Is it easy to find a job in Germany after graduating with a PhD?

PhD graduates are a relatively special group. They have better qualities and have received more systematic and rigorous professional training and scientific research training. It is said that they should be more popular in the job market. However, the actual situation is quite different. Many Chinese PhD students studying in Germany are not recognized by their employers. Through many years of experience in helping doctors studying in Germany find jobs, the author will share with you the characteristics and difficulties of finding a job for doctors in Germany.

During the doctoral studies in Germany, PhD students have to have in-depth exchanges with their supervisors and people in the same group every day, and usually establish better personal relationships. In their spare time, they also gather with their supervisors and colleagues for travel, etc. So the German level is usually very good. Usually only when one's professional ability and communication ability are recognized during the master's degree can one have the opportunity to study for a doctoral degree. Through three to five years of rigorous training, doctoral graduates can take the mastery of professional knowledge in related fields to a higher level. Rigorous academic Attitude, professional and rapid learning ability are usually not matched by a master's degree. During the Ph.D. program, doctoral students usually participate in several academic conferences and establish close contacts with relevant companies, thereby gaining a better understanding of the corporate dynamics of their major. These are the obvious and valuable advantages of studying for a doctorate in Germany. But why do they have trouble finding jobs?

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German companies are very pragmatic. Everyone’s common sense is that only very professional and complex positions need to recruit PhDs. Generally, for complex positions, a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree are sufficient. This results in very few positions for PhDs in the job market. Usually only scientific research institutes, large companies and a very small number of small and medium-sized companies have demand for PhDs. To a certain extent, this puts doctoral graduates in a predicament where heroes have no use.

What is reflected in the German job market is that if you apply for a senior position, it will be difficult for you to succeed just by submitting a resume, because passing a resume review plus one or two interviews does not ensure that the most suitable talents for the company will be selected. Selecting and hiring the wrong senior talents will cause huge losses to the company. You can imagine that if BASF recruits a Ph.D. in chemistry to work in R&D, he spends three to five years on a project that consumes tens of millions of euros, and then he concludes that the R&D field has no future and is not worth continuing to invest in. In-depth research and development.

What should the company think? Was there an error in the assessment when the project was established, or was the developer not reliable enough and missing something? If it is the latter, unreliable scientific researchers will do great harm to the enterprise, losing R&D funds and valuable time. This is something that big companies will never accept and try to avoid. How can we avoid it?

Germany is a credit society. When recruiting senior positions, companies not only value your performance during the interview, but also attach great importance to your history and whether you have enough credit to recommend you and the strength of the recommendation. In reality, many senior positions in large companies are given to doctoral candidates who have performed well in interviews and are highly recommended by their peers.

Unfortunately, China’s Ph.D. program in Germany is not done well enough. When you graduate, you usually only get a mediocre recommendation letter from a professor, and there are very few companies and other scientific research institutes to deal with. Additional recommendations from experienced professionals at the firm. This has also resulted in fewer Chinese Ph.D.s studying in Germany entering important positions in leading companies in various industries.

Some doctoral programs are in English. If you want to find a job in Germany, please learn German immediately. Except for a small number of industries and a small number of international companies, German companies still have requirements for German. English-only positions are rare and require job seekers to have extremely high professional achievements and good luck. 95% of the PhDs we have seen found positions in German.

If you still cannot find a job as a Ph.D. after six months of job hunting, it is recommended that you treat yourself as a job seeker with a master's degree and some work experience. The position should not be limited to R&D. Ph.D.s in many industries It is very common to do quality management, project coordination and market development after graduation.

If you have not completed your doctoral studies, complete your project as much as possible, have a good relationship with your supervisor and senior professionals, and ask them to give you a strong recommendation letter.

Don’t be too obsessed with salary. The average annual salary of a newly graduated Ph.D. is about 57,000 euros. Some are high and some are low. Many times, PhDs must look for jobs as senior masters. Many medium-sized companies cannot offer such high salaries to masters, but the job prospects are very good. At this time, a salary as low as 50,000 is acceptable. /zd/lx