Hello everybody

I am living in Russia with my wife (both Russian citizens) and will soon defend my PhD thesis at a Dutch university (I have lived in the Netherlands for 4 years). My wife will soon finish her Master's at a Russian university. I'd like to apply for a Postdoc somewhere in the EU or in US/Canada, while my wife wants to do a PhD abroad.

Ideally, I want us to have interesting and rewarding jobs and continue living together somewhere-I-don't-yet-know-where. However, I am a bit anxious about how to achieve both these objectives at once.

We both work in the field of life sciences, but our expertise areas are too different to try to apply together to the same research group (and my wife would not approve of this anyway, she wants to keep her personal and professional lives separate). I have not investigated the situation in the US, but in Europe, the "dream destinations" of mine and of my wife's are quite far apart.

The basic plan is that each of us looks for a position wherever he/she wants, and when one of us finds something, the other focuses on applying to positions at the same institution/town/region. I have doubts, though, on whether it's really the best strategy, as it severely limits the choice of the "slower" partner. However, I don't know which approach could be better than that.

I wonder if anybody could give me some suggestions or share their experience.

I think the basic plan you describe is probably your best option. I don't see what else you could do? In the US I've seen instances where one spouse is offered a position and negotiates a position for a spouse, but I expect this is probably for later stage career researchers. I think you are going to find one partner is always going to be on the back foot in their career at one stage or another if you want to live together. Look up 'two body problem' for more info.