How does getting a new job work? You tell the new company that you have to give 3 months notice? That's some long term planning on the part of the hiring company.

Yes exactly. Sometimes they ask you if you can negotiate with your employer to shorten this period, which is often the case.

Of course, they would rather it was shorter, but hiring is already a multi-months long process in most cases, so a few more months is inconvenient, but not the end of the world. If you need someone now, you hire contractors.

Interesting. Does it go for firing as well? Is it very hard to fire someone without providing the 3 months notice?

You would have to prove cause to fire without notice.

Also, depending on the country, firing/layoffs can be difficult without cause (and often even with cause) (e.g. you can't layoff someone at will, you might need to prove that you have an economic downturn before downsizing). But this varies way more between countries as far as I know.

That was my thought. It's typical in Canada that an employer will pay you out for the rest if your two weeks or whatever, and in the U.S I don't know, but have it really favours the business. I'm still at abloss as to how this works in what is apparently most of Europe. Notice is more like 2 or 3 weeks.

Don't forget that the notice period applies to all companies and all employees. So the whole culture expects that, and works with the long lead times.

Can't speak for Sweden, but we do pretty much exactly that with our India team. They have to give notice well in advance, and so when we hire a new team member we have to do so with the understanding that it will probably be a few months before they join the team.

Yes, but that's nothing unusual when the entire industry expects that. The last time I changed jobs, I signed a contract at the end of March, to start in August. That was the three month notice period plus most people are on vacation in July, so my new company would rather have me in August.

There are contractor agencies filling the niche of providing employees on short notice (and usually for a short period), but generally having people begin 3 months later is just something everyone expects and factors into their processes.

The average length of time people spend at a single job is also longer than in the US.