I am a high-earning career woman in Switzerland, AMA

[JollieJullie]

Bit bored today as everyone is on holiday and work is quiet

If anyone is interested in my experience with climbing the corporate ladder and moving to Switzerland, I'd be happy to share.

What do you mean by “high”? How much do you earn?

What do you do for work?

Do you have a husband//wife/partner and/or kids?

North of 200k CHF.

I work as a Communication Director at a large Swiss multinational company. I lead a big team so a massive part of my role is people management rather than comms work.

Are you multi-lingual? Did you move to CH at the height of your career or midway?

No, I am single. I moved countries a lot in my 20s to develop my career and then had a pretty unhappy relationship right after I moved to Switzerland at 29.

I am now in my early to mid 30s and I am still hoping to meet someone and open to the possibility of having kids down the line.

Yes I am bilingual, but I actually can't speak the language of the canton I live in (Zürich). At work we speak English only, so learning German hasn't been necessary so far.

I moved here after working in Asia and London for 5 years, I was essentially at a project manager level and had no leadership experience. Most of my career development to date has happened in Switzerland.

Where did you go to uni and what did you study?

For some reason from your title I imagine you have a gorgeous work wardrobe like this and envy you for that

Funny enough, I studied something completely unrelated to what I do today.

I studied Architecture (Bachelor and Masters). I got my Bachelor in my European home country and then got a double masters degree in Denmark and China.

After graduating I realized that architecture wasn't my thing and I was able to get an internship at a startup as a Junior Graphic Designer in the marketing and comms team, and then worked my way up from there.

Ahahah to be honest it is not that far off

Have you worked both corporate and for agencies in comms?

I have only worked for companies so far. From the outside working at an agency doesn't look super appealing (crazy hours and unpredictable requests from clients), but never say never

Are there many career men where you work?

Yes I would say most of the senior roles (Director level upwards) are held by people, men and women, who are very ambitious and invested in their careers. My department is mostly female and my manager is a woman, but the comms is traditionally a female-dominated field. In my company sales and ops are male-dominated and marketing is 50/50 I would say.

Do you find that Swiss society tends to support career women? Also, how is your HR department?

Did you have a ‘privileged’ childhood (don’t mean that in a bad way)?

What was your first job?

My specific company is quite good in supporting women, there is good flexibility for mothers and several women in leadership positions with multiple young kids.

However, I hear that Swiss society at large is not supportive of working mothers at all. The school system is essentially set up based on having one parent at home and childcare is insanely expensive.

I had a "privileged" childhood in a very middle class sense of the word. My family was financially comfortable, both my parents were very invested in my education, and I was given lots of educational opportunities such as traveling and taking private language courses. My parents supported me at university and allowed me to live abroad for my masters. So I don't come from extreme money but I definitely had a privileged childhood in many ways.

My first job was as an unpaid design intern at a tech startup in China. I was 24.

Are you going to the street parade? 😂

It's the middle of the working day.

Have you not got much to do this week?

Most of my colleagues are on holiday so work is pretty slow this week. I expect it will pick up again next week.

LOL, over my dead body

why should I care?