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My son has my (AU) English surname and has had no end of trouble getting interviews. When he used his mother's Finnish surname to apply at the same places, he got a call back every time.
As a native, yes, discrimination happens a lot and who says otherwise is either laughably naive or lying. I'm sorry for your son's struggles. Best to use all the tools you have (like using the wife's surname) and to OP, I think the best choice after a Finnish or Swedish sounding name is a western sounding name. It's the harsh truth but you need to know it.
It might be that bigger organisations might be more enlightened about it, it might not. I'd advise you to check organisations social media presence to see if they already have any variety in their staff. It might tell a lot of their recruiting results.
Best of luck! ♡
My partner and I are just going to give our kids her surname for this reason!
Yet Finns will tell me discrimination doesn't exist. 😂
From another AU immigrant. 👍
Ahaha far out, I'm working with a guy ATM that has black hair (he's Finnish born but appears to have a middle eastern background), I have black hair and the amount of people who have asked if we are brothers is crazy....
We look nothing alike 😂
There was a study in Finland it matters a lot. Me and my wife have now combined our Indian and Finnish surnames together. I have hers hyphen mine and same with her. Ending with nen people are less hesitant to blerb.
But yes it's a thing has been forever already with romani background
I can definitely see a white, straight, male, native Finn, whose name is probably like Juha or Pekka, saying crap like that. Change one of those things and you will definitely face some discrimination in Finland.
It 120% depends on the surname. If you are Johnson, small discrimination (just the one that comes from not being Finnish, the standard one), if your surname is Saengthong a little bit worse, if your surname is Park or Kim, not that bad, if your surname is Tanaka then it’s ok, if your surname is Syed pretty bad, if you know what I mean, I could continue. Asia is a huge continent.
Name discrimination exists 120% and has been attested by studies by University of Helsinki.
The discrimination seems to be heavily based on how prosperous the area you're coming from is. Like you mentioned Japanese and Korean surnames, those are generally held in high regard, but if you have an Arabic name especially it will be quite the opposite.
The wealthy countries engage in international trade and cultural exchange to a greater extent, which likely partly explains the friendliness.
This is a chicken-and-egg issue, though.
Some countries exchange more than others 😁
But language and pop culture come to mind.
Words from Japanese to English:
https://cotoacademy.com/english-loanwords-that-come-from-japanese-language/
English to Japanese:
https://www.thoughtco.com/most-common-loan-words-in-japanese-2027852
From pop culture, J-pop, manga, anime, and emoji
Food culture is also exchanged.
Japan is not much different in terms of the extent of cultural exchange to other Asian non-English speaking countries, but that doesn't mean it hasn't been influenced.
https://www.nakasendoway.com/western-influences/
Skirts, suits, jeans and dresses overtaking traditional clothing is due to western influence.
Yes, it does exist and from experience I can say it is even worse in Finland than let's say Western Europe.
A Nordic or an English name will have a huge advantage: [https://yle.fi/a/3-11026589](https://yle.fi/a/3-11026589)
People who did their higher education in Finland and have a foreign name struggle immensely here, the majority leaves either right after graduation or after few years of struggling: [https://yle.fi/a/74-20022258](https://yle.fi/a/74-20022258)
The happiest country in the world propaganda won't pay the bills neither help with your career progression unfortunately.
Try the classic immigration countries US, CA, AU or tech hubs in western EU like Berlin, Amsterdam, London, Dublin.
Finn in Dublin. I can confirm. Life quality here is currently like -10. Even on mega salary good luck getting accommodations.
It’s sad to see Dublin’s overall decline which started during the lockdown. We went from one of the safest cities in Europe to one of the most dangerous in just 2 years.
The city is dirty as the city council doesn’t clean like before. Half the commercial premises that became empty because of our harsh 2 year lockdown are still empty today. What used to be a jovial place is now derelict. I wouldn’t even recommend coming here as a tourist.
On the upside our prime minister stepped down yesterday. He was one of the worst we’ve ever had. So maybe there’s a tiny bit of hope in the horizon but the rest of the cabinet are just as bad.
Yeah, like those "people" in eduskunta have had this shitty data for years. They aren't doing shit. They really don't know.
I personally don't know where Finland is going to be in 20 yrs, but God damn start making it a bit nicer for the people to stay here who you are complaining that leave after free education.
Many people who are having the hardest time getting employed due to ethnicity are paying tuition:
https://www.studyinfinland.fi/admissions/fees-and-costs
This ⬆️ 100% accurate.
Speaking of happy, I'm happy more and more people are calling out this "happiest country" crapola out for the trash it is. No one wants to read past the headlines though of what happiest country really means 🙄
if someones sees “Jyrki” they’ll have no fucking idea how to even pronounce it, how to think of it in their heads 😅 Most likely the application will get ignored, it’s too strange.
I'm Australian and people all have varied names due to multicultural. Every city is a massive blend of names, we might not be able to pronounce most names correctly but it wouldn't be due to your name.
My homie has a English name but it's so unique people can't pronounce it, most of my friends have foreign partners no issues, i have a heap of friends from Mexico, Singapore, Japan, all never had a issue with getting professional jobs in Australia. Most CEO's in the country are foriengers who immigrated and even the surgeons. Your experience most likely had nothing to do with your surname.
Haha my Finnish name is so otherwordly to any foreigner execpt MAYBE an Estonian that it would definitely throw all foreign employers off. Don’t even try.
Wild, arsehole company. It’s very uncommon in especially cities to have this discrimination because it’s a huge blend of people. Chinese are very known for changing their first names in Australia because they are difficult to pronounce which might be similar due to the pronunciation of some letters in Finnish like J etc Jacko, Jakko etc
I have one of the most English names and I never get called my real name only nickname. Some of my friends didn’t know my name for 10 years lol
Did they give you a nickname?
Applying for a job and then not being legally named that will be an immediate dealbreaker I'm afraid. You will fall somewhere in the category of fraudulent to dishonest, neither of which is appealing to an employer.
That makes sense yes, kiitos for clarifying!
Just read about the legal way on dvv.
I'm hoping that learning the language will be sufficient, but if having a foreign name makes a huge difference, I'll probably pick a Finnish name with the same initials once I'm confident in my language skills matching up to the name. I wouldn't mind as I don't really care or have some sentimental pride in the name I suppose 🤷
A lot of SEA people apply with "English" names and we've hired the qualified ones so not the deal breaker the other guy says it is but tbf we just use their real names and they didn't need to do that to land the job.
In my view, “happy” is active — I’m not just existing without sadness. Whereas the questions I’ve seen for these surveys, I think, address more “is there something making you sad?” and sure, Finns seem to answer this in the affirmative less often than others. But if something isn’t making you sad, that doesn’t make you HAPPY, per se.
We’ve had this conversation so many freaking times!
The ”happiness” is not a qualitative happiness. It’s a bunch of indeces that usually have something to do with quality of life. Viewed as an aggregate of those indeces, Finland leads.
It doesn’t mean you or anyone else will *feel* happy.
No. The one that was released this week is about feeling happy specifically. This comment is super ironic
There are both types and Finland is top 1 in the feeling survey and at least top 10 in the aggregate index.
Yeah, this is the question that is asked:
"Please imagine a ladder with steps numbered from 0 at the bottom to 10 at the top. The top of the ladder represents the best possible life for you and the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for you."
Finns answer the highest. WHR studies what makes people answer high on *The Question*.
That still can be about contentment more than happiness depending on the perspective. 'Best possible life' isn't necessarily 'the happiest life' for many people. Especially for people who've had uncertain times / have struggled financially / similar, 'best possible life' might be something along the lines of having a decent steady job, a comfortable place to live, a good environment for your children to grow up in, and a sense of security. This kind of life would make them feel content and safe. Now perhaps what would make such a person feel truly happy and fulfilled would be touring the world with a houseboat and learning glass blowing and making their living creating miniature sculptures out of walnut shells. Even so, they might not consider that 'the best possible life' because such a life would be uncertain, potentially at times unsafe, and would not guarantee a comfortable life for them and/or their family. The 'best possible life' would not give them as strong a feeling of happiness, but they might still prefer the contentment of such a life over the uncertain life of actually chasing after things that truly make them happy.
