How tough is it for a US citizen to work in The Netherlands?

Question

I lived in Amsterdam for 1.5 years going through school. I've got a degree in Finance and I would love to work for ABN Amro, or ING, or some other bank in the Netherlands. Anyone out there know the best way to find a job? Anyone know anyone? lol. Business jobs you seem to need an "in" and to get back over there to work, it seem's i'm missing that necessary "in".

Answer 1

Basically you have two issues (a) the visa one and (b) Dutch language

In short - unless you hold a EU passport (or have a relationship with a Dutch/EU national) then in principle there are only a couple of 'routes' in to getting a working visa (and you can read all of these on the Dutch immigration site in English)

(a) being self-employed http://www.ind.nl/EN/verblijfwijzer/verb...

(b) as a 'au pair' http://www.ind.nl/EN/verblijfwijzer/verb...

(c) As a highly skilled migrant http://www.ind.nl/EN/verblijfwijzer/verb...

(d) Self employed http://www.ind.nl/EN/verblijfwijzer/verb...

(d) When aa company sponsors you with a job offer http://www.ind.nl/EN/verblijfwijzer/verb...

Basically to get a working visa for the latter you must have a job offer and it is catch 22 as companies do not want to take the time, money or effort to bring someone from outside the EU unless they hold specialist knowledge/experience that they cannot find within the EU.  If you read applications online, the majority even have the stipulation now in the application

The Banking sector in general is going through a massive period of reform with several mergers (e.g. ABN Amro is one such case now with Fortis and job redundancies are taking place), so the good positions are hard to come by currently in this area.  Plus the working environment would be in Dutch and that is your second hurdle

So to get an "In" your best bet would be for an International organisation, UN, Europol, etc etc or to work for a company in the US that has branches in NL and in which you can build up knowledge to be transfered based on that knowledge/experience.

Sorry if it's not what you want to hear....