Archives November 2006

A Trip Abroad Can Help You Win a Job

By Kevin Voigt

From The Wall Street Journal Online

Finding a job in a distant market can be tough, as employers are less likely to give a break to someone who has no experience in the market, or who must be flown in for an interview. To make matters even trickier, what holds true in one country often doesn’t apply in another, says job recruiter Lawrence Wang, author of the job-hunt book “Know the Game, Play the Game” and managing director of Beijing-based Wang & Li Asia Resources.

For starters, he says, remember that while the Internet is good, legwork is better. With the proliferation of specialized online job sites, it is easy to get your resume to the market you are interested in. “But there’s really no substitute for being there,” says Mr. Wang.

He suggests planning a trip to the area and letting the companies you are interested in know you are coming to town and would like to stop by. “If you fly there, it shows your commitment and gives a much higher indication of your interest in relocating.”

Contacting local chambers of commerce and career centers, or stopping by bars and clubs frequented by professionals in the area, can give a job searcher more ideas and contacts, Mr. Wang says. If you don’t know anyone in the city you are targeting, check your university alumni directory to see if any classmates live in the area.

Often, this process can help people decide whether they really want to relocate. “For example, Beijing is a real exciting place, but it’s not for everyone,” he says. “People sometimes come here a few times and decide it’s not for them — which is good. Now they won’t spend the next five years wondering what could have been.”

Spread your net of contacts. Dumb luck is often a key ingredient in a successful job search, and it often is resting in the hands of someone you haven’t even met. By broadening your list of personal contacts, your break can come from the unlikeliest places.

Mr. Wang, a California native, began his first job search in Taipei when he was a 28-year-old graduate business student at the University of California, Los Angeles. Seeking a marketing position, he cold-called 50 foreign-owned companies. He got only three interviews. They were all unsuccessful. His break came not by slogging through company directories and mass-mailing resumes, but by calling an acquaintance — a former classmate — who had family in Taipei. In the end, his “classmate’s sister’s husband” was the one who made the connection that netted his first job with a Taipei marketing firm.

“The kindness of strangers can really come through for you,” Mr. Wang says. “People in the international community have been through this before, so they can identify with you. And the average person knows a lot. They can know the people to talk to, have their names and numbers, and they’re flattered that you’re asking their advice. Use them.”

Patience is a virtue in this kind of search. Don’t be disheartened if the first trip doesn’t yield a job. One of the biggest mistakes job seekers make is born out of impatience, Mr. Wang says. Overeager applicants often don’t take the time to gain an understanding of the market, and they let their naivete show. “A common mistake we see is people coming into the market and completely outpricing themselves,” he says.

Salary requests have to be within the market range, and wildly overshooting the curve undercuts your credibility.

Mr. Wang suggests talking to anyone who knows something about the job market you are looking at: “What are the trends, what is the current market mindset? What kind of skills are employers really looking at right now?” he says.

Job seekers must also be realistic about their chances in a market where they have no language skills, Mr. Wang adds.

Email your comments to cjeditor@dowjones.com.

Project names ‘top employers’

A project was launched in Beijing on Friday aiming to build employer brands by naming China’s “top employers” in a new publication and on TV.

The China Top Employers project was also launched in Shanghai in May by the Corporate Research Foundation (CRF), a Netherlands-based independent publishing company.

“Its format is unique in China. It aims to help companies build an employer brand,” said Cai Rong, chief representative of CRF China. She added the project is currently active in nine countries.

Jobseekers, MBAs, EMBAs and graduates returning from overseas will be able to get information about companies selected by the CRF through books and TV shows.

“But each company has to pass a rigorous selection process to become one of the ‘top employers’ in China,” Cai said.

After registering, companies complete a questionnaire and a CRF journalist interviews one of their senior human resources managers and two employees from the firm.

“Our questions vary from country to country and region to region covering a wide area from salary, welfare and corporate culture,” Cai said. She added questions for each region are designed by a panel comprising experts from human resources companies, universities and the media.

“The information provided by the questionnaire is fully confidential and will be used to evaluate the participant and generate benchmark data,” she said.

The CRF determines whether a company meets the minimum criteria to become one of China’s “top employers,” determining the top three reasons to work for the firm and a confidential report.

If a company fails the final selection and publication, all research material and CRF reports are returned. The whole process is then free of charge.

If the participating company is selected as one of China’s “top employers,” the company profile as written by a CRF journalist is submitted to the firm. Companies are only able to make factual changes to the text.

The companies will be listed in a book, which is to be directly delivered to jobseekers. The book describes the advantages of the companies through information gleaned from the interviews.