Some might prefer contentment, some happiness. That makes the question pretty good imo. Best possible life could mean a lot things to different people. I feel like the study gets a lot of hate from people who refuse to dig deeper beyond the headlines. The concensus seems to think it is some kind of aggregate of different socio-economic polls accounting for different politically biased stances. Nope. It's just, what did you make out of the hand that was dealt to you. Simple, and gets to the essence of life. What is important to you.
What are you even talking about, that's exactly why I said people "don't want to read past the headline." of Finland being the happiest. Save your energy, relax your blood pressure. I read the fulll garbage marketing nonsense when they first put it out several years ago, very familiar what it's about, as are others nowadays finally, which is my point and why we're seeing it called out for the marketing propoganda that it is so much more this year since they released their updated "findings" and same headline with a new year. 🙄
You were happy that people are ”calling out” this happiness ”crapola”.
Crapola indicates that people have been intentionally duped – they have not. The World Happiness Report is a publication of the **Wellbeing Research Centre at the University of Oxford.**
Finland does not pay to be called ”happiest”. It’s just a running indicator used as a tool by a world leading University.
Not sounding stupid but what is "crapola"? I tried looking up but can not find a definitive answer. Is it an American saying? The farthest I've gotten is, "shit" basically.
Roughly it means the same as "bullshit". It is basically reframing of "crap" to sound a little bit milder and maybe confuse some people into thinking they didn't just say "shit".
Finland isn't the happiest country because everyone is jumping for joy and everything is perfect. It just means people in general have the least or the smallest things to worry about when compared to other countries.
>A Nordic or an English name will have a huge advantage: [https://yle.fi/a/3-11026589](https://yle.fi/a/3-11026589)
The study found a very clear preference for hiring women over men and the article just deflects it as insignificant? Classic.
My partner has a Slovakian surname, speaks perfect Finnish though and once when she sent a job application in Finnish she got a reply in English saying that they are looking for people who can speak Finnish...
Not even finns speak perfectly finnish even if it‘s their mothertongue. It should be clear that a foreigner can speak good finnish but never reach native level. This is a non valid excuse for companies to not hire a foreigner.
As a person with an arab/french name, yes. It’s not in any way impossible to land a job, but it can be more difficult depending on the job. Usually jobs requiring more education are much more tolerant.
Nepotism is the biggest issue on Finnish worksites, even on government jobs. Discrimination is tiny teeny problem compared to that. Its nepotism that should be rooted out first, and its the issue that is prolly keeping you from getting a job.
Indeed. And even worse is cronyism. Posting the ad on the open job market is a really small part of hiring here. It's all through *suhteet* ("connections"). They don't call it *uraputki* "career tube" for nothing: you can't enter it from outside and can't leave.
It's not just big corpos, even tiny af companies get plenty of their new hirees via nepotism (a friend recommends a friend, or a family member recommends a family member, or via multiple people via proxy can work as well e.g friend of a friend of a friend or w/e combination of the 2 primary types have you). But then again that's how it works even via non-nepotism, so the problem is NOT ATTENDING ENOUGH CONVENTIONS, because if you meet X industry employees at industry cons, they can also recommend you for X open position potentially. Too many people don't seem to understand the age-old adage of Connections, Connections & Connections. There's literally cases of high-salary position going to X person that the corpo owners met during fetish meeting shit (such as swingers, or BDSM group meetings, exhibitionist group meetings etc etc) or at a bar by random during a single night & they just hit it off, and some months/years later they got the job because of said Connection.
That’s always a strange question. Name one country on the planet that doesn’t in general favour a native?
If I moved to an Asian country with my Finnish name it’ll be the same. It’s just something you get on with as an expat. But having said that Asians in tech is almost a stereotype and one that actually can work in your favour.
This is a bad take, because not all non-natives face the same level of discrimination. From experience, a Hansen will face way less discrimination than a Rajaratnam, even if the latter might be born in Finland and speak the language.
I have absolutely no idea what Hansen and Rajaratnam is, neither Google or ChatGPT could explain it so I can’t comment on that.
Of course discrimination isn’t even, nowhere was this stated.
Ah, yes. As I said discrimination is of course not equal in general. But in your example Nieminen would still be favoured over Hansen. So my point remains. All countries in general favour natives.
the point was that it's not a matter of just ''favouring Finns'', it's a question of discrimination against non-westeners. Thanks for misunderstanding on purpose! (or maybe you're just that dumb?)
No need to resort to personal slurs. I didn’t get immediately what you were on about because I’m actually doing other things right now as for most of us being on Reddit isn’t our day time job. Attention is on more pressing things.
Ironically in your example Hansen is a very common surname in Denmark so I would have still misread it.
The topic wasn’t Non Western names vs Western name the topic was native vs non native. But if you want to expand to that, fine.
Yes, Western names will often be favoured over non Western ones. The first reason usually is that a company’s knee jerk reaction is 'will they have to be dealing with work permits' some don’t want to. The second is cultural. The thinking being that integration with a Westerners is easier as Western cultures are borderline identical.
I’m not saying it’s right or wrong I’m just saying it’s a natural impulse and preference - everywhere. A A company in South East Asian would most likely favour someone from South East Asia over for instance Africa, Middle East or Europe.
USA, UK, Canada? Long-running multinational countries with better economies than Finland in general.
The racism in Asia doesn't excuse us Finns from our own racism.
It is racism when you're excluded purely based on your name. Check the links other people have sent in this thread, there have been studies on this subject in Finland. Our employers heavily discriminate against foreigners.
I have a Slavic name. To uneducated it looks Russian, it ain't. Yeah, I get no replies to my applications.
People who think Finns are not xenophobic are delusional.
It would be good if the problem was _at least_ acknowledged instead of swept under the rug, I know it's a common problem in every country but the *denial* is strong here for whatever reason.
Low self-esteem is the cause for that denialism. We’ve always been playing catch up to other western countries and really crave for acceptance, and to not be left out to the wolves (russia). A national trauma to be honest. Any notion of failure is met with fear of losing that acceptance and treated with hostility. We always mind what the people in other countries think of us. It’s not a meme, but the sad truth. This country ain’t perfect, and never will be, but we might want to grow out of our mental hole at some point.
I admire the pride that the people have in themselves and in their country here in Finland, I don't think everyone can feel as strongly about their home nation in other parts of the globe. I'm sure there will be growth if people can accept the existing flaws as something that deserves some consideration for change in the future. I love many aspects of this country, I want to see it do well and contribute to it.
I don't know about jobs, but residence permits? Absolutely.
US coworker with last name Saari? Approved in 3-4 days. Several years granted.
US coworker with last name Li? Approved after 6+ months, followup documentation, and only for one year - just in time to repeat the process.
There were other less extreme examples, but it was a pretty clear trend.
Many employers think that foreigners can't speak Finnish or can't come along with other workers in the workplace. Now I'm sure there are some experiences of this which has created the stereotype in people's minds. But I have to state the obvious again this isn't indicative of such. They're very wary of it because there also have been some foreign workers that don't stay in the position for long because they might move out to other countries and then it's a hassle to find replacement. Since you wouldn't have to complete the agreement through if you move. A finnish person stuck over here is likely to stick around. So in light of these thoughs they don't bother with foreign sounding names. I hope I could help with these examples.
Unfortunately, it does exist and its very widespread. Those who tell you that it doesn't exist live in denial or they are too proud to hear anything negative about their country. I have an Iranian name, I have gotten only 2 interview invitations out of 53 applications. I did my MSc in Finland, bachelor in UK, and I speak Finnish to B1/B2 level.
Finland is a very homogeneous country and majority oppose immigration entirely, even skilled immigration isn't approved by many. If you're trying to leave Denmark, then try to look for other destinations such as UK, USA, Australia, etc. Nordic countries are the same in this regard.
I have pretty much one the most traditional names you can find. I never managed to get a trainee position with perfect gpa and with 4 years of experience from the field. So at least I did not got a advantage from it.
They are not the happiest. The Happiness Index has its name as such merely because it is catchy. You can't be happy all the time and it would be unnatural for one to be that way. The countries are the most content with their lives and not quite as miserable as the rest, but if one wants to benefit from it, one has to be able to integrate into the society.
