My GTK journey: a personal guide for current and future students searching for jobs

2025.08.13.

Erekle Abashidze from Georgia graduated as a a Stipendium Hungaricum scholarship holder on the International Business Economics programme. As a recent graduate, he is well aware of how overwhelming it may be for international students to start their new life in a foreign country, to study in a first unfamiliar higher education system, and to find an internship and/or employment that suits their career goals. Therefore, he would like to take you through his student journey and his recruitment process since he was a freshman at ELTE GTK all the way to now, when he is working for a leading enterprise for trusted open-source technology, Canonical. We hope, his story motivates you to persevere and succeed.

Why did you choose ELTE GTK?

Since high school, I realized the importance of pursuing my studies at a university that combined academic excellence with practical experience. This is when I found ELTE GTK, which stood out with its great reputation in business education and its diverse student body. I did my research on which companies ELTE Alumni worked for and found many cases when they were employed by “The Big 4”, as well as companies known worldwide including Amazon, Red Hat, Google, and others.

The fact that a year of work experience in the form of a two-semester internship was mandatory for graduating blew my mind, and the university also actively helped many of its students get involved in internships or part-time work. I knew it was the right environment to support my career goals in Hungary.

How did your student job search in Hungary begin?

I was not really sure where to begin when I decided to get my first job in Hungary, but when I asked around, it seemed like many international and local students were feeling the same way. Therefore, I realized I needed to start with small steps: updating my CV, checking university job boards (which, by the way, I received in the form of a newsletter every other week!), and researching platforms like profession.hu and LinkedIn.

Never forget that networking is a huge part of the job search process. A pro tip from me would be to reach out to ELTE Alumni on LinkedIn for pieces of advice, and possible referrals. These may increase your chances by a lot!

I admit and you should also be aware that finding a job is not always easy but, if you are persistent, your odds are very high when it comes to landing a student job in Hungary.

Can you tell us a little about your experience during your studies?

For the majority of my fellow student friends, job fairs organized by ELTE were particularly helpful. I know many people who started internships at Morgan Stanley, Blackrock, and other prominent corporations.

I landed my first job through a student union called ‘MUISZ Iskolaszövetkezet’, which regularly posted jobs from international companies. I started working as a marketing technology trainee at Graphisoft SE, the company behind the famous architecture software Archicad. It was challenging, but super entertaining as well. Along with the academic knowledge I was getting from the university, I acquired a lot of hands-on technical and soft skills on the job.

The internship and my growing expertise in automation prompted me to deepen my skills in coding. To strengthen my confidence, I took a Python course at the university, and although it was at a different faculty, ELTE GTK allows you to experiment and learn new things and disciplines.

A couple of years later, I applied for a Marketing Ops Specialist position at Canonical – the enterprise behind the flagman product Ubuntu. After a challenging process of recruitment, I got the position, and my responsibilities grew immensely. I was able to work on tackling real-world, complex business challenges. The curriculum at ELTE GTK made this possible a core subject students must take in the seventh semester is the internship, i.e. working at an organization.

What advice do you have for students searching for jobs in Hungary?

To summarize, here is what would be my best take at navigating through the process of job search:

Start early! If planned correctly, the earlier you begin your student job search in Hungary, the more opportunities you’ll uncover.
Tailor your CV! Use LLMs (Chat GPT) to find the best keywords from the job postings and use these keywords in your Resume.
Acquire new skills! Go beyond your core field of studies and expertise to expand the areas in which you can work. Take up extra courses at ELTE or elsewhere to learn something new.
Use ELTE resources! Remember that your chances are very high if you opt in for the help of ELTE’s Career Center, and professor recommendations. Attend ELTE’s Career Day for Students.
The show must go on! The beginning of the job search is the toughest. Let yourself fail! And do not give up! You only need one email starting with “Congratulations”.

Photos: Ádám Temesi