How my journey began

December 2018 I saw a job advertisement on my school’s online job board for the Embassy of Finland’s External Economic Relations Department in Washington DC. That day I applied. I spoke about my multicultural upbringing, bilingual language abilities, love towards business podcasts, Richard Thaler, and understanding the world around me.

A few weeks pass. One month. Two months.

I’ll be honest, by this point I thought the Embassy team had already chosen somebody else. Luckily an early Wednesday afternoon I got a call. An interview request! I was ecstatic! I was told about some practicalities and we agreed to have an interview the following week around the same time.

I end the call and bounce my way to my mom to tell her the news. I mean, I didn’t get the job yet but obviously I was thrilled for the opportunity. I started making a plan. I read the news more carefully for the following week and took notes on high level economic and political U.S. and Finland related issues. To get that extra edge I spoke a few times with my grandfather who I look up to and really knows a lot about the world. I wish I was like him when I grow old. He not only gave me the recap of worldly events but also gave his take on them. I was ready.

On the day of the interview I was understandably nervous. I didn’t really know what to expect but I had done what I could to prepare, without forgetting the basic personal strengths or weaknesses and “why here, why this” questions. The interview was surprisingly tough as the questions revolved around big picture questions and diplomatic understanding. For example, I was asked about how to deal potentially differing views on climate change policy between U.S. and Finland. Another example is, how I would act in certain situation or what my thoughts were on some current affairs. They were generally, broad issues that were easy to know about if you followed the news at all. However, to be honest, I don’t know if my answers were good or my way of (diplomatic) answering style was more of the focus. Either way I felt good after the interview, and to cut the interviewers some slack, they were very kind!

Next part, I knew I would almost immediately receive an email of a topic that I had to write a one page synopsis of. The topic was: What has happened in the U.S. – China trade war in the past year. I had one hour. Look, at this point if you hadn’t been following the news, it would have been hard to get a good one pager. Possible but hard. Luckily I knew the basics of what it was about but I did look up some timeline information and 1-2 analyses on the topic. One hour later I send the paper.

I got in. Originally I thought I would start Summer 2019 but I was flexible and so they gave the fourth rotation which started in December 2019.

So, what to take from this? Read the news from different sources. Expect a good amount of wait before you hear back from government organizations. It’s not just about what you say but how you say it in the interviews. Take as much out of the experience as you can! Want to know more? Check out my earlier posts or reach out to me! I’d love to tell you more about my experiences and answer questions you may have.

Fun fact: I’m glad I started in December. A few months later I found myself an intelligent beautiful woman that I am still with today (Jan 14th 2020 – Yes, I update this every half year, if I don’t reach out!)