Sebastian Redolfi
When we made the decision to move to Sweden sometime in 2024, my expectations were simple: find a new corporate job, a good place to live, and continue having a modest, fulfilling life. Looking back now, that was rather naive.
Naive expectations
For the first 32 years of my life, I lived in Austria, went to school there, studied there, and eventually ended up with a decent, well-paid job at a multinational corporation.
Already as a teenager, however, I had the dream of moving to northern Europe, but for many different reasons never made the move.
When my wife then got a job offer from Lund University, it wasn’t a hard decision for us. Thinking it wouldn’t be too hard to find a job again, I quit my position and took a few months off from work, organized our move, and followed my wife to Lund by the end of January 2025.
Thankfully, she had read the welcome email from LU mentioning the International Citizen Hub and the Kick-Start Program. I signed up and it quite literally kick-started my journey in Sweden. Through the program I understood the peculiarities of the Swedish labour market, laid the foundation for my network in Sweden, and realized that there is a realistic chance of doing things in a different way.
A new beginning
Beyond moving north, there was another dream I had held for a while and never thought I would ever follow through on: running my own business.
The time off from corporate life, the challenge of finding a job “the normal way” in Sweden, everything I learned in the Kick-Start Program, and also the simple fact that it was the right time in my personal life, altogether eventually led me to dare to make a new start.
Maybe it was naive to start a business in a new country, without knowing the language, without a network and without prior experience as a business owner. What I can say for sure is that in the short time I have been doing this now, I’ve learned more than in the four years of my PhD.
Now, a year and a half into this journey, the tide is slowly turning and things start to move in the right direction. Along the way, I met all kinds of interesting, kind, and incredibly generous people, some of whom I’m glad to now call friends.
I’m far from a position to give advice, but what I can recommend to all my fellow internationals is to be open-minded, step out of your comfort zone, build relationships based on a genuine interest in people, and dare to ask for help when you need it.
Outside of work, my wife and I enjoy the beautiful nature of Skåne and spend a lot of time exploring the region. With the sailing club in Lomma, I found a place to follow my passion for being out on the water.
/Sebastian
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