Estonian side however would benefit from the partnership through access to the large German market. By cooperating with start-ups from Berlin, Tallinn’s start-up scene could expand to the German market, as well as attracting more German investors to the Estonian start-up scene.
Therefore, this is a win-win situation and we are glad to welcome the Estonian start-ups here in Berlin!