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Amusingly, I'm not actually sure if this goes on meta, but this is probably the place it's most likely to be seen.

I was looking through the "work here" page and looking at one of the roles - Enterprise Account Executive, Teams (Bengaluru). While it's not a role I'm personally interested in, I find looking at the page useful in trying to guess the overall direction of the company. I'm baffled by the requirements.

Screenshot of the requirements for the job mentioned. Words "Must be fluent in English and German" circled in red

I feel like the requirements were copy pasted - since they expect that the candidate be fluent in English and German. German is roughly as useful as being a purely Hindi Speaking Aircrew in a Chennai-Coimbatore flight, as the old joke goes.

English is certainly useful. Hindi is the Lingua Franca of India (as much as it pains me to admit, as a proud Tamil) - and ought to be the secondary language listed. The native language of the region Bengaluru is in is Kannada, and I suppose that might be useful. In theory one might find French spoken in Pondicherry, or Portuguese in Goa...

German though... well, y'all might have made it a little difficult for candidates familiar with the region. I hardly think there's any place where it's spoken much anywhere in the subcontinent.

Could we have someone review the copy and adjust it to reflect more practical language requirements for the region please?

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  • 10
    Maybe the post is responsible for their German clients/accounts?
    – Martin James
    Commented Dec 5, 2020 at 22:04
  • Also "If you want to work in our office… You’ll be in our headquarters in New York City". There are a lot of (minimum) trilingual people who split their time between Bengaluru and New York. Right? :-)
    – ben is uǝq backwards
    Commented Dec 5, 2020 at 22:04
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    @MartinJames There's another opening for "Enterprise Account Executive, Teams (Fluent- German)" - based in the UK, and I guess they have the same copy. I was under the impression SE had an office in Germany, and with brexit, it seems a bit odd to have it as a UK based job, but I don't have a linguistic horse in that race.
    – Journeyman Geek
    Commented Dec 5, 2020 at 22:07
  • 3
    If I recall, SE has a team in Düsseldorf, so this may be related to that.
    – Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog
    Commented Dec 5, 2020 at 22:08
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    The cynical version is that this is India-based only because of lower wages, and still targeted at the German market.
    – Mad Scientist
    Commented Dec 5, 2020 at 22:11
  • Tbh, that would almost be a logical answer, other than India being a pretty big potential market, that basically got dragged kicking and screaming into remote work by covid. You'd still want to find a fluent german speaker in a job market where german isn't likely to be a first or second language.
    – Journeyman Geek
    Commented Dec 5, 2020 at 22:15
  • 7
    My suspicion is that the position is aimed squarely at furloughed Lufthansa employees from the region.
    – Sonic the Anonymous Hedgehog
    Commented Dec 5, 2020 at 22:17
  • 1
    @SonictheK-DayHedgehog lol, that flies in the face of the evidence. It's plane to see that you are wrong:)
    – Martin James
    Commented Dec 6, 2020 at 3:34
  • @MartinJames ._. OUT SIR. OUT.
    – Journeyman Geek
    Commented Dec 6, 2020 at 9:53
  • @JourneymanGeek meh...SE is so hostile and unwelcoming:)
    – Martin James
    Commented Dec 6, 2020 at 13:16

2 Answers 2

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Thanks for your report. I brought it up with our People Team, and German is indeed not a requirement for this role. The job description has been updated accordingly.

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The "What you'll need to have" was copied word by word from a different job offer for Enterprise Business Development Manager Field Sales (Fluent-German) (Google cache, offer expired by now) which indeed required German, as implied from the job title itself.

So my best guess is the one who copied the text forgot to omit the "German" part.

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  • There's also Pacific Northwest and Southeast; it doesn't matter where it's being advertised. --- BTW: While searching I noticed a free resume service with templates that include the skills asked for, just use one of those resumes and stick your name on top; equal effort, equal result. --- Wonder which advertisement originated that language requirement, which ranks 12th place.
    – Rob
    Commented Dec 6, 2020 at 10:10
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    They do have an Munich office but strangely the current fluent german opening is in the UK.... which is outside the eurozone.I guess someone will notice and fix it. Interestingly the "What you’ll get in return" section on the german posting is UK specific, and the one on the india one is the generic "anywhere" one.
    – Journeyman Geek
    Commented Dec 6, 2020 at 10:47

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