“We will also take them (the selected companies) to seminars and TV shows to discuss with young talents issues concerning employer branding,” Cai said.

Companies are charged US$5,800 in Shanghai and US$7,800 in Beijing to cover research, writing, editorial, production and marketing costs.

The programme attracted 48 companies in Shanghai, including DHL, Alibaba, China Mobile and Home Inns. Thirty-eight have been selected as China’s Top Employers for 2007.

But Cai said domestic companies only make up a tiny proportion of the firms about 10 per cent of the total.

“We hope Chinese companies will attach more significance to building an employer brand,” she said.

The concept of employer brand was put forward by Western enterprises. Human resources departments play an important role in Western companies, but this is not the case in China.

“Human resources directors are not given enough rights in China and some roles that should belong to the department are played by other departments,” Cai said. “China’s human resources departments always remain at the operational level rather than at the strategic level.”

In many Chinese companies human resources departments are responsible for recruiting but not for retaining people. For this reason job turnover in Chinese companies is two to three times higher than in Europe.

Cai said it is also an initiative that drove them to bring the project to China

A reader’s toolbox:

70-536 as well as 70-290 are necessary to meet the eligibility criteria of 640-822 and 642-812 as well as EX0-101. Eventually all this experience matters in ccie.

All star corporate talent a scarce resource in China

By Michael Flaherty

SHANGHAI, Oct 9 (Reuters) – Minutes after news he had quit as chief financial officer of KongZhong Corp. (KONG.O: Quote, Profile, Research), J.P. Gan took a call from a headhunter.

On offer was a top spot at a venture capital-backed Chinese company with plans for an overseas initial public offering.

CFOs and top level executives are in high demand across the globe as cash-rich investment firms put their money to work buying companies, changing management teams, and growing the businesses.

In China the effect is amplified. Young, western-savvy CFOs who have language skills, regulatory knowledge and international experience are highly sought after and hard to find. “Talent is limited, in general. That’s just the way things are in China,” said Jixun Foo, a Shanghai-based managing director at venture capital firm Granite Global Ventures.

Aggravating the shortage is the flow of western-educated executives out of the the corporate and investment banking sectors and into private equity firms and hedge funds.

To name but a few: HSBC China investment banking chief Huan Guocang joined Primus Pacific Partners. Dennis Zhu left JPMorgan to join Oaktree Capital Management while Bain Capital recently hired away Morgan Stanley China chief executive Jonathan Zhu.

Mark Qiu — former CFO of CNOOC Ltd. (0883.HK: Quote, Profile, Research), last year left the top Chinese offshore oil producer to set up a private equity fund.

“Understanding the people-risk factor may be one of the most important things an investor needs to know before coming here,” Foo said.

Buyout firms have invested more than $4 billion in China this year, compared with only $723 million in 2003, according to market data firm Dealogic.

While talented chief executives are in demand in China, many investors view equally talented CFOs as more significant and harder to find, given the increased accounting demands required by global securities markets.

Chinese companies need CFOs who can put in place or modernise their financial infrastructure to satisfy investors and regulators.

That means establishing proper billing procedures, cleaning up books, creating budgets, and setting up legal and compliance departments — areas either neglected in many existing companies or not yet formed in young start-ups.

“There is a great demand for the CFO position,” said Gan of KongZhong, who from 2000 to 2005 was Carlyle Group’s director of venture capital investments in China.

Gan is leaving KongZhong, a $250 million Chinese wireless services company, for venture capital firm Qiming Venture Partners in Shanghai. He said he knows at least 10 venture-backed companies hunting for CFOs right now.

One key executive requirement is solid English skills.

With Wall Street investors and outside regulators increasingly involved with corporate China, English is seen as essential, especially for CFOs who handle the bulk of calls from such people.

A CFO of a foreign-listed or Hong Kong-listed Chinese firm can expect to earn anywhere from $150,000 to $500,000, plus options, said several people interviewed for this article, with CEO’s earning slightly more.

That is well short of what some U.S. and European executives make, but it is more than many non-listed, old-style Chinese companies would pay.

Also fuelling CFO demand is a string of successful new China listings, which have sparked a rush to the initial public offerings market.

Peter Mok, President and CEO of KLM Capital Group, an investment firm specialising in Asia, says the real talent search action goes on among companies going for IPO.

“They are looking for someone who understands GAAP (Generally Accepted Accounting Principles) and who can connect with Wall Street,” he said. “They need a guy who is dynamic and who is going to stay up late to talk to New York.”

