Anybody have experience of working for a Swiss company?

Check your contract for holes.

What kind of answer is that? Are you (e)mental?

If it's anything like the flag it'll be a big plus.

So you work from gnome?

I worked for Toblerone in the 90's. It had it's ups and downs

It's enough to drive you cuckoo.

I have, and they seem like the oddest lot I've ever experienced.

They were always far to busy to explain what they wanted you to do, or the parameters or rules around that, or let you have any pertinent information but all the time in the world to tell you how wrong you got things after you'd tried.

They are big on rank. Information is available by rank, which means the people not doing the work have access to the information needed to do it, but the ones doing the work do not. See above.

About 10% of the workforce was on a disciplinary at any one time. I got disciplined once (the first and only time in my life) for doing EXACTLY what I'd been told to do by my boss via his administrator.

I've been over there for a day for a meeting and discovered at lunchtime that I pay for my own lunch, in cash, from a machine two blocks away that dispenses a minimum of 100F notes. For a sandwich. in the canteen of the HQ of my employer, when in every other country I've ever worked in the protocol is the local firm covers this sort of thing to reduce buggeration and admin. But they love buggeration and admin.

Manager takes exception to an expense claim that is entirely within policy and threatens to discipline the whole company if this happens again.  When their error is pointed out is there any kind of sensible response? No. Pretty much everyone in Europe receives a new contract of employment. I bet that was cheap. No comment when people quit on principle and needed replacing. Buggeration and admin.

Training? My boss said with a straight face that he would produce a training record showing I had been taught something I didn't know when we both know this training never happened and that record would be falsified.

When a car crash whilst working landed me in hospital the VERY FIRST communication from my boss was to tell me off for not filling in the right form to report the damage to my car.

12 of us out to dinner is Swiz. Each pay individually so 12 expense claims in 12 home countries is so much more buggeration and admin that doing it just once. Only the Swiss thought this was a good idea.

Arrive at a restaurant in the rain 15 mins before your reservation. Can you come inside and maybe get a drink? No -  pace around in the rain and I'll let you in at 19:00. Only the Swiss thought this was a good idea.

Transiting through a Swiss airport to France (like 1/2 the people in that airport). When you want a sandwich and have loads of Euros and £ in your pocket, they go all theatrical that you haven't armed yourself with the currency of a country you hoped to spend less than an hour in. Pretending that this has never happened before. They'd rather argue about it than make the sale.

At least the chocolates good....

Are you employed in the UK affiliate of the swiss company, or employed out of Switzerland but resident in UK? (I.e. have a swiss not UK contract?)

@smiffy

Thanks for articulating exactly what I have experienced!

Although they did buy my lunch when I visited.

Which i was gald about as a canteen lunch of soup or salad and a basic main like burger and fries is £20!

So it could be a cultural trait rather than specific to my employer?

That makes me feel a bit better.

@big_scot_nanny the former.

I've had a few Swiss clients over the years.  My impression (as a slight outsider) was that they are actually pretty good places to work but they do like a rule and are not good at change.  I did find that they were about 40 years behind the UK on attitudes to women in the workplace - not sexual harassment stuff (that would be against the rules) but the bigger cultural equality/respect/value/glass ceiling aspects.  A friend who lives there tells me that essentially reflects society in general though - she has a PhD, but still the assumption was when she had kids she's stay home to look after them.

I work in the London office of a Swiss company. Absolutely no issues - in fact it's probably the most efficient, people-focussed place I've ever worked. Never have to work late, zero-stress, loads of benefits etc. All my Swiss colleagues (mainly in Zurich) seem to enjoy it too. And there are plenty of high-ranking women in the company despite it, historically, being a very male dominated industry.

So, you're saying it runs like clockwork then?

@smiffy That's exactly my experience of Switzerland as well. I just stay away from Switzerland nowadays.

A good friend of mine, who worked in a Swiss office for many years said that, in Switzerland, everything is either mandatory, or forbidden.

I’ve worked for the uk affiliate of a Swiss pharma giant, and directly for the same Swiss global corp.

absolutely no issues at all.  In fact, really liked working for them: they really wanted to do things properly.  Expectations were high, but they were for everybody, you also got to enjoy the benefits of those high expectations.

however: also worked for another Swiss pharma giant (based in the same Swiss town) - and they were absolutely the opposite.  I was working (contacted onto a big project) with a UK based teams, and they were probably the least professional and most unpleasant people I’ve ever experienced (and I work with Biotech companies - who are frequently run by egomaniacs/narcissists). It was consistent, so certainly a cultural issue at that company.

so in summary: I’ve found that it depends on the individual companies culture, and the quality of the people that they are hiring.  I’ve had both better and worse treatment from companies in other countries.

I’ve lived and worked in Switzerland for over 15 years and haven’t really experienced any HR oddness. Having said that, I’ve only worked for small companies, where HR is the people down the corridor, not a faceless department. I have sometimes been surprised how quickly colleagues have been let go, always with the assurance that the correct process has been followed. When it takes so long to recruit someone, this can be frustrating, but it’s more efficient than promoting useless people to other departments which I saw happen often in local UK government..

I think the important thing to realise about Switzerland is that there is a huge difference in attitudes between the French and German speaking populations. That anecdote from Smiffy about not being let into a restaurant early - I’ve never experienced anything like that in Lausanne, where I live.

I have a few Swiss German clients. Easiest explanation of how they are is this: they’re Germans, turned to 11.

The one French Swiss client I had was pure evil. Omnidirectional, back stabbing, out to trip you up, evil. But that was more to do with the company than the national culture.

The large allegedly-gold-tooth-processing bank were lush to work with. Their in-house developed software that I was replacing was actually marketable it was that good. Employees were really happy and seemed to enjoy a good working environment.

tomtomthepiperssonFull Member
I work in the London office of a Swiss company. Absolutely no issues – in fact it’s probably the most efficient, people-focussed place I’ve ever worked. Never have to work late, zero-stress, loads of benefits etc. All my Swiss colleagues (mainly in Zurich) seem to enjoy it too. And there are plenty of high-ranking women in the company despite it, historically, being a very male dominated industry.

Maybe Tom and I work for the same company, maybe it's one of the others.

I worked for the UK subsidiary of a Swiss food manufacturer. No real issues- their model was to give a reasonable level of autonomy to the international entities.

I also worked in the UK office of a smaller Swiss company. They were pretty laid back (French based). Took a while getting used to the 3 kiss greeting when meeting colleagues.

Lived and worked there for 5 years, for the Swiss arm of a giant US Biotech company. There are so many Swiss 'rules' that are unspoken which even left my German colleagues exasperated.
Hard to do but get friendly with some Swiss people - they last a lifetime and they'll help with those rules. 10 years later I still have zoom calls with 3 of them.
As you probably know Switzerland is 3 countries in one. The Swiss Germans differ from the French and Italian Swiss. The Swiss Germans company management were some of the most pedantic people I ever met.

At least the chocolates good….

I used to get a kilo a month free. 🙂

I enjoyed the experience. My French colleagues were great and I rarely met any of the Swiss. When I did they ignored me which was fine by me.

I've lived here for more than 15 years. The Swiss may be geographically European but are socially, culturally and economically an island.

If you're used to a UK working culture, and you're working remotely , then any foreign employer has the potential to be tricky , and culturally very different.  I work for a Norwegian company, love the culture but we have remote workers who hate it.  C'est la vie

I'd say you're on a roll.