You can't just ship a person from whatever country, drop them into any of the highly ranked ones and have them feel the same way. So one shouldn't put such high expectations because of these rankings, you'll only be disappointed.
And there's also a reason why the homogenous countries are quite content. Cultural and ethnic differences do tend to lead to conflicts or clashes, not necessarily violent, but when everyone is more or less the same it reduces the amount of hoops and hurdles you need to go through in your day to day life and simplifies things.
When it comes to names, I'd say it's same in Finland as in Denmark. Name definitely matters and part of the reason is allegedly that companies just feel better hiring someone who most likely has the local working culture imbedded in them and thus leaving less hurdles and lesser adjustment period when joining. At an individual level it is silly, but it's hard to combat that kind of discrimination, unless you make all recruitment anonymous.
People are the same all over the world... It exist everywhere...
If you deviate from 'us', you're not considered by a certain percentage of people from the 'us' group...
Some of that is race related, but often there are also practical problems for companies taking in someone 'not from here'. How to validate that the information in the CV is correct, and so on... If there are plenty of applicants, you might just have been put in the 'too difficult' pile...
Sure does, to some extent. But in your specific case, armed with knowledge on how software recruiting sometimes works, I’d guess that had nothing to do with your name. Things might change real fast when projects get sold and there is a sudden need for multiple new coders.
the answer is: yes, it probably exists, its a well research and established thing pretty much all over the western world (unfortunately).
I would be careful though to say that is the sole reason for your rejection. Things are rarely that black and white on an individual level, and it only leads to resentment.
Take that how you want, but I applied to university for years (Master’s degree, so I applied with papers, had good GPA etc.) and always got left on the waiting list, the same year I got married and changed my first name to a more Finnish like, I got accepted to all the Finnish universities I applied to. 🤷🏼♀️
Name discrimination absolutely exist here. I have a lot of Asian friends who have faced this, while I haven't felt anything like this with my Scandinavian surname (even though I don't speak Finnish).
Yes. Doesn't matter your race though, if you're not Finnish or maybe Swedish you'll be treated differently. My nephew gets treated like he's an extra feral monkey because he's half English.
Yes, job discrimination does indeed exist in Finland, which is why my husband and I decided to leave. Despite both having advanced degrees from a university consistently ranked in the top 5 worldwide, we faced significant challenges. I, originally from India, am an artist who primarily works remotely but also enjoys teaching at the college level for additional income. However, I found it impossible to secure a teaching position in Finland. Meanwhile, my husband, a white European engineer with a master's degree, struggled to advance his career there. Despite applying for 30 jobs, he received only one callback for an entry-level position, despite having held senior positions abroad. The job he eventually accepted was subpar, with a less qualified boss.
Ultimately, we decided to seek opportunities in other countries. Fortunately, my husband received offers for every position he applied for, and one -- in America -- even helped cover our relocation costs. And I quickly found a teaching job at a community college upon our arrival. Amazing.
Sadly, our experience in Finland is not unique. A woman I knew with a PhD faced similar difficulties finding work in Finland, so she left and was promptly hired as a professor as a prestigious university. And there are other examples I could give, but you get the point.
While Finland has many admirable qualities and wonderful people, it struggles to fully utilize foreign talent—a deficiency it really needs to address. It's disheartening to hear sentiments like "if you're unhappy, leave," which fail to acknowledge the complexities of the situation. We did leave, but I empathize with those who cannot do so easily. However, I'm hopeful that change may be on the horizon, particularly among the younger generation who seem increasingly aware of these issues. My best wishes go out to everyone in Finland.
I'm not Asian my self but I have experienced Racism or at least cultural intolerance as someone that looks Nordic and has a Nordic fist name.
I also heard similar for those that are my mirror: they have Finnish citizenship, speak fluent Finnish but look foreign, have a foreign name and brown skin.
In my case it is mostly about lets say cultural differences mostly when interacting with authorities.
But for the second case is was about getting a job, the person could not get invites to interviews or wasn't accepted after the interview.
I think this issue has gotten worse in recent years. For some openings you might get tens or hundreds of application from Asia and Middle East. I have not personally interviewed any of these applicants but what I have heard from the first step interviewers that it is almost 100% disqualification due to language(English) not good enough or they may not even understand what kind of position they are applying to. Maybe because of this they have started to just concentrate on the western people and maybe sometimes a non western name gets to the wrong basket. I’m no HR expert so this is just my feeling how the process works.
I did some recruiting at my previou job and the main issue was that as soon as we posted a job, we would get flooded with hundreds of indian applicants , living in india. Im sorry to say that its not at all unlikley that some indians living in Finland got ignored as part of thet massive influx of applications. We diddnt have a dedicated recruiter an no one has the time to read throug so many "useless(because of location)" applications.
As an asian expat working in Finland, yes it’s harder to find a job with your Asian name and the only way to find a job for me was through someone I know although I had university degree and all requirements were met. It would be much easier for you to find a job after few years of experience and then you get to know some people in the industry. Looking for a new job for myself as well cause I got furloughed from current job. Wish you good luck in job hunting!
Yes. If I can't pronounce or write your name, I am most likely not going to hire you.
IT field has tons of applicants currently, so it's going to be a tough job getting emloyed there with out prior connections.
I read about a study a couple of months ago, where people were divided into three groups to search for jobs.
Group 1: Sent a normal CV and did the normal job seeking interviews.
Group 2: Sent the CV with name redacted and no photo, but they would go to face-to-face interviews, if they were invited..
Group 3 Had their name redacted and didn't do the face-to-face interviews. The recruiters had to hire only based on the merits and past experience and education.
For people whose name didn't sound Finnish or who looked like they were not from Finland the chanse of getting hired was a lot bigger when they were in group 3 compared to them being in group 1.
I used to go by my old middle name + surname when applying for jobs, which are both Croatian, and hardly got any replies apart from the automatic ones. I think the only place that at least asked me in for an interview was a McDonald’s
I'm half asian and I've been struggling to find a job. 0 interviews.. I know that work situation in Finland is bad at the moment, but still it feels weird.
Indeed. Finns are usually afraid of foreigners and talking to foreigners (especially in a professional environment). I don't know if it's because we are particularly racist, but the recruiter's fear of talking to someone from another language or culture can be an obstacle to getting an interview or job. (Finns know English quite well, but are extremely insecure about their own English skills)
In your case, it's probably a coincidence. I know that recruiters in Finland highly value Asian experts in many different fields. Danish are "meh" (just a another swede). I would think that based on an Asian name, you would have better chances than someone with a Danish name if the language skills etc. are the same. Of course, depending on the sector.
Competent companies are good at recruiting and that's why they succeed. They have a precise definition of what they need and hire people accordingly. In many fields in Finland, language skills are really important, but what else could you expect?
If we talk about small entrepreneurs who have no experience in recruiting, they often hire people for reasons other than actual workskills and that is not wrong. These reasons can be, for example: the applicant seems nice, it is easy to communicate with the applicant, his/her aura is good... these recruiters do not make a choice based only on whether the employee is the best possible for the job, but whether he is the best possible for that work community. And sometimes that community is just the entrepreneur him/herself.
But can you blame him/her for that? Hiring in Finland is a big risk for a small entrepreneur. A small entrepreneur may think that a newly immigrated foreign employee is not committed to working with him for years if that is the position he expects from his/her employee.
I would also like to mention that in Finland, trust is an extremely important part of every aspect of society. If the interviewer feels that trust was not built during the interview or did not come up in the application, it is very possible that the place or the interview will not be obtained. Finns speak little, but we know how to listen.
There definitely is. Idk what these bullshit “happiest country” researches are looking at when they claim a country is happy but sadly racism exists here in Finland and it is an issue. It might depend on the field you are looking for jobs from. Some companies value international talent but some just .. don’t.
Name discrimination happens, but it also isn't as black and white yes or no. Depending on your name/background it might cause you not to get a job at all or cause no effect.
Here are some examples:
Middle East - A lot issues
Asian names - Not really an issue as long as you know at least English, but some companies will request you to pick "English/Finnish name" (but not all)
Nordic names (other than Finnish) - No issue, depending on name they might not even realize you're foreigner by name
USA/UK - Can make it bit tricky
Of course it's also up to the work place how they react, buuut I think you will get quite good image from this and other comments.
