Hercog, Metka and Flavia Cangià

Skills on the move: Highly skilled migrants in Switzerland and beyond
2021

This article explores how highly skilled migrants make sense of and subjectively validate their skills when in search of employment in a new country. With the use of a transnational perspective, we suggest that in the context of migration, skills can only be properly understood if we consider the multiple locations and events in people’s life trajectories. In addition to foregrounding the spatial context, we also explore skills through a temporal perspective. The country of origin, previous countries of migration, receiving context and future destinations, and past experiences and future plans can all play a role in the way individuals make sense of and subjectively validate what migrants themselves consider to be their skills. Drawing upon qualitative research among highly skilled migrants in Switzerland, we examine how personal and professional skills intertwine with each other when people engage with a given yet evolving socio-economic environment.