Recruit Holdings Joins Forces With Netease For Job Portal

Hong Kong-listed recruitment advertising group, Recruit Holdings Ltd, is going to cooperate with Netease.com (NTES) to launch a job-seeking portal 1010job.com.

1010job will not only provide job related information to the huge traffic of viewers generated by NetEase, but will also provide ‘Elite Job Forum’ in association with ‘NetEase Forum’. A unique ‘CV Through Train Service’ will be provided to the 160 million NetEase mailbox users to facilitate their needs in job application. Apart from that, Netease and 1010job will produce more value-added service to jobseekers based on their shared ‘jobseeker-centred’ concept.

The potential of the online recruitment market in China has been attracting steadily increasing foreign investment. Major online recruitment providers from Europe, America and Japan have already devised and actioned a variety of strategies enabling them to participate in exploiting the Chinese market.

2006 is seen as being a landmark year for foreign investments coming into China. Following Monster’s acquisition of a major stake in ChinaHR, Japan Recruit, Japan’s largest recruitment service provider became a significant shareholder of 51job. Enjapan, the second largest online recruitment website in Japan announced it had agreed to cooperate with 800HR, a segmental recruitment website in Beijing. The largest recruitment website from Ireland, Keyland, has been even more aggressive in merging two local recruitment websites in Shanghai and Beijing, respectively. Meanwhile, major players from Taiwan and Hong Kong have also expedited their expansion into the mainland market. Taiwan’s biggest recruitment website, 104 HR bank has already entered Shanghai.

Is a Job Move Worth It? How to Weigh Your Options

Two years ago, then 28-year-old Valerie French experienced a culture clash when she moved from southern California to Washington, D.C., to work at a major art museum. “I loved my job, but I just hated living there,” she says. She found the nation’s capital too conservative, “the kind of place where if you wear Banana Republic you’re cutting edge.”

So, after just a year, Ms. French started looking for a new job that would have her move again. “Your environment is so important,” she says from New York, where she is now happily settled.

Moving for a job, especially when you’re just starting out, can be the springboard that launches your career. But weigh your options carefully. Where you move is just as important for your happiness as the job you move for, many career managers and recruitment professionals say.

Occupational Horizons

Moving to a new locale is risky because there are so many unknowns. Add in a new job and you set yourself up for a pretty stressful time. So make sure that the job on the other end is worth it.

Think about what your career prospects will be five years from now if you take (or don’t take) the position. A new job, especially if it requires relocation, “should mean greater opportunity coming in the door and greater opportunity looking at that five-year horizon,” says Brian Sullivan, head of Christian & Timbers, an executive search firm based in New York.

Obviously, the last thing you want is to move and then be let go. Ask what happened to the person who formerly filled the slot. High turnover may be a red flag. Is your position new or part of a new program? If so, you may want to think extra hard, because the company could change course and eliminate the post, says Cathy Goodwin, a career consultant in Seattle.

Figuring Your Finances

“It’s not all about salary,” says Anne Moore, a career specialist at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Consider the cost of living in a different locale as well.

Say you live in New York and make $40,000 a year. If you move to Atlanta, which has a 44.8% lower cost of living, according to Salary.com, you could earn just $22,090 a year and still maintain your current standard of living. Match your current pay in Atlanta, and you’d feel like you have lots more money to save or spend.

To check out different cities at Salary.com, scroll down to “Salary Data” and click on “Cost-of-Living Wizard.”

The financial equation is far more complicated if you are moving with a spouse or other partner who has to leave a current job and take a chance on finding a new position in your destination city.

Also weigh the costs of making the move and ask how much of that your new employer will pay. More than 90% of U.S. companies will cover some if not all of a person’s relocation expenses, which may include house-hunting trips, temporary housing and closing costs on a new home, according to Worldwide ERC, a professional relocation association. Unreimbursed moving expenses may be tax-deductible. Check out www.irs.gov/taxtopics/tc455.html online.

Location, Location…

Saying yes to a job in a small town when you live in a big city — or vice versa — involves big changes and may require sacrifices. Weigh factors such as cultural offerings, sports and recreation opportunities, traffic and the pace of life. Even “the weather can really influence people’s happiness,” says Ms. Moore of Johns Hopkins. The question: Can you live with the differences?

Ms. Goodwin recommends making two trips to get a feel for a new place. Pay attention to local customs and “try to connect with real people” while visiting, she says.

“It is very easy to get seduced by the idea of something new,” notes Mr. Sullivan. But particularly if you are moving away from your home city, consider how you’ll fare away from family, friends and the social supports that you’ve relied upon in the past.

Email your comments to cjeditor@dowjones.com.