Skip to main content
Campus Community

Career Services Hosts International Job Specialist

Leading international employment consultant and author of The BIG Guide to Living and Working Overseas, Jean-Marc Hachey (at left), provided information and tips on international employment during the BYU-Hawaii’s Career Services seminar on International Employment held Thursday, March 27 and Friday March 28.

Hachey, who is originally from Canada, has a long list of activities and involvement with organizations that qualify his expertise in the subject. According to Kim Austin, director of Career Services, he received a Bachelor of Business Administration degree from the University of New Brunswick in 1979 and a Master of Arts in Political Science from the Université Laval, in Québec City, Canada, in 1986.

He is a columnist for Transitions Abroad Magazine, and has been involved with international organizations such as the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, World University Service, Canadian Crossroads International, and the German Volunteer Service; and he is fluent in both French and English.

Hachey shared information at three different sessions, the Thursday evening one for international students entitled "How To Get There From Here: Finding Employment in Other Countries," where he shared ideas on how to obtain a position working overseas. His main suggestion was to go for a local firm that had employees abroad, rather than going directly to a firm in another country.

“The key to having a professional career-enhancing job will most likely be obtained from searching by specific sectors, rather than for a specific country,” Hachey said. He also explained the difficulties in trying to find work in a specific country, where you may be limited to small-wage jobs, such as in a restaurant or shop. Instead, he advised the students to look at a specific employment sector because many large firms have international offices. Once established, employees might be sent overseas and the firm will take care of the expenses. “That’s a much easier way to get a job in the international arena.”

At the beginning of the seminar, after the introduction by Austin, Hachey encouraged the students to emphasize the international population at at BYU-Hawaii and include it in future school and job applications.

During the second session for faculty and staff on Friday morning, Hachey shared the same information with faculty and staff who were interested in helping their students excel in the international job world. He spoke mainly about the type of employee who succeeds in the international employment sector, and mentioned specific characteristics that employers look for. According to Hachey, students need a certain “international personality, or characteristics that one develops while living abroad.” Someone who has an international personality:
    enjoys change
    loves a challenge
    has street smarts
    has a sense of adventure
    keeps an open mind
    exhibits patience
    has a sense of curiosity

Hachey also had lists of characteristics to help one be effective in overseas work, such as lots of energy and a calm demeanor, among other things.

He encouraged the faculty to enable students to participate in international research projects with diverse teams who work together to learn about international organizations, and other cultures or events.

“You should have meetings where students are not allowed to meet face to face, but have to use the telephone, email and the Internet. Students need those skills,” he said, and added that students also need to “suffer through the frustration of waiting 24 hours or more for a piece of information” that they need to finish the project.

At the end of the presentation, he promised students would get a job if they were persistent, proceed boldly, take the initiative, present confidence and are determined to get one.
 
Austin shared that she wanted Hachey to come to BYU-Hawaii since hearing him speak “at a conference in New York and felt that his international employment presentation may have value for many of our students. His background and subject matter seemed to be a good fit for our campus.”

She felt the student session was the most beneficial of the three sessions. “His two-hour presentation on Thursday night was a very detailed workshop on how to prepare, find and apply for those opportunities. There were several areas that he covered particularly well. I thought his suggestions on how to do occupational research on employers in other countries were very good. I liked that he broke that down by sector.”

As for the information Hachey shared and how it fits into the goals and orientation of the BYU-Hawaii Career Services office, Austin said, “There were a few suggestions offered by the speaker that our staff would not necessarily recommend; but overall, the seminar provided very useful information and advice.” She recommended separating the good from the less useful. “When I attend presentations, I always try to identify a few key ‘take-aways’ from the session.”

“While I may not see eye-to-eye on every single point, I can generally either learn something new or increase my understanding of a particular subject. In this case, I found more than a few key take-aways.” 

-photos by Ryan Bagley