Sikh coming to Poland with over 14 years experience in Customer Service and running operations

Cześć fellow forum members,

I am a practising Sikh and moving to Poland next month. I have over 14 years of experience in customer service and operations. It would be grateful if I get answers to the following questions to be mentally prepared on what to expect while in Poland:

1. Being a Sikh with beard and a turban, how easy it is for me to be a target to racial violence? I have gone through this thread here (polishforums.com/life/poland-safe-indians-sikhs-living-temple-72655/), but it got carried away in a totally different direction.

2. Keeping in view my experience and qualification (I am a graduate in Sciences with Six Sigma training), what is the amount that I should target for a salary in Warsaw?

Many Thanks

Sadly there is little education in Poland as to the difference between Sikhs Hindus and Muslim, sadly there is a chance you could get some bother from some random lunatics.

There certainly needs to be more education worldwide when it comes to Sikhs and Sikhism to avoid confusion, Sikhs are very good people indeed.

I've seen quite a few Sikhs in Warsaw and nobody seems to take any notice of them. You should be fine just going about your business during the day. Obviously be careful at night just as any man or woman should be in a big city :)) and keep away from football supporters on match day! They always seem to be looking for a fight with the world and his wife!

When in Rome do as the Romans do, lose the turban and shave off your beard and get your head shaved like the Polish youth do and you should avoid all racial problems.

But then he would be breaking one of the five Kakaars, they are a peaceful good people that help others.

Oh I didn't know.
Religious law definitely trumps mans law.
In that case just avoid eye contact if possible and always smile like you do when visiting any foreign country.

Not true- but Sikhs are good in a fight and are loyal to the country they live in, so we need to be nice to them.

very true. we are a martial and military religion who have been fighting against invaders since 300+ years :)

Haha. That is nice. Point noted.

The same in Poland brother.

We shared the same battlefield at Cassino - montecassinotours.com/index.php/page/id/19/the-indian-army-in-italy.html

So is someone in poland gives you trouble remind them.

And while you're at it, please remind them of the Indian Legion as well... :)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Legion

What the 14% that were Sikh, you mean I don't know that almost the same percentage of my own countrymen betrayed Poland by taking the side of the soviets and nazis, hey the wounds run deep.

You likely will not be assaulted by anyone if you stick to busy areas, but if you wear your turban and beard in public you will be mistaken for a muslim and be stared at a lot and a few may call you names if you're on the tram or something. You likely will be told to take off your turban if you wish to enter a club. A Sikh in Krakow had this problem and tried to get his 15 minutes of fame because he was upset that a bouncer wouldn't let him into a club with a turban. Also, watch out for groups of young guys around soccer stadiums and near the bloki - they're just waiting to find a dark skinned guy with a turban. Due to all the issues with terrorism and Poland being very much on the side of rejecting migration from middle east/Africa, I'd ditch the turban and beard if I were you. You'll fit in better and most people will then think you're simply another IT professional from India. If you go around in a turban in Poland you're just begging for people to stare at you, mock you, etc.


Is your degree a bachelor's or graduate level (i.e. masters, phd)? Customer service jobs, even managers, don't get paid very much in Poland. You'd be lucky to get a job paying 10k 12k z's a month and that's still on the higher end. Unless you have a lot of operations management experience then perhaps you can land a mid level op manager job where you would make 10k-20k. It's difficult to tell what kind of jobs you'd be able to get without knowing more about your experience, jobs you've held in the past, etc. Essentially, take a job that you'd be qualified for in the US as an example and divide the salary by 2 and again by 3 - that'll give you an approximate range as most corporate office type jobs in PL tend to pay 1/2 to 1/3 of what they do in the US.

:)


Its a bachelor's degree in Science. My Experience spans over a decade in operations and customer service


Well I am turbaned but certainly not dark skinned ;)

Yeah sorry you won't make much money working in customer service. At best, you'll get a job at a call center and even if you manage to become a customer service manager you'll likely make between 4-7k zloty, maybe 8-9k if you're lucky but that's on the higher end. Since I'm going to assume you don't speak Polish, if you wish to get a job in CS you'll likely have to focus on western corporations that have call centers located in Poland. As far as operations management, if you had relevant manufacturing management experience you could get a job.

