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Good morning,

Throwaway to avoid being recognised. I Just changed jobs to join the EU Institutions. It was not really part of the career plan but hey, when you get the opportunity ...

As background, I'm Belgian, and have worked as a civil servant all my career. I started late after failing to complete my Master's.

I started with shift-work as front-line agent, was very motivated by my work and got promoted a couple of time to become a Project Manager in a normal office setting. I was working on several EU projects, and got luckily noticed and asked to participate to an interview for an internal job where they couldn't find a candidate. I got offered fixed term contract as a temporary agent, but after that there is no certainty at all.

Work pressure is very high and politics is everywhere. I will have to reevaluate in a while to see if it's manageable in the long term from a mental health perspective.

For people who also had to start at the bottom: Good and honest work pays off, stay motivated and true to yourself and you'll get there. For perspective, my first salary back in 2013 was 1522 € Net. 9 years later I was earning 3660 Net when I left the Belgian administration, and now this.

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1. PERSONALIA

  • Age: 36
  • Education: Bachelor Political Science
  • Work experience : 10y as civil servant in same field
  • Civil status: Legal cohabitation
  • Dependent people/children: 1

2. EMPLOYER PROFILE

  • Sector/Industry: EU Public Administration
  • Amount of employees: About 32.000
  • Multinational? No

3. CONTRACT & CONDITIONS

  • Current job title: Project Manager (non-IT)
  • Seniority: 6m in this job
  • Official hours/week : 40 hours/week
  • Average real hours/week incl. overtime: 50-65 depending on deadlines
  • Shiftwork or 9 to 5 (flexible?): 8 to 6
  • On-call duty: no
  • Vacation days/year: 26 + max 2 overtime compensation per month

4. SALARY

  • Gross salary/month: 6980,66
  • Average net salary/month (incl. net fees): 6295,00 (incl. household allowance and child allowance)
  • Netto compensation: 0
  • 13th month (full? partial?): No
  • Meal vouchers: No
  • Ecocheques: No
  • Salary car/bike and/or fuel card: No
  • Group insurance (% employer): No
  • Other insurances: EU social security (118€ monthly retention) completely replaces BE social security
  • Other benefits (bonuses, stocks options, ... ): EU Staff pension system, EU Crèche, EU schools, ...

5. MOBILITY

  • City/region of work: Brussels
  • Distance home-work (km's/time): 65km - 1h15
  • How do you commute? Car + Train + Metro
  • How is the travel home-work compensated: 50% intervention on public transport subscription
  • Telework days/week: Max 3/weeks depending on the agenda

6. OTHER

  • How easy can you plan a day off: Difficult, has to be planned a long time in advance, with Business Continuity
  • Is your job stressful? Yes
  • Education possibilities: A lot internally
  • Responsible for personnel (reports): Responsible for daily work of a team of 7, but no HR reporting
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