This advice is a bad fit for a public health professional with a masters degree in epidemiology from Emory. Do you find your counsel goes down more smoothly when you call the recipient "dopey?" A friend was recruited by an engineering firm in Brisbane. Had she been to Australia? No. Did they offer her the job before she'd even been there? Yes. Did she visit, on my advice, before accepting? Yes. Did she decide Brisbane was a shithole? Yes. My experience with other trained professionals is that their hiring does not follow the same arc as that which is led by HR. We recruit doctors very differently than how we recruit front desk.They don't want to helicopter in some dopey American kid that has never been anywhere, and is going to have a meltdown the first time they can't find a McDonalds.