Most of the guys that come from India and Pakistan tend to go into IT. It is one of the best paying careers and you can easily make at least 10k 12k zloty a month (considered an upper middle class income in Poland - you'll be able to buy certain luxury and save some money especially if you're single and don't have a woman or kids to support). If I were you, I would try to get a job in that. It's going to be way easier for you to take a basic programming course (usually 6-12 months) and upon graduating you'll get a quick offer. This IMO is the best job for non-Polish speakers who wish to migrate to Poland. In my city of Wroclaw, there's a small recruiting company that will train you for 6-12 months to program (I don't think there's any cost for the training aside from maybe like a small paperwork processing fee) and upon completion you take a short programming test and if you pass you get hired for a small/mid size Polish software company at 10k zloty starting salary. IMO, you'll make far more money doing programming than working in CS or OM unless you have like a masters/phd, management experience, preferably know several languages including Polish, etc. in that case you'd be looking at salaries of even 15k, 20k, 25k a month.


Again, you'll likely just get stares and at worst some name calling by drunk people especially if you're walking around late at night on the weekends. I wouldn't recommend walking alone at night on the weekends as oftentimes the hools (mostly soccer hooligans, blokerzy which are like punk wanna be gangbangers, some skin heads) are looking to pick a fight. You won't experience the shootings and violence with weapons like in US or even UK, Sweden, etc. in Poland but you may be a target for racist drunks coming out of the clubs late at night. Just be careful and be aware of your surroundings. Also, don't be surprised if you try to go to a club or something the bouncers will likely ask you take off your turban. This is for dress code and in a way your own protection as it'll make you stand out less. If you get attacked, don't expect the police to drop everything to help you.

You won't get a salary of 10-12k with a six month programming course under your belt. For computer science graduates with a full three or four year degree, the opening offers tend to be around 4K. Bear in mind they are also native speakers of Polish and most have basic English too.

Also bear in mind that any jobs of this sort would be snapped up by Ukrainians. The chances of an Indian or Pakistani landing an entry-level IT job in Poland are nil.

Sikh coming to Poland, eh why don't you stay in England?

You would be in Poland

I am not looking for an IT job, though I have the skills of a professional level IT Degree Holder.


Because I am not English. I presume that you have presumed that everyone is rushing to poland because their home country is not offering a decent pay. That is not the reason with me. I easily make 1500 Euros a month here, which is great for India. The reason to migrate is more sentimental to me.

@Wulkan - That might be a case. Your opinion is most welcome. :)

Then it will be hard for you to find any job. Job opportunities for Indians in Poland are very scarce indeed outside of the IT field. Unless you have some serious higher level qualifications and lots of experience in the quantitative aspects of high finance, you basically have no chance.


Poland is not the sort of country that treats sentimental people well at all. It has a way of chewing them up and spitting them out. Poland will slap you in the face with cold, hard reality. There is nothing romantic or sentimental about living in Poland. It's not for dreamers.

If you mean you want to be with some "girlfriend" that you met online, then grow up. Bull$hit like that is for silly teenagers, not for responsible adults. Take a cold shower.

I agree you have to be tough, Britain is much less of a nut to crack a better place to make money as a migrant, I know my family did just that, well although under some duress at the time.

you really have to work damn hard and be very lucky to make it to the top 5% in Poland.

And you have to have a well-thought-out, concrete plan of action that is firmly grounded in cold, hard reality, and a viable Plan B as well. Rose-tinted optimism is the second leading cause of failure among expats who come to Poland. Right behind "love".

I am in my thirties, and my ability to take decisions based on hormonal rampage has been lost since my teenage years.


exactly my words.

Yes you can. I personally know of a firm in Wroclaw where you take a programming course and upon successful completion of a 'test' of sorts at the end of 6-8 months, you're offered a 10k zl gross job.


That is true. Nonetheless, there's an ever increasing amount of Indians and Pakis taking up IT jobs in Poland with little to no knowledge of the local language.


Oh definitely - that is probably the truest thing I've read here in a long time. Foreigners investing in small businesses especially seem to lose their shirt rather quickly.

By 'sentimental reasons' do you simply mean you wish to meet beautiful Polish girls? Don't be shy, you wouldn't be the first guy to migrate to Poland, Ukraine, etc. for those reasons

Plenty of them are doing just that after graduating here. I know one guy who graduated from the art school in Poznań and landed a good entry level job with one of the better corporations.

Things have changed Dominic. Right now, there simply aren't enough people to fill the jobs going.

The OP is not a graduate of a Polish school. He's still in India and would need a work permit. Chances of him getting one for an entry level position are nil.

Dominic he can provided the employer is willing but no one would do until they get any benefit out of that. I know there are so many so called consultants mushroomed in Warsaw doing this hanky lanky business, just watch on YouTube how they lure them.also I know some are making over 100k euros a month.amazing how these guys get trapped.

Merged:

Sikhs in Poland

Are there any Sikhs on Polishforum living in Poland?
And can share their experience of Poland