Change is in the wind

Post Christmas has seen a few changes in my working environment. Unlike NZ, it seems that Swedes tend not to change jobs every often. Or houses, for that matter. Over the course of my 30 year working career, I've had 9 different employers. A couple I only satayed with for a year or so, others I worked for about 5 years. That would be a pretty average sort of history in NZ. Employers don't view this as a negative thing. Every place of employment brings new experiences and perspectives that a future employer can make use of. Stay in one place for too long, and you risk the risk of developing a tunnel vision within your chosen profession. In my opinion. I've found in Sweden that employees tend to stay in one place. I guess that brings a loyalty and stability to the workplace. It also means that employees tend to become highly skilled at the task they have been assigned to do. The downside is that they soon forget how to do bugger all else. I left my first job in NZ after nearly 6 years. My rationale was that, if I stayed much longer, then I'd only ever know how to do one thing. Which would make it harder for me to gain employment elsewhere, leading to my employer owning my arse. But back to the subject in hand. I work within a small team in a large office. There are 7 of us in an office of 50. 4 out of the 7 have been working together in the same office for 20 years. An incredible collective depth of specialised knowledge. They are also a very tight group, which has made it tough for a new job (not to mention a frickin immigrant) to break in. It hasn't been easy being the new guy, even after 2 and a bit years. Now, however, 2 of the team have decided to branch out on their own. Breaking up the gang. There's still 2 lifers remaining, but now there's a more equal balance of newbies. It will be interesting to see how this plays out over the coming year. They'll either close ranks, or be a bit more welcoming to those who have less than 20 years experience with the same company. Or, they may also decide it's too great a change, and move on themselves. Whichever way, it's going to be a really interesting study in Swedish conditioned human behaviour.