A good friend of ours, Matt, has just left Paris to return to the UK. He loved living here, but found that the french corporate structure was preventing him from moving his career fast enough. Generally advancement was determined by years of service rather than merit, and he was constantly frustrated by being stuck in a position where he knew he could do better. From the US and UK style of working (anglo-saxon as they call it here, as though we were a bunch of vikings or something), it might appear that he didn't put himself forward enough, but that wasn't the case - they actually prevented him from even applying for internal positions, saying that policy dictated minimum experience in certain roles before moving on to others. The policies of this company were quite bizarre, and possibly I shouldn't tar all of french industry with the same brush, but when he stated his intention to leave, they claimed it was company policy *not* to give references.

Back home you did hear of stuffy accounting firms that still called each other by Mr so-and so, as though they were caught in a Dickensian time warp, and it becomes an urban myth type joke. Here it doesn't seem quite so funny, and if I ever return to the world of proper employment, I'd be extremely wary of taking on a job in France without trying to get a rough idea of their office style. Don't forget hand writing analysis is still taken seriously here as part of the job application process, hence the reason cover letters are often required to be handwritten. So far I've not heard of anyone having the bumps on their head felt for a job though. The expectation of having bizarre testing methods does soften the blow of having to put your gormless photo on your CV - perhaps the first culture shock our politically over-corrected senses will feel if you intend to come here to work...

I should be careful not to be too critical - there's been a lot said lately about how french workers produce more than UK workers for less hours. While nobody's arguing the less hours (did they include coffee and cigarette breaks?), the actual numbers could be dodgy.

ps. on checking the spelling on Dickensian, I found out Chas's real name was Charles John Huffam, and his pen-name was Boz! Good job the Boz didn't catch on, otherwise we'd all have Bozian christmas's etc...

pps Good luck Matt, don't forget Gallic shrugs are really annoying back home, so do it as often as possible.