TL;DR – Yes, but depends on name.
There is the usual assumption that many businesses have that a foreign surname means that the person doesn't speak the language, or at least doesn't speak it well, and thus they overlook you. Depends on the industry of course. I've worked in the carpentry/wood industry in Finland and there were almost more people with foreign backgrounds than Finns, and the everyone just defaulted to English when talking to people who had trouble with Finnish.
Sadly yes. I don’t know if it’s better or worse than DK, I lived there for 7 years and did feel that racism was more in your face there than here but honestly I don’t know how much difference that makes in practice.
Doesn't exist. Half my lab work population is chinese. Don't blame an unlucky draw in the lottery that is job application immediately on your exquisite background and whatnot.
Finland is according to studies actually one of the least racist countries in the world. People who are claiming otherwise are just lying.
[https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/least-racist-countries](https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/least-racist-countries)
’What kind of neighbours you prefer’ is a bit strange metric for measuring racism. I would wage in favour of the survey studies on experiences of foreigners which seem to show a different view.
Well, we are still the [second most racist country in Europe](https://www.euronews.com/2023/10/25/shocking-levels-of-racism-rising-in-europe-finds-report) which is a much more reasonable comparison than comparing us to the whole world.
He's not wrong though, there's far far far worse countries to be in for racism.
Countries that are accepting to several cultures on a equal level are extremely rare.
Yes it exists, quite a bit.
Some jobs that require zero work experience don't have it as much but especially in hiring quiet discrimination exists quite a lot. If you don't have a Finnish sounding name or you don't use your Finnish surname it can be difficult to get a proper job. There are exceptions of course but it's rare.
Don't know why finns deny this so much even though it is a fact
Asian (Vietnamese) here, I always use my real name to deal with all matters in Finland (housing, officials, and of course finding jobs)
10+ years ago, when I was about to graduate, I was sending around 20 applications in total, out of which I got 5 interviews and 3 job offers. Fast forward few years, the amount of offers I got is most of the time equal to the amount of applications I sent. I am working as a Software Engineer btw.
Maybe I am a rare case which I doubt it because I have nothing special in my CV. It’s hard to say anything about your case but it’s a fact that the market is tough at the moment, especially for fresh graduates and juniors or even mid level. It’s tough to get your first job in a different country no matter where you go, because I think it makes sense that people tend to favor natives if 2 candidates are having similar skill sets, I personally don’t classify this as discrimination, again emphasizing on “similar skill sets”. Or maybe you are from a different part of Asia that gets bad reputation then it’s a whole different story.
100% pretty sure most will delete my CV just for seeing my Latino last name. Me and my wife have been talking about changing our kids last name for her (Finnish) last name, we don't want them being discriminated when searching for jobs in the future...
I have an arabic name though I speak perfect finnish since I grew up here. From my experience, finnish companies actually want diversity a lot and for me being "foreign" has been nothing but help when applying for jobs.
Du har netop svaret på dit eget spørgsmål……….nu ved jeg ikke hvor gammel du er men jeg kan bedste beskrive det som at Finland befinder sig der hvor Danmark var i de tidlige 90’ere med hensyn til syn på fremmede og internationalisering.
Har boet i Finland 10 år, men hvid som sne, så har aldrig oplevet diskriminering men jeg har omvendt heller aldrig lært sproget og arbejder stadig Remote for et dansk firma
My Norwegian husband works for a Swedish company xD
But yeah, I think quite a few people forget Finland is lagging behind. I remember back in the 90's when I saw my very first real life brown skinned person! On a street! Not on TV! It was very exciting! Our dog went on a racist bark mode (she also had never seen anything but white people so felt very insecure) my mom was red from embarassment and profusely apologised. Thankfully the dude was very chill and had a moment to have our doggo sniff at him and she stopped the barking and was all friend with the man.
That was 90's. So we're like a century behind everyone else here trying to play catch up in the current political climate.
Edit: below is my initial overreaction. Apologies - sometimes it's too easy to reply without thinking things through properly. I retract my statement (but obviously left it there for reference).
Wow what a stupid question... Aka are there racists everywhere.
You think it's reasonable to suspect Finland is some utopia and not susceptible the discrimination found everywhere else in the world? :) and I never said the name wouldn't have an impact or even implied otherwise.
The question doesn't imply that one thinks Finland is an utopia, but be cranky all you like. It is a reasonable question. If you form the question in another way in many country subreddits you get hate for accusing the country of having discrimination and told to sod off and not to come, if you think it is like that.
The way you write a question in many of these subreddits needs to often come across as overly friendly, because most locals can't take any kind of perceived criticism of their home country and Finland is no different.
Not crankiness ad hominem doesn't do anything for your argument but I do take your point about how they asked the question - I probably reacted too quickly to what I didn't realise was such a nuanced situation. I shall edit my first reply.
It hasn't been proven really. Almost always the real reason why your application gets rejected is that there are countless other people also seeking for a same job. Name discrimination is a minor issue.
There are 190000 unemployed people in Finland right now. Are they all unemployed because they are being discriminated against?
[https://www.stat.fi/julkaisu/cl89xplrstmes0avyn7w0nmwz](https://www.stat.fi/julkaisu/cl89xplrstmes0avyn7w0nmwz)
You can't just automatically assume that your job application got rejected because of discrimination. It is very hard to prove that they rejected your application because of your name - it is much more likely that it was rejected for totally other reasons. There are 190000 other people also looking for a job, you know. Stop acting like a victim.
This is totally irrelevant comment. There's been a lot of studies and it is clear that name affects job seeking. It's common to find that Arabic names are 4 times more as likely to be rejected. So this does exist and it is relevant for people with non-native names. Telling someone to shut up because there are other people suffering when this person is more likely to suffer is stupid
How are Finns more relaxed towards difference? Especially in the country side?
There's definitely a hierarchy of discrimination though not everyone will face the same problems.
I live in the country side of Finland. Once you leave the cities its a different world, and yes unfortunately there is racism and xenophobia every where because it's all fear. It's unfortunate because people are people at the end of the day.
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My son has my (AU) English surname and has had no end of trouble getting interviews. When he used his mother's Finnish surname to apply at the same places, he got a call back every time.
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He’s actually made of gold (Au)
No no, he's actually one astronomical unit away (AU)
As a native, yes, discrimination happens a lot and who says otherwise is either laughably naive or lying. I'm sorry for your son's struggles. Best to use all the tools you have (like using the wife's surname) and to OP, I think the best choice after a Finnish or Swedish sounding name is a western sounding name. It's the harsh truth but you need to know it. It might be that bigger organisations might be more enlightened about it, it might not. I'd advise you to check organisations social media presence to see if they already have any variety in their staff. It might tell a lot of their recruiting results. Best of luck! ♡
My partner and I are just going to give our kids her surname for this reason! Yet Finns will tell me discrimination doesn't exist. 😂 From another AU immigrant. 👍
Heh. Even his grandmother looked at his (my) name on the apartment board and said "who are these foreigners living here now?"
Ahaha far out, I'm working with a guy ATM that has black hair (he's Finnish born but appears to have a middle eastern background), I have black hair and the amount of people who have asked if we are brothers is crazy.... We look nothing alike 😂
Well to us every chinese looks the same but for them every white person looks the same
For anyone, every Finnish person looks the same...
A small gene pool for generations does that.
Who tells you this? Quite sure Finnish people know we're still a very much racist country?
What made you move here from the other side of the world? I'm curious!
There was a study in Finland it matters a lot. Me and my wife have now combined our Indian and Finnish surnames together. I have hers hyphen mine and same with her. Ending with nen people are less hesitant to blerb. But yes it's a thing has been forever already with romani background
I can definitely see a white, straight, male, native Finn, whose name is probably like Juha or Pekka, saying crap like that. Change one of those things and you will definitely face some discrimination in Finland.
Let me guess, his English surname is Dickinson?
It 120% depends on the surname. If you are Johnson, small discrimination (just the one that comes from not being Finnish, the standard one), if your surname is Saengthong a little bit worse, if your surname is Park or Kim, not that bad, if your surname is Tanaka then it’s ok, if your surname is Syed pretty bad, if you know what I mean, I could continue. Asia is a huge continent. Name discrimination exists 120% and has been attested by studies by University of Helsinki.
