Recruiting in China

BEIJING, Oct 15, 2009 (SinoCast Daily Business Beat via COMTEX) -- The Chinese call center industry is predicted to have a revenue of CNY 10 billion in all during 2010, Wang Jun, chief engineer of the government and enterprise customer division of China Telecom Corporation Ltd. (NYSE: CHA, SEHK: 0728), one of the nation's Big Three telecommunications carriers, said at the China Call Center Industry Summit in Beijing on October 15.

The industry is expected to reach a 20% growth next year, the chief engineer estimated. The size of the call center outsourcing service market will rise to USD 20 billion in the Asia Pacific region in 2011.

However, China is weak in the competition for call center outsourcing services from Europe and the United States. The establishment of a call center is based on a similar culture environment, so Japan and South Korea choose China as their offshore outsourcing base.

In addition, the summit is held in Beijing on October 15 to 16.

Need staffing your call center in China? go to DaCare Staffing - the only specialized call center staffing agency in China

Royal Bank of Scotland, whose private banking entity in Singapore reported mass resignations by 70 employees recently, will continue to hire aggressively for its investment banking business in China, China Daily reported Thursday.

The bank would try to attract and retain talents in China and stick to its stated goal of becoming a top-five banking entity in the country, the newspaper said, citing John Hourican, chief executive of RBS' Global Banking and Markets operations.

The Edinburgh-based bank recently announced a barrage of new hires in China in a bid to beef up its investment banking business. Among the key appointments, the bank named Raymond Yin, who joined RBS from JP Morgan where he was chief representative and head of general industrials for the China market, as the co-head of investment banking for China.

The move comes in the backdrop of a battle for banking talent in Asian countries, especially in the private and investment banking sectors. Citigroup recently appointed Rodney Tsang, a senior investment banker with Bank of America Merrill Lynch, as co-head of its China investment banking team.

RBS is now 70-percent owned by the British government.

HONG KONG, Oct. 20 (Xinhua) -- About 200 university graduates in Hong Kong have or will soon set off to various Chinese mainland cities as interns, said a Hong Kong official on Tuesday.

The cities include Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Chengdu, Shenzhen, Dongguan, Foshan, Panyu and Hangzhou.

Speaking at a ceremony for the Internship Program for University Graduates on Tuesday, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government's Commissioner for Labor Cherry Tse said the program provides 4,000 places for university graduates to work as interns and receive training for six to 12 months in local or Chinese mainland enterprises. Up to 1,000 places are earmarked for Chinese mainland internships.

For local internships, graduates receive training in their capacity as employees and are paid wages commensurate with the duties, responsibilities and content of the training posts. An employer is eligible to receive a training subsidy of 2,000 HK dollars per intern per month.

Mainland internships are not premised on an employment relationship. Interns are entitled to a living allowance of 3,000 HK dollars per month and depending on circumstances, an accommodation allowance of 1,500 HK dollars per month from the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government.

Tse said as of Oct. 15, about 1,000 graduates have been employed by local enterprises as interns under the program. Their average monthly salary is 8,800 HK dollars and the highest offer is 22,000 HK dollars.

HONG KONG, Oct. 19 (Xinhua) -- Hong Kong's labor market has begun to improve as the latest seasonally adjusted unemployment rate recorded its first drop since the outbreak of the global financial turmoil last year, said the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government on Monday.

Hong Kong's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell from 5.4percent in the June-August period to 5.3 percent in July-September. The underemployment rate remained unchanged at 2.4percent, the Census and Statistics Department said on Monday.

Secretary for Labor and Welfare Matthew Cheung said as business conditions gradually improve and the labor market stabilizes, employers may adopt a more positive attitude towards recruitment.

"This is expected to ease the pressure on the unemployment rate in the near term," Cheung said.

Total employment in July-September was 3,495,500, about the same as June-August which stood at 3,495,300. The labor force fell7, 400 to 3,704, 700 in July-September.

The number of unemployed fell 7,700 to 209,100 in July- September while the number of underemployed rose 1,700 to 89,900.

Falls in the unemployment rate were mainly observed in the construction, information and communications, arts, entertainment and recreation sectors.

The unemployment rate of people aged 15 to 19 fell 2.7 percent to 25.7 percent, showing that the local government's efforts to boost youth employment have begun to take effect.

Cheung also noted that the recovery path may still be uneven as overseas markets have yet to show visible improvement.

He said the government will promote employment on all fronts through training, retraining and skills upgrading.

THE number of job openings on China's mainland is expected to rise in the fourth quarter after posting consecutive declines since last October, according to a report released yesterday by Hudson Recruitment Ltd, a global consulting company.

In the survey of 650 companies on the Chinese mainland, the Hudson Report concluded that 39 percent of them plan to increase headcount in the fourth quarter this year - a sharp increase from 27 percent in the last quarter.

More than half of the firms polled signaled that they will keep their payroll steady in the quarter. Only 5 percent of the companies are planning to cut their number of employees, a drop from 12 percent in the third quarter.

"Although the overall hiring expectations are still lower than a year ago, it is a clear sign that the job market is going on an upward trend," said Mark Carriban, managing director of Hudson Asia.

The study also showed that China reported the highest hiring expectations of the markets surveyed in Asia.

The banking and financial services sector posted the highest expectations of hiring and the greatest increase from the previous quarter. About 54 percent of respondents plan to hire more staff, up from 28 percent in the last quarter.

Expectations have also risen among information technology and telecommunication firms, with 53 percent of the respondents predicting hiring more, representing a substantial jump from 33 percent of the previous quarter.

