A blogger at something called “Principle Pictures” gives a first hand account of a group of Iraqi professionals arriving in the US and finding their former professions in Iraq mean very little here.
On Saturday afternoon forty-eight Iraqi refugees who have resettled in the U.S. arrived at Reagan International Airport. The men wore pressed suits and ties and the women had freshly polished fingernails and high heels. They were clearly dressed to impress. In their luggage they carried a most prized possession – resumes detailing their work with American companies, the American military and the American government in Iraq. While they are a unique refugee group — all are college-educated professionals — they face the most common refugee problem: continuing their careers in America
I confess I don’t understand why the outfit that brought them, Upwardly Global, brings immigrants to America with the expectation that they will walk into good jobs. It seems cruel. We have seen one story after another from around the country where educated refugees are cleaning motels or cutting meat.
We even had one sad sounding Iraqi college professor whose husband was a doctor write to our blog literally begging us to tell her what sort of jobs they might have in America. How do you tell older people, formerly successful people, that they will likely have no satisfying work.
Iraqis learned the hard truths about hunting for a job here: human resources managers spend an average of 20 seconds on every resume, personal stories (even the heart-wrenching ones they all have to tell) have no place in a job interview, the economy is terrible, resumes should be limited to a page or two (most of theirs are 3, 4 and 5 pages), and, most difficult for them to hear, don’t expect their employers in Iraq to hire them in America.
“Iraqis are having a hard time coming to terms with the reality that while their education and skills were valued in Baghdad, Fallujah, and Basra, they are not valued here,” says Jane Leu, Upwardly Global’s founder and president. “These people were leaders in Iraq, and they will be leaders here if given the chance. The idea that all immigrants have to pull themselves up by their boot straps is outdated.”
I wrote about Upwardly Global kicking off a lobbying campaign in April to bring more Iraqis to the US here. They are a non-profit group, but apparently act as a head hunters for American companies. Sounds like they fell down on the job with this group.
Read Judy’s earlier post here about how Iraqi officials do not want to lose Iraq’s professionals—they need them to rebuild Iraq.