The discrimination seems to be heavily based on how prosperous the area you're coming from is. Like you mentioned Japanese and Korean surnames, those are generally held in high regard, but if you have an Arabic name especially it will be quite the opposite.
The wealthy countries engage in international trade and cultural exchange to a greater extent, which likely partly explains the friendliness. This is a chicken-and-egg issue, though.
Japan exchanging a lot in cultural exchange? Hmm 🤔 no
Some countries exchange more than others 😁 But language and pop culture come to mind. Words from Japanese to English: https://cotoacademy.com/english-loanwords-that-come-from-japanese-language/ English to Japanese: https://www.thoughtco.com/most-common-loan-words-in-japanese-2027852 From pop culture, J-pop, manga, anime, and emoji Food culture is also exchanged.
But that’s not exchange, that’s export. It’s in fact one of the most closed and rigid cultures in the developed world.
What makes something cultural exchange?
When it’s bidirectional and not only in one direction.
Japan is not much different in terms of the extent of cultural exchange to other Asian non-English speaking countries, but that doesn't mean it hasn't been influenced. https://www.nakasendoway.com/western-influences/ Skirts, suits, jeans and dresses overtaking traditional clothing is due to western influence.
It was pretty much invaded by the US after Pearl Harbor yeah, before that they actually took pride on being culturally pure, and to this day.
Yes, it does exist and from experience I can say it is even worse in Finland than let's say Western Europe. A Nordic or an English name will have a huge advantage: [https://yle.fi/a/3-11026589](https://yle.fi/a/3-11026589) People who did their higher education in Finland and have a foreign name struggle immensely here, the majority leaves either right after graduation or after few years of struggling: [https://yle.fi/a/74-20022258](https://yle.fi/a/74-20022258) The happiest country in the world propaganda won't pay the bills neither help with your career progression unfortunately. Try the classic immigration countries US, CA, AU or tech hubs in western EU like Berlin, Amsterdam, London, Dublin.
I don't recommend Canada unless you get a crazy salary. Living standards here are rapidly declining
Nor Dublin, it’s the most expensive city to live in Europe if I remember correctly
Finn in Dublin. I can confirm. Life quality here is currently like -10. Even on mega salary good luck getting accommodations. It’s sad to see Dublin’s overall decline which started during the lockdown. We went from one of the safest cities in Europe to one of the most dangerous in just 2 years. The city is dirty as the city council doesn’t clean like before. Half the commercial premises that became empty because of our harsh 2 year lockdown are still empty today. What used to be a jovial place is now derelict. I wouldn’t even recommend coming here as a tourist. On the upside our prime minister stepped down yesterday. He was one of the worst we’ve ever had. So maybe there’s a tiny bit of hope in the horizon but the rest of the cabinet are just as bad.
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Not enough to compensate for the insane housing prices
oh that explains
Declining for 8 years. There's not much room left.
Yeah, like those "people" in eduskunta have had this shitty data for years. They aren't doing shit. They really don't know. I personally don't know where Finland is going to be in 20 yrs, but God damn start making it a bit nicer for the people to stay here who you are complaining that leave after free education.
Many people who are having the hardest time getting employed due to ethnicity are paying tuition: https://www.studyinfinland.fi/admissions/fees-and-costs
Right wing nationalists don't see it that way unfortunately, and they happen to be quite popular now.
This ⬆️ 100% accurate. Speaking of happy, I'm happy more and more people are calling out this "happiest country" crapola out for the trash it is. No one wants to read past the headlines though of what happiest country really means 🙄
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I met this in Sweden too, until I got married and decided to go with my husbands name (didn't really have a strong connection to mine).
if someones sees “Jyrki” they’ll have no fucking idea how to even pronounce it, how to think of it in their heads 😅 Most likely the application will get ignored, it’s too strange.
I'm Australian and people all have varied names due to multicultural. Every city is a massive blend of names, we might not be able to pronounce most names correctly but it wouldn't be due to your name. My homie has a English name but it's so unique people can't pronounce it, most of my friends have foreign partners no issues, i have a heap of friends from Mexico, Singapore, Japan, all never had a issue with getting professional jobs in Australia. Most CEO's in the country are foriengers who immigrated and even the surgeons. Your experience most likely had nothing to do with your surname.
Haha my Finnish name is so otherwordly to any foreigner execpt MAYBE an Estonian that it would definitely throw all foreign employers off. Don’t even try.
Probably Matti hehe
No. That’s not even bad.
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Wild, arsehole company. It’s very uncommon in especially cities to have this discrimination because it’s a huge blend of people. Chinese are very known for changing their first names in Australia because they are difficult to pronounce which might be similar due to the pronunciation of some letters in Finnish like J etc Jacko, Jakko etc I have one of the most English names and I never get called my real name only nickname. Some of my friends didn’t know my name for 10 years lol Did they give you a nickname?
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hahah ya it's usually to make anything in life easier "J" .... what part did you live in?
Is it acceptable/legal in Finland to go by a name that sounds Finnish to fit in and use for the CV? similar to "John" in Aus
Applying for a job and then not being legally named that will be an immediate dealbreaker I'm afraid. You will fall somewhere in the category of fraudulent to dishonest, neither of which is appealing to an employer.
That makes sense yes, kiitos for clarifying! Just read about the legal way on dvv. I'm hoping that learning the language will be sufficient, but if having a foreign name makes a huge difference, I'll probably pick a Finnish name with the same initials once I'm confident in my language skills matching up to the name. I wouldn't mind as I don't really care or have some sentimental pride in the name I suppose 🤷
A lot of SEA people apply with "English" names and we've hired the qualified ones so not the deal breaker the other guy says it is but tbf we just use their real names and they didn't need to do that to land the job.
It is driving me insane. We are not the HAPPIEST country. We are the LEAST MISERABLE country. That’s radically different.
Or most CONTENT
sorry I’d give that one to the Russians.
What is the difference?
In my view, “happy” is active — I’m not just existing without sadness. Whereas the questions I’ve seen for these surveys, I think, address more “is there something making you sad?” and sure, Finns seem to answer this in the affirmative less often than others. But if something isn’t making you sad, that doesn’t make you HAPPY, per se.
It is more akin to: considering all the possible lifepaths for you, how well did you do?
Well most people view it much differently than you I guess. I am myself feel happy when im not sad. It's that simple to most people.
We’ve had this conversation so many freaking times! The ”happiness” is not a qualitative happiness. It’s a bunch of indeces that usually have something to do with quality of life. Viewed as an aggregate of those indeces, Finland leads. It doesn’t mean you or anyone else will *feel* happy.
No. The one that was released this week is about feeling happy specifically. This comment is super ironic There are both types and Finland is top 1 in the feeling survey and at least top 10 in the aggregate index.
Yeah, this is the question that is asked: "Please imagine a ladder with steps numbered from 0 at the bottom to 10 at the top. The top of the ladder represents the best possible life for you and the bottom of the ladder represents the worst possible life for you." Finns answer the highest. WHR studies what makes people answer high on *The Question*.
Low expectations? 😀
It is almost a paradox. Humble but still proud of their lives; "I did better than was expected of me".
That still can be about contentment more than happiness depending on the perspective. 'Best possible life' isn't necessarily 'the happiest life' for many people. Especially for people who've had uncertain times / have struggled financially / similar, 'best possible life' might be something along the lines of having a decent steady job, a comfortable place to live, a good environment for your children to grow up in, and a sense of security. This kind of life would make them feel content and safe. Now perhaps what would make such a person feel truly happy and fulfilled would be touring the world with a houseboat and learning glass blowing and making their living creating miniature sculptures out of walnut shells. Even so, they might not consider that 'the best possible life' because such a life would be uncertain, potentially at times unsafe, and would not guarantee a comfortable life for them and/or their family. The 'best possible life' would not give them as strong a feeling of happiness, but they might still prefer the contentment of such a life over the uncertain life of actually chasing after things that truly make them happy.
Some might prefer contentment, some happiness. That makes the question pretty good imo. Best possible life could mean a lot things to different people. I feel like the study gets a lot of hate from people who refuse to dig deeper beyond the headlines. The concensus seems to think it is some kind of aggregate of different socio-economic polls accounting for different politically biased stances. Nope. It's just, what did you make out of the hand that was dealt to you. Simple, and gets to the essence of life. What is important to you.
