I left Germany and moved to the US for work. Here are the 5 things that shocked me the most about American culture.
- Emma Brooke moved from Berlin to New York City in 2022 after working throughout Europe and Japan.
- UK-born, she expected a smooth transition without a language barrier but was met with challenges.
I've been obsessed with travel since I was young. While other kids dreamed of becoming doctors and lawyers, I wanted my career to take me places — literally.
Now, as a 35-year-old creative lead, I've traveled the world with my career. After a decade of working all over Europe and in Japan, I moved my job to New York City from Berlin in 2022.
Like many people, I thought that the actual move would be the hard part. It's not easy to haul your life across an ocean. Little did I know, the real challenge would start after the last box was unpacked.
I'm from the UK, and I had visited New York City once as a teenager, so I assumed that working in another English-speaking country would be a breeze. But in some ways, the differences have been just as hard to navigate as when I moved to Tokyo. Here are some of the biggest culture shocks I've encountered and how I survived them.
1. Cost of living
In Paris and Berlin, I met Americans who were not-so-pleasantly surprised at their European salaries. But soon after discovering that a coffee cost 1 euro, they learned that what seemed like a little went a long way.
My experience was the opposite. After seeing my paycheck almost double overnight, I started imagining Fifth Avenue shopping sprees and a roomy Manhattan apartment. But my first month stateside gave me a reality check.
Eye-watering rents, huge grocery bills, and the cost of healthcare soon made me realize that there's a reason the salaries seemed so high: The cost of living was, too. My monthly rent of 1,000 euros, or about $1,100, felt like a lot in Berlin — until I signed a $3,000 lease in Brooklyn.
Before you move to the US, do your research. Use a paycheck calculator to estimate your income after tax. Check out local rents to understand where you can afford to live. But most of all, reframe your mindset with that research in mind.
Your glamorous midtown Manhattan dream might land you in Brooklyn, but if you know what to expect, you can fall in love with that reality, too. After a few months, I did.
2. Self-promotion
In the UK, most people have a self-deprecating mindset. It's not a culture that encourages bigging up your achievements.
In the US, people seem more at ease championing their accomplishments. If you're not willing to get on board, it's easy to be overlooked when opportunities arise — to succeed, you have to be your own biggest fan.
This confidence is one of the things that I love the most about the US, but it was also one of the hardest to get used to. My advice is to get comfortable with feeling awkward at first and treat it like an affirmation practice.
Talk to yourself about your accomplishments in the mirror. Say them aloud when you're alone. Soon, what once felt weird and unnatural will feel as easy as ordering lunch — and likely give you a big self-esteem boost along the way.
3. Communication
In international offices, communication is an art. In one country, small talk might be superfluous, but in another, it's key to a successful negotiation.
Before moving here, I constantly adapted my communication style to accommodate cultural nuance, but I felt a sense of lightness and ease in New York. Finally, I wasn't getting reprimanded for not using formal verb conjugations with clients in Paris or forgetting to bow to my boss in Japan.
For anyone working in a new country, accept that open-mindedness is the key to successful communication. Start by observing how your colleagues interact. Do they address each other more formally than you're used to? How and where are key decisions made? A willingness to adapt and challenge your instinctive way of working can reduce friction and open up collaboration opportunities.
4. Work-life balance
Europe's work culture is the stuff of legend — 30 days of vacation, two-hour lunches, and no emails after 5 p.m. While this is an exaggeration in many environments, there's no doubt that a healthy work-life balance is easier to achieve. In the US, I've noticed people answering emails on dates, taking calls at family birthdays, and never taking time off.
This is one area where I've actively tried not to change. Sometimes it's hard to switch off when it feels like the whole city is still working, but by setting boundaries — such as not putting Slack on my phone — it's possible.
Unless I'm in the middle of a busy project, I try to keep a 9-to-6 schedule, which allows me to perform at my peak and keep my creative brain sharp.
I've also found little ways to bring my European work perks across the pond. I always book the bridge day between a public holiday and a weekend. I never eat lunch at my desk. And, even if it's only for 15 minutes, I make sure that every day I cultivate a part of my nonwork life, whether that's reading a fiction book or meeting a friend after work.
5. Identity
Upon moving to the US, I noticed how quickly professions came up in conversation. Despite having a decadelong career as a writer and creative, I rarely defined myself in those terms before moving here.
Surviving this identity shift came in a couple of ways. There was no getting around more closely connecting my sense of self with my career. But in my personal life, I experimented with ways to talk about myself. Bringing up a passion project or new favorite hobby allowed me to define who I was on my own terms and helped people get to know me beyond my job title.
Working in a new country continues to challenge me in ways I'd never expected. But with every culture shock comes a new lesson, idea, or way of looking at the world, and it's one of the best crash courses in personal growth I've ever taken.
I'm no longer fazed by all the differences I've encountered, and they've grown into a source of endless fascination.
Have you experienced culture shock after moving to a new country? Email Lauryn Haas at lhaas@insider.com.