German 4 Dummies: "Quereinsteiger"

Have we got a good one for you today!

Hm, hold on, did we just use a Jon Stewart Daily Show meme? We did, sorry. We'll leave it there in the hope it is not trademarked.

Quereinsteiger is a compound noun made up of "quer" (lateral) and "einsteiger" (beginner, novice). In case you thought quer looks similar to queer, they do share common roots.

The meaning of Quereinsteiger according to the dict.cc website is lateral entry employee, lateral recruit, newcomer.

Puzzled?

You should be puzzled because, in the context of U.S. culture, Quereinsteiger is at best useless, at worst a lead weight big enough to sink a resume.

The Germans have a word, a compound noun at that, for the simple fact that you work in a job which you did not go to school to learn, or for which you did not undergo a multi-year training program.

So, if a friend asks you how you say Quereinsteiger in English, respond you don't. Well, you could use "career change" but it is more factual, you do one thing, then another for a sufficiently long time. It does not have the "you do not belong here newbie connotation".

We, wordy narcissists we are, would say Quereinsteiger is a much better example for something that does not translate than the old standby Gemütlichkeit. To the blogster, the latter is simply comfort or coziness with a strong flavor of Germans on drugs (pipe tobacco and beer).

As a concept, however, Quereinsteiger is a window into the German soul. It means you are quite different from the rest of the cohort, your path in life is so different it merits a new conceptual tag (a "word").

When and how do you use the term?

Never use it to describe a higher status, higher skill transition to lower status, lower skill - unless you are doing satire or want to insult someone. Calling a move from lawyer to supermarket shelf stacker Quereinsteiger, well...good fun, though.

We have not seen it used in the context of <some job> to <career politician>, and will have to think about what that means.

Moving from one professional track to a different one is the basic usage scenario. Theology graduate turned software developer, for instance. Or English major to management consultant.

The positive meaning of Quereinsteiger increases the higher up you go in the perceived ranking of jobs. At the very top, though, it gets fuzzy again, less cool. We surmise this may be because those at the very top of the pile often think of themselves in terms of being so special and in a super category that regular HR talk no longer applies -- but just a guess.

Quereinsteiger may be losing some of its less savory meaning (that of being a misfit, really) with better permeability of educational hierarchies and more immigrants in Germany, but deciding whether to apply for a job that says Quereinsteiger welcome, it is a difficult call.

If a job posting says Superhero degree or equivalent experience, go for it. How about Superhero degree, Quereinsteiger considered?

If you are a superhero, go for it, but be aware that the daily routine will have some very un-superhero activities, for example, erecting a scaffolding instead of leaping over a tall building in a single bound.

One more thing: The blogster has done the Quereinsteiger thing so often, the best derogatory term would be zig-zagging through life.