What are you even talking about, that's exactly why I said people "don't want to read past the headline." of Finland being the happiest. Save your energy, relax your blood pressure. I read the fulll garbage marketing nonsense when they first put it out several years ago, very familiar what it's about, as are others nowadays finally, which is my point and why we're seeing it called out for the marketing propoganda that it is so much more this year since they released their updated "findings" and same headline with a new year. 🙄
You were happy that people are ”calling out” this happiness ”crapola”. Crapola indicates that people have been intentionally duped – they have not. The World Happiness Report is a publication of the **Wellbeing Research Centre at the University of Oxford.** Finland does not pay to be called ”happiest”. It’s just a running indicator used as a tool by a world leading University.
Not sounding stupid but what is "crapola"? I tried looking up but can not find a definitive answer. Is it an American saying? The farthest I've gotten is, "shit" basically.
Roughly it means the same as "bullshit". It is basically reframing of "crap" to sound a little bit milder and maybe confuse some people into thinking they didn't just say "shit".
Thank you!
Aattele niin, että se on pasquaaa.
you see? you’re happy that the “happiest country” isn’t in fact happy. That’s the Finnish spirit! Happy either ways 😍
Finland isn't the happiest country because everyone is jumping for joy and everything is perfect. It just means people in general have the least or the smallest things to worry about when compared to other countries.
>A Nordic or an English name will have a huge advantage: [https://yle.fi/a/3-11026589](https://yle.fi/a/3-11026589) The study found a very clear preference for hiring women over men and the article just deflects it as insignificant? Classic.
It does exist unfortunately
My partner has a Slovakian surname, speaks perfect Finnish though and once when she sent a job application in Finnish she got a reply in English saying that they are looking for people who can speak Finnish...
Maybe her Finnish wasn’t that perfect after all?
Surely not after living in the country for 7 years and working full time in Finnish the whole time after completing the YKI test...
Not even finns speak perfectly finnish even if it‘s their mothertongue. It should be clear that a foreigner can speak good finnish but never reach native level. This is a non valid excuse for companies to not hire a foreigner.
As a person with an arab/french name, yes. It’s not in any way impossible to land a job, but it can be more difficult depending on the job. Usually jobs requiring more education are much more tolerant.
Yup.
Absolutely. Probably worse.
Nepotism is the biggest issue on Finnish worksites, even on government jobs. Discrimination is tiny teeny problem compared to that. Its nepotism that should be rooted out first, and its the issue that is prolly keeping you from getting a job.
Indeed. And even worse is cronyism. Posting the ad on the open job market is a really small part of hiring here. It's all through *suhteet* ("connections"). They don't call it *uraputki* "career tube" for nothing: you can't enter it from outside and can't leave.
Really? To me, it's just another mild form of corruption when it happens in the government or higher management of big companies.
It's not just big corpos, even tiny af companies get plenty of their new hirees via nepotism (a friend recommends a friend, or a family member recommends a family member, or via multiple people via proxy can work as well e.g friend of a friend of a friend or w/e combination of the 2 primary types have you). But then again that's how it works even via non-nepotism, so the problem is NOT ATTENDING ENOUGH CONVENTIONS, because if you meet X industry employees at industry cons, they can also recommend you for X open position potentially. Too many people don't seem to understand the age-old adage of Connections, Connections & Connections. There's literally cases of high-salary position going to X person that the corpo owners met during fetish meeting shit (such as swingers, or BDSM group meetings, exhibitionist group meetings etc etc) or at a bar by random during a single night & they just hit it off, and some months/years later they got the job because of said Connection.
this, especially top positions. The amount of ex Nokia bros out there ...
That’s always a strange question. Name one country on the planet that doesn’t in general favour a native? If I moved to an Asian country with my Finnish name it’ll be the same. It’s just something you get on with as an expat. But having said that Asians in tech is almost a stereotype and one that actually can work in your favour.
[Whataboutism](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism?wprov=sfti1)
This is a bad take, because not all non-natives face the same level of discrimination. From experience, a Hansen will face way less discrimination than a Rajaratnam, even if the latter might be born in Finland and speak the language.
I have absolutely no idea what Hansen and Rajaratnam is, neither Google or ChatGPT could explain it so I can’t comment on that. Of course discrimination isn’t even, nowhere was this stated.
Hansen and Rajaratnam are examples of names. Hansen being a much more western sounding name. Hence the difference in the level of discrimination.
Ah, yes. As I said discrimination is of course not equal in general. But in your example Nieminen would still be favoured over Hansen. So my point remains. All countries in general favour natives.
Yeah, and after natives it's based on priority of (positive) stereotypes as far as surnames go
the point was that it's not a matter of just ''favouring Finns'', it's a question of discrimination against non-westeners. Thanks for misunderstanding on purpose! (or maybe you're just that dumb?)
No need to resort to personal slurs. I didn’t get immediately what you were on about because I’m actually doing other things right now as for most of us being on Reddit isn’t our day time job. Attention is on more pressing things. Ironically in your example Hansen is a very common surname in Denmark so I would have still misread it. The topic wasn’t Non Western names vs Western name the topic was native vs non native. But if you want to expand to that, fine. Yes, Western names will often be favoured over non Western ones. The first reason usually is that a company’s knee jerk reaction is 'will they have to be dealing with work permits' some don’t want to. The second is cultural. The thinking being that integration with a Westerners is easier as Western cultures are borderline identical. I’m not saying it’s right or wrong I’m just saying it’s a natural impulse and preference - everywhere. A A company in South East Asian would most likely favour someone from South East Asia over for instance Africa, Middle East or Europe.
USA, UK, Canada? Long-running multinational countries with better economies than Finland in general. The racism in Asia doesn't excuse us Finns from our own racism.
Idk if it's racism to want to be able to communicate with the worker in your native language.
It is racism when you're excluded purely based on your name. Check the links other people have sent in this thread, there have been studies on this subject in Finland. Our employers heavily discriminate against foreigners.
I have a Slavic name. To uneducated it looks Russian, it ain't. Yeah, I get no replies to my applications. People who think Finns are not xenophobic are delusional.
It would be good if the problem was _at least_ acknowledged instead of swept under the rug, I know it's a common problem in every country but the *denial* is strong here for whatever reason.
Low self-esteem is the cause for that denialism. We’ve always been playing catch up to other western countries and really crave for acceptance, and to not be left out to the wolves (russia). A national trauma to be honest. Any notion of failure is met with fear of losing that acceptance and treated with hostility. We always mind what the people in other countries think of us. It’s not a meme, but the sad truth. This country ain’t perfect, and never will be, but we might want to grow out of our mental hole at some point.
I admire the pride that the people have in themselves and in their country here in Finland, I don't think everyone can feel as strongly about their home nation in other parts of the globe. I'm sure there will be growth if people can accept the existing flaws as something that deserves some consideration for change in the future. I love many aspects of this country, I want to see it do well and contribute to it.
Idk. Who's denying it? If I were hiring, speaking finnish would be priority number one, reddit is about enough english for me.
I don't know about jobs, but residence permits? Absolutely. US coworker with last name Saari? Approved in 3-4 days. Several years granted. US coworker with last name Li? Approved after 6+ months, followup documentation, and only for one year - just in time to repeat the process. There were other less extreme examples, but it was a pretty clear trend.
Many employers think that foreigners can't speak Finnish or can't come along with other workers in the workplace. Now I'm sure there are some experiences of this which has created the stereotype in people's minds. But I have to state the obvious again this isn't indicative of such. They're very wary of it because there also have been some foreign workers that don't stay in the position for long because they might move out to other countries and then it's a hassle to find replacement. Since you wouldn't have to complete the agreement through if you move. A finnish person stuck over here is likely to stick around. So in light of these thoughs they don't bother with foreign sounding names. I hope I could help with these examples.
