# Chemical Engineer Visa and Job strategy



## Alextwo14 (Jun 3, 2014)

Hi,

I am a chemical engineer from Germany and I am considering my options to work and live in Australia in the mid term. I was wondering whether you could help me with some strategic decisions for visa and job market. 

My skills assessment with Engineering Australia has already been completed successfully. Initially the "189 - skill independent" was my preferred visa category because of being not dependent on one single employer. But I am afraid that job hunt from overseas could be very difficult as an engineer without any specific work experience in Australia. These considerations brought me to the sponsorship visa 457/187. Unfortunately job vacancies which offer sponsorship for chemical engineers explicitly are rare at the moment.

At the bottom line:
- What are specific advantages/disadvantages for 189 and 187/457(+ application PR after two years) in my case?
- What are my chances to get a job as a Chemical Engineer without local work experience with 189 on the Australian job market? Maybe someone has some more insight in related job markets?
- In general is it realistic to get a job offer from overseas as a Chemical Engineer in the current environment?

Thanks for reading and thanks for your thoughts.

Cheers,
Alex

--edited for clarity


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## Quinnaroo (Mar 19, 2013)

Alextwo14 said:


> Hi,
> 
> At the bottom line:
> - What are specific advantages/disadvantages for 189 and 187/457(+ application PR after two years) in my case?
> ...


I am an Engineer and former recruitment consultant. As far as your visa goes the more it looks like you are going to be in Australia for a long time the more attractive you look to employers.

That said, you may have experience and skills that in high demand. If this is the case, you will not need to worry about a visa at all potentially.

Chemical engineering in general is limited to a handful of industries in Australia so you need to think about how your experience best fits into those industries and tailor a resume to suit.

Current job market in Australia for anything to do with Engineering (apart from fracking) is slow but you experience may trump all that anyway.

Hope this helps.

Quinn


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