Baker Hughes and Micron at the Politecnico to welcome international students

20 September 2020

In the first half of 2020 there were 500 international freshmen from 70 countries around the world. Every year Politecnico organizes the WELCOME WEEK, a week of seminars and workshops together with professors and fellow students, also in collaboration with companies, during which new students also learn how to "survive" in Milan.

In the second semester, despite the pandemic situation, many international students enrolled at Politecnico di Milano. The Welcome Week, like all the other initiatives, is guaranteed also at a distance with a series of meetings and virtual seminars.

How to do the Cv in Italy? Companies hire me if I only speak English, right? Do you find the job for me? Can I do an internship in a company during the first year of the course?

These are just some of the many questions that international students ask daily to the Career Service. But the real problem is when the questions don't come at all!

Many foreign recent graduates are not fully aware of the differences between the labor market in their home country and Italy. And when they take for granted that they find a familiar context, they risk underestimating some characteristics of our labour market, which can then turn into barriers to entry and non-inclusion.

Hence the importance of providing foreign students with the key elements to understand how to move in the Italian working world well in advance of their graduation date. On the contrary, the Politecnico di Milano decided to do it so much in advance that it invited a group of companies to speak to international students on their arrival in Milan, during the Welcome Week of the university.

And so, on February 20th, the companies Baker Hughes and Micron came to the Politecnico to meet a classroom full of new international freshmen who had just arrived in the city, after the introduction to career guidance services by the Career Service office.

"The presence of companies at these meetings is necessary to get concrete feedback and give a strong message to these students, both in terms of the skills required and the behavior to be adopted in the search for the first job in Italy, and to make it clear that companies are interested in retaining international talent in the Italian working world," comments Francesca Saracino, Head of Career Service at the university.

Before the meeting in the classroom, we spoke with Francesca Deidda from Baker Hughes and Manuela Seminara from Micron, to explain why they accepted the invitation to participate and how the two companies they work for are committed to Diversity & Inclusion.

Francesca Deidda, University Relations Italy at Baker Hughes, tells us: "We at Baker Hughes believe in diversity and inclusion as a key factor for competitiveness. Teams of people with different perspectives and experiences generate more ideas. Promoting a diverse and inclusive workforce is not only the right thing to do, it's crucial to gain a competitive advantage. Identifying untapped opportunities, developing innovative technologies and new business approaches increases our competitiveness. To do all this, the company has established a set of clear global objectives and criteria in terms of performance, culture, diversity and inclusion by which managers are measured and evaluated, all monitored by a Global D&I Board of Directors.

"Initiatives such as the welcome week are very useful to introduce international realities to students who come to study in Italy," said Manuela Seminara, European Academic and Talent Acquisition Manager of Micron: "We have joined because we are interested in foreign students for our sites in Italy and especially in the world. We are a company very attentive to Diversity&Inclusion. Politecnico di Milano is a strategic partner able to support an international pipeline on all our sites worldwide. The goal is to present an increasingly globalized labor market".

After the chat we went to peek inside the classroom to hear what they were saying to international students.

Francesca: "I recommend that you focus on your studies, but don't forget to cultivate soft skills, as they are just as sought-after as technical skills. This is true for everyone, and especially for foreign students, who need to build a social and professional network in the country of arrival. It is essential to invest time to learn Italian, because the language will help to strengthen your ability to move in the community and will represent an additional skill to be included in the cv".

Manuela: "We are interested in understanding your strengths and peculiarities, we are looking for specific skills: the "Micron Behaviour (soft skills)". By soft skills we mean that series of transversal skills, such as behavioral and relational skills (team working or problem solving), which in the working world are as valuable as technical skills (hard skills)".

The Politecnico di Milano believes in multiculturalism as a fundamental educational value for students and for the entire polytechnic community.

Welcome Week takes place twice a year, in September and February, and is part of a series of initiatives of the university aimed at intergration of international students and the diversity they bring with them.