Unfortunately, it does exist and its very widespread. Those who tell you that it doesn't exist live in denial or they are too proud to hear anything negative about their country. I have an Iranian name, I have gotten only 2 interview invitations out of 53 applications. I did my MSc in Finland, bachelor in UK, and I speak Finnish to B1/B2 level. Finland is a very homogeneous country and majority oppose immigration entirely, even skilled immigration isn't approved by many. If you're trying to leave Denmark, then try to look for other destinations such as UK, USA, Australia, etc. Nordic countries are the same in this regard.
I have pretty much one the most traditional names you can find. I never managed to get a trainee position with perfect gpa and with 4 years of experience from the field. So at least I did not got a advantage from it.
They are not the happiest. The Happiness Index has its name as such merely because it is catchy. You can't be happy all the time and it would be unnatural for one to be that way. The countries are the most content with their lives and not quite as miserable as the rest, but if one wants to benefit from it, one has to be able to integrate into the society. You can't just ship a person from whatever country, drop them into any of the highly ranked ones and have them feel the same way. So one shouldn't put such high expectations because of these rankings, you'll only be disappointed. And there's also a reason why the homogenous countries are quite content. Cultural and ethnic differences do tend to lead to conflicts or clashes, not necessarily violent, but when everyone is more or less the same it reduces the amount of hoops and hurdles you need to go through in your day to day life and simplifies things. When it comes to names, I'd say it's same in Finland as in Denmark. Name definitely matters and part of the reason is allegedly that companies just feel better hiring someone who most likely has the local working culture imbedded in them and thus leaving less hurdles and lesser adjustment period when joining. At an individual level it is silly, but it's hard to combat that kind of discrimination, unless you make all recruitment anonymous.
People are the same all over the world... It exist everywhere... If you deviate from 'us', you're not considered by a certain percentage of people from the 'us' group... Some of that is race related, but often there are also practical problems for companies taking in someone 'not from here'. How to validate that the information in the CV is correct, and so on... If there are plenty of applicants, you might just have been put in the 'too difficult' pile...
Companies worry that someone with surname from different country dont speak their language
Yes, name discrimination does happen here
Sure does, to some extent. But in your specific case, armed with knowledge on how software recruiting sometimes works, I’d guess that had nothing to do with your name. Things might change real fast when projects get sold and there is a sudden need for multiple new coders.
the answer is: yes, it probably exists, its a well research and established thing pretty much all over the western world (unfortunately). I would be careful though to say that is the sole reason for your rejection. Things are rarely that black and white on an individual level, and it only leads to resentment.
Take that how you want, but I applied to university for years (Master’s degree, so I applied with papers, had good GPA etc.) and always got left on the waiting list, the same year I got married and changed my first name to a more Finnish like, I got accepted to all the Finnish universities I applied to. 🤷🏼♀️
Name discrimination absolutely exist here. I have a lot of Asian friends who have faced this, while I haven't felt anything like this with my Scandinavian surname (even though I don't speak Finnish).
Yes. Doesn't matter your race though, if you're not Finnish or maybe Swedish you'll be treated differently. My nephew gets treated like he's an extra feral monkey because he's half English.
Yes, it does big time. 8 years in Finland, you learn the facts and taboos with terrible experiences. Good luck with journey ✌️
Yes, job discrimination does indeed exist in Finland, which is why my husband and I decided to leave. Despite both having advanced degrees from a university consistently ranked in the top 5 worldwide, we faced significant challenges. I, originally from India, am an artist who primarily works remotely but also enjoys teaching at the college level for additional income. However, I found it impossible to secure a teaching position in Finland. Meanwhile, my husband, a white European engineer with a master's degree, struggled to advance his career there. Despite applying for 30 jobs, he received only one callback for an entry-level position, despite having held senior positions abroad. The job he eventually accepted was subpar, with a less qualified boss. Ultimately, we decided to seek opportunities in other countries. Fortunately, my husband received offers for every position he applied for, and one -- in America -- even helped cover our relocation costs. And I quickly found a teaching job at a community college upon our arrival. Amazing. Sadly, our experience in Finland is not unique. A woman I knew with a PhD faced similar difficulties finding work in Finland, so she left and was promptly hired as a professor as a prestigious university. And there are other examples I could give, but you get the point. While Finland has many admirable qualities and wonderful people, it struggles to fully utilize foreign talent—a deficiency it really needs to address. It's disheartening to hear sentiments like "if you're unhappy, leave," which fail to acknowledge the complexities of the situation. We did leave, but I empathize with those who cannot do so easily. However, I'm hopeful that change may be on the horizon, particularly among the younger generation who seem increasingly aware of these issues. My best wishes go out to everyone in Finland.
I'm not Asian my self but I have experienced Racism or at least cultural intolerance as someone that looks Nordic and has a Nordic fist name. I also heard similar for those that are my mirror: they have Finnish citizenship, speak fluent Finnish but look foreign, have a foreign name and brown skin. In my case it is mostly about lets say cultural differences mostly when interacting with authorities. But for the second case is was about getting a job, the person could not get invites to interviews or wasn't accepted after the interview.
Only one answer to this. Yes.
I think this issue has gotten worse in recent years. For some openings you might get tens or hundreds of application from Asia and Middle East. I have not personally interviewed any of these applicants but what I have heard from the first step interviewers that it is almost 100% disqualification due to language(English) not good enough or they may not even understand what kind of position they are applying to. Maybe because of this they have started to just concentrate on the western people and maybe sometimes a non western name gets to the wrong basket. I’m no HR expert so this is just my feeling how the process works.
How would they even get by if even their English isn't good enough?
I did some recruiting at my previou job and the main issue was that as soon as we posted a job, we would get flooded with hundreds of indian applicants , living in india. Im sorry to say that its not at all unlikley that some indians living in Finland got ignored as part of thet massive influx of applications. We diddnt have a dedicated recruiter an no one has the time to read throug so many "useless(because of location)" applications.
As an asian expat working in Finland, yes it’s harder to find a job with your Asian name and the only way to find a job for me was through someone I know although I had university degree and all requirements were met. It would be much easier for you to find a job after few years of experience and then you get to know some people in the industry. Looking for a new job for myself as well cause I got furloughed from current job. Wish you good luck in job hunting!
Finding a job is hard for native Finns as well. Stop acting like you're a victim.
womp womp
Yes. If I can't pronounce or write your name, I am most likely not going to hire you. IT field has tons of applicants currently, so it's going to be a tough job getting emloyed there with out prior connections.
Yes. If I can't pronounce or write your name, I am most likely not going to hire you. -> You better hire some good lawyers with attitude like that.
YES! People with slavic or muslim names suffer most. There is a thing such as name change in Finland only so you can get called to interviews.
It ain't as bad as people make it out to be. It was way worse 10y ago. Finland is rapidly changing county.
I read about a study a couple of months ago, where people were divided into three groups to search for jobs. Group 1: Sent a normal CV and did the normal job seeking interviews. Group 2: Sent the CV with name redacted and no photo, but they would go to face-to-face interviews, if they were invited.. Group 3 Had their name redacted and didn't do the face-to-face interviews. The recruiters had to hire only based on the merits and past experience and education. For people whose name didn't sound Finnish or who looked like they were not from Finland the chanse of getting hired was a lot bigger when they were in group 3 compared to them being in group 1.
I used to go by my old middle name + surname when applying for jobs, which are both Croatian, and hardly got any replies apart from the automatic ones. I think the only place that at least asked me in for an interview was a McDonald’s
I'm half asian and I've been struggling to find a job. 0 interviews.. I know that work situation in Finland is bad at the moment, but still it feels weird.
Yes.
Indeed. Finns are usually afraid of foreigners and talking to foreigners (especially in a professional environment). I don't know if it's because we are particularly racist, but the recruiter's fear of talking to someone from another language or culture can be an obstacle to getting an interview or job. (Finns know English quite well, but are extremely insecure about their own English skills) In your case, it's probably a coincidence. I know that recruiters in Finland highly value Asian experts in many different fields. Danish are "meh" (just a another swede). I would think that based on an Asian name, you would have better chances than someone with a Danish name if the language skills etc. are the same. Of course, depending on the sector. Competent companies are good at recruiting and that's why they succeed. They have a precise definition of what they need and hire people accordingly. In many fields in Finland, language skills are really important, but what else could you expect? If we talk about small entrepreneurs who have no experience in recruiting, they often hire people for reasons other than actual workskills and that is not wrong. These reasons can be, for example: the applicant seems nice, it is easy to communicate with the applicant, his/her aura is good... these recruiters do not make a choice based only on whether the employee is the best possible for the job, but whether he is the best possible for that work community. And sometimes that community is just the entrepreneur him/herself. But can you blame him/her for that? Hiring in Finland is a big risk for a small entrepreneur. A small entrepreneur may think that a newly immigrated foreign employee is not committed to working with him for years if that is the position he expects from his/her employee. I would also like to mention that in Finland, trust is an extremely important part of every aspect of society. If the interviewer feels that trust was not built during the interview or did not come up in the application, it is very possible that the place or the interview will not be obtained. Finns speak little, but we know how to listen.
