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Taking time out, sabbatical, gap year, independent travelling, skiing bumming, call it what you like but working aboard certainly has its attractions.
While the rest of the world struggles through another cold grey winter stuffed into offices, putting up with over bearing bosses and staring at a computer screen you could find yourself working aboard living the life people normally pay their hard earned cash for! What’s more you won’t have to return at the end of a short week away but can look forward to up to 6 months away and you’ll get paid for it too!
Fantastic Scenery
Holiday destinations are always surrounded by fantastic scenery and for many just living
somewhere so special surrounded by mountain peaks or the beautiful summer landscapes of the Mediterranean are enough to make it all worth while. Even in the best ski resorts it doesn’t snow all the time and most resorts are bathed in sunshine for most of the winter months. Short heavy snowfalls followed by weeks of skiing in the warm sunshine are the norm. Spring in the Alps is a truly special time with most workers enjoying skiing or snowboarding long hours and partying outside in the evenings. Some seasons finish as late as May and most resorts hold a workers party or seasonnaires race or ball before returning home.
Flexible working hours
You’ll be working hard but the companies all realise that the reason you are there is to have fun and get out and enjoy yourself. Working for a few hours and then having the afternoon off to ski/ board or just hang out certainly beats watching the clock waiting to get home to just in time to fall asleep during Eastenders. When the day’s work is finished the party is normally just starting and most season workers get together and hit the resort bars and nightclubs.
All holiday resorts thrive on a unique energy and to be part of that can be life changing.
You’ll get fit and come home with a fantastic tan
Most companies actively encourage you to participate in the local sports giving you time to ski, sail, surf or climb after the early morning chores are completed. Spending the afternoon snowboarding or going to the beach certainly beats another coffee break in the office.
Get good at Snowboarding or Skiing!
If you really want to improve at winter sports the only way is practice. Great skiers and boarders have fantastic technique because they’ve done the seasons. You may not have grown up in a country with mountains and snow but that doesn’t mean you can’t become a fantastic boarder or skier. You’ll no longer be counting the weeks skied or runs you’ve boarded, but measure your life by the snowstorms and powder days you’ve experienced.
You’ll no longer be a tourist
You’ll even improve your language skills if you get out and talk to the locals who are normally so much more friendly to people who they see working amongst them. Feeling like you belong in a foreign country and not feeling like a tourist is a great experience.
Forge new friends
The opportunity to work and party with so many different types of people will last a lifetime. You’ll almost certainly be working as a team which will give you valuable experience coveted by future employers. Many seasonal workers have made valuable contacts with guests who become friends for life. Some even find guests are the link to that important full time job on returning home. The friendships formed while working a season will be one of the most lasting experiences with connections from across the world lasting a lifetime. Although the days of chalet girls being sent to the Alps to find a husband are thankfully long gone many a person has found lasting relationships with people they met working aboard.
Work hard, then play hard, is definitely the motto here.
Europe is often considerably cheaper to live in than the UK but the best holiday destinations and ski resorts are never cheap places to live in if only because your bar bill will probably increase!
Wages may not always be as high compared to living in the UK but the package that companies put together often includes a competitive wage, travel expenses, accommodation, insurance, sports equipment hire and food which gives an employee a chance to save good money. Winter sports operators should include an expensive season ski pass as part of the deal (some resorts charge more than £800 for this alone).
Many jobs give the savvy worker chances to improve their basic wages by receiving generous tips from guests and although we at Gravity Recruitment and many tour operators frown on staff earning “extras” from organising extra activities for guests, we’d be lying to say that this doesn’t happen.
Most of the larger operators are on the lookout for exceptional staff and these are often the ones offered jobs in the companies head offices back in the UK. Tour operators hire the majority of their full time UK staff from people who have worked a season successfully for them in some capacity. Many a ski town is filled with happy, well- travelled, fun loving people who first came out with a small seasonal job years ago and ended up staying on. If you have useful transferable skills such as languages, cooking, chef or child care qualifications you are immensely sought after and companies will pay you accordingly.
It’s not wasted time
Far from being wasted time, your future mainstream employer will take more interest when they see a season on your c.v and instead of a waste of time they will see it as an example of confidence and initiative and you’ll be truly able to say you’re a team player! All useful extra skills in the UK job market.
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