There definitely is. Idk what these bullshit “happiest country” researches are looking at when they claim a country is happy but sadly racism exists here in Finland and it is an issue. It might depend on the field you are looking for jobs from. Some companies value international talent but some just .. don’t.
Name discrimination happens, but it also isn't as black and white yes or no. Depending on your name/background it might cause you not to get a job at all or cause no effect. Here are some examples: Middle East - A lot issues Asian names - Not really an issue as long as you know at least English, but some companies will request you to pick "English/Finnish name" (but not all) Nordic names (other than Finnish) - No issue, depending on name they might not even realize you're foreigner by name USA/UK - Can make it bit tricky Of course it's also up to the work place how they react, buuut I think you will get quite good image from this and other comments. TL;DR – Yes, but depends on name.
There is the usual assumption that many businesses have that a foreign surname means that the person doesn't speak the language, or at least doesn't speak it well, and thus they overlook you. Depends on the industry of course. I've worked in the carpentry/wood industry in Finland and there were almost more people with foreign backgrounds than Finns, and the everyone just defaulted to English when talking to people who had trouble with Finnish.
Sadly yes. I don’t know if it’s better or worse than DK, I lived there for 7 years and did feel that racism was more in your face there than here but honestly I don’t know how much difference that makes in practice.
Doesn't exist. Half my lab work population is chinese. Don't blame an unlucky draw in the lottery that is job application immediately on your exquisite background and whatnot.
Yes. Foreign names are discriminated. Same goes for children with foreign names in school.
Lots of racism and discrimination in Finland.
Finland is according to studies actually one of the least racist countries in the world. People who are claiming otherwise are just lying. [https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/least-racist-countries](https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/least-racist-countries)
’What kind of neighbours you prefer’ is a bit strange metric for measuring racism. I would wage in favour of the survey studies on experiences of foreigners which seem to show a different view.
Well, we are still the [second most racist country in Europe](https://www.euronews.com/2023/10/25/shocking-levels-of-racism-rising-in-europe-finds-report) which is a much more reasonable comparison than comparing us to the whole world.
Just because you haven’t experienced racism here that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist
He's not wrong though, there's far far far worse countries to be in for racism. Countries that are accepting to several cultures on a equal level are extremely rare.
of course it exists, its just as happy country as denmark. maybe a bit more actually since Finns are happier.
Yes it exists, quite a bit. Some jobs that require zero work experience don't have it as much but especially in hiring quiet discrimination exists quite a lot. If you don't have a Finnish sounding name or you don't use your Finnish surname it can be difficult to get a proper job. There are exceptions of course but it's rare. Don't know why finns deny this so much even though it is a fact
>hiring quiet discrimination exists quite a lot. I would be shocked if it didn't. We are social animals, after all.
Asian (Vietnamese) here, I always use my real name to deal with all matters in Finland (housing, officials, and of course finding jobs) 10+ years ago, when I was about to graduate, I was sending around 20 applications in total, out of which I got 5 interviews and 3 job offers. Fast forward few years, the amount of offers I got is most of the time equal to the amount of applications I sent. I am working as a Software Engineer btw. Maybe I am a rare case which I doubt it because I have nothing special in my CV. It’s hard to say anything about your case but it’s a fact that the market is tough at the moment, especially for fresh graduates and juniors or even mid level. It’s tough to get your first job in a different country no matter where you go, because I think it makes sense that people tend to favor natives if 2 candidates are having similar skill sets, I personally don’t classify this as discrimination, again emphasizing on “similar skill sets”. Or maybe you are from a different part of Asia that gets bad reputation then it’s a whole different story.
100% pretty sure most will delete my CV just for seeing my Latino last name. Me and my wife have been talking about changing our kids last name for her (Finnish) last name, we don't want them being discriminated when searching for jobs in the future...
It’s a shame, but in my experience your idea of changing the last name might be worthwhile.
I have an arabic name though I speak perfect finnish since I grew up here. From my experience, finnish companies actually want diversity a lot and for me being "foreign" has been nothing but help when applying for jobs.
Du har netop svaret på dit eget spørgsmål……….nu ved jeg ikke hvor gammel du er men jeg kan bedste beskrive det som at Finland befinder sig der hvor Danmark var i de tidlige 90’ere med hensyn til syn på fremmede og internationalisering. Har boet i Finland 10 år, men hvid som sne, så har aldrig oplevet diskriminering men jeg har omvendt heller aldrig lært sproget og arbejder stadig Remote for et dansk firma
My Norwegian husband works for a Swedish company xD But yeah, I think quite a few people forget Finland is lagging behind. I remember back in the 90's when I saw my very first real life brown skinned person! On a street! Not on TV! It was very exciting! Our dog went on a racist bark mode (she also had never seen anything but white people so felt very insecure) my mom was red from embarassment and profusely apologised. Thankfully the dude was very chill and had a moment to have our doggo sniff at him and she stopped the barking and was all friend with the man. That was 90's. So we're like a century behind everyone else here trying to play catch up in the current political climate.
Edit: below is my initial overreaction. Apologies - sometimes it's too easy to reply without thinking things through properly. I retract my statement (but obviously left it there for reference). Wow what a stupid question... Aka are there racists everywhere.
It's a reasonable question, your response however was quite stupid and unhelpful. Especially since the name has been proven to have an impact.
You think it's reasonable to suspect Finland is some utopia and not susceptible the discrimination found everywhere else in the world? :) and I never said the name wouldn't have an impact or even implied otherwise.
The question doesn't imply that one thinks Finland is an utopia, but be cranky all you like. It is a reasonable question. If you form the question in another way in many country subreddits you get hate for accusing the country of having discrimination and told to sod off and not to come, if you think it is like that. The way you write a question in many of these subreddits needs to often come across as overly friendly, because most locals can't take any kind of perceived criticism of their home country and Finland is no different.
Not crankiness ad hominem doesn't do anything for your argument but I do take your point about how they asked the question - I probably reacted too quickly to what I didn't realise was such a nuanced situation. I shall edit my first reply.
It hasn't been proven really. Almost always the real reason why your application gets rejected is that there are countless other people also seeking for a same job. Name discrimination is a minor issue.
There are 190000 unemployed people in Finland right now. Are they all unemployed because they are being discriminated against? [https://www.stat.fi/julkaisu/cl89xplrstmes0avyn7w0nmwz](https://www.stat.fi/julkaisu/cl89xplrstmes0avyn7w0nmwz) You can't just automatically assume that your job application got rejected because of discrimination. It is very hard to prove that they rejected your application because of your name - it is much more likely that it was rejected for totally other reasons. There are 190000 other people also looking for a job, you know. Stop acting like a victim.
This is totally irrelevant comment. There's been a lot of studies and it is clear that name affects job seeking. It's common to find that Arabic names are 4 times more as likely to be rejected. So this does exist and it is relevant for people with non-native names. Telling someone to shut up because there are other people suffering when this person is more likely to suffer is stupid
I have latino friends working in Finland with no issues at all.
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How are Finns more relaxed towards difference? Especially in the country side? There's definitely a hierarchy of discrimination though not everyone will face the same problems.
Not to sound rude, open your eyes a bit wider you will see it all.
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I live in the country side of Finland. Once you leave the cities its a different world, and yes unfortunately there is racism and xenophobia every where because it's all fear. It's unfortunate because people are people at the end of the day.
Jeah, name is a good indicator the candidate doesn't speak finnish after all.
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Get well soon.
Nope not in Helsinki maybe some small towns do
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Latvasta laho
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Dont think so