The media, public relations and advertising companies have the lowest expectations of hiring intention, with 17 percent planning to increase payroll. But only 2 percent say they will shed staff this quarter, down from 17 percent in last quarter, the report said.

The Hudson Report is released quarterly after surveying about 2,000 key employment decision makers.

TAIPEI, Taiwan -- Proficiency in the English language helps create better job opportunities and brings comparatively higher pay for employees in Taiwan, according to the latest survey by an online employment agency. As high as 68 percent of enterprises or organizations in Taiwan include a good command of English among the major criteria when recruiting new employees. They are also willing to offer an average of NT$3,105 more in starting salaries to those with stronger competence in the international language.

The survey by online job agency www.1111.com.tw also shows that companies in the field of trading, product distribution, industrial and commercial services and education, as well as government agencies place the highest priority for English proficiency.

However, only 22 percent of salary earners presently possess credible English proficiency certificates.

A high percentage of job seekers — 67 percent — admit they lost interview opportunities when looking for new jobs because of inferior English capability.

The survey finds that 71.2 percent of employees believe that improved English ability will bring more employment opportunities and better positions with higher pay.

But among the 78.2 percent of employees who still have no English proficiency certificates, 64 percent acknowledged that their current level is still not up to the tests, while 36 percent said they even don't know how to prepare for such examinations.

A representative of the Educational Testing Service (ETS) of the U.S. stationed here said the average TOEIC (Test of English for International Communication) score in Taiwan ranks at eighth place in the Asian region, falling behind China and South Korea.

The general English level of professionals like certified public accountants and lawyers, as well as R&D staff at electronics and other high-tech companies in Taiwan, is below international standards, hampering the nation's overall competitiveness in the world market, he said.

But he also pointed out that the number of people taking the TOEIC certifying test here has continued to increase in recent years, rising to 180,000 in 2008 from about 40,000 in 2004.

This shows that more people in Taiwan have become aware of the important role of English language in their careers.

Another positive development is that the average TOEIC score of marketing staff here has risen above the level of people in similar positions around the world, he said.

The survey of English proficiency and job opportunities, covering 488 employees and 1,465 employees, was carried out islandwide Oct. 1-14 this year.

The Chinese central government will start its annual recruitment of new staff in mid October, offering about 15,000 positions, said the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security here Monday.

About 130 departments of the central government and affiliated institutions will recruit new staff, said a statement issued by the ministry.

The ministry will start taking in applications from Oct. 15 to 24 and an examination will be held on Nov. 29 at the capitals of provinces, autonomous regions, municipalities and several big cities, the statement said.

The departments prefer people with grassroots working experience, it said. "About 70 percent of the positions will be taken by people with at least two years of working experience at the grassroots level."

A quota will be provided for young people who finish their service in the government programs of working at remote and less developed regions and villages after college graduation, it said. But the statement did not release how much it will be.

"We hope high quality talents with adequate grassroots experience will work for the central government," said a ministry official in charge of the recruitment.

The application will be done on Internet.

SHANGHAI — China's manufacturing activity continued to expand at a steady rate in September, as domestic and overseas demand continued to improve, an independent survey published Wednesday indicated.

The HSBC China Manufacturing PMI, or purchasing managers index, fell slightly to 55.0 in September, from 55.1 in August.

A reading above 50 nevertheless means the sector is expanding, while a reading below 50 indicates an overall decline.

"Although the headline PMI remained broadly unchanged from the previous month, there was a marked expansion of manufacturing employment in September," the bank's chief China economist Hongbin Qu said.

Manufacturers were hiring in September at the fastest rate in 25 months to keep up with rising sales volumes, HSBC said in a research note.

Foreign order levels rose for a fourth straight month, but the increase in total new orders outpaced export sales, suggesting domestic demand was driving the overall improvement, the bank said.

China's economy expanded by 7.9 percent in the second quarter of the year, up from 6.1 percent in the first quarter, mainly as a result of massive government spending amid the global downturn.

Beijing announced a four-trillion-yuan (585-billion-dollar) stimulus package last year in a bid to prop up growth in the country by boosting investment in infrastructure and other government-backed projects.

The PMI sank to a record low of 38.8 in November as the global financial crisis took hold, but improved continuously in the following months, moving above 50 in March.

Manufacturing accounted for more than 40 percent of China's economic output last year, which has been hit hard by evaporating demand for its products in key export markets such as the United States and Europe.

THE city's job market is recovering from the global economic downturn with the number of jobs created at the same level as before the crisis, the Shanghai Human Resources and Social Security Bureau said yesterday.

The number of jobs available in the city's human resources market exceeded 120,000 in August, almost the same as last October when the financial crisis began to affect the job market in Shanghai.

Of these, the number of new jobs reached 40,000. Though still 20.43 percent fewer new jobs were created compared with last year, the figure was much lower than February's 72.9 percent rate of decline over the previous year.

"Since the economy is getting better in the city and the government has launched a series of jobs-boosting measures, the job market is stepping out of the downturn and getting better," said Li Ying, of the department of promoting employment in the Shanghai Human Resources and Social Security Bureau.

However, the bureau didn't release figures for the unemployment rate.

Shanghai reported a registered unemployment rate of 4.3 percent last year. Local authorities pledged to create 500,000 job positions this year, with an unemployment rate controlled at about 4.5 percent.

From January to August, the city created 466,800 new jobs, helped 11,370 business startups, and provided vocational training to 105,300 people after a series of job stimulus efforts was launched at the beginning of this year.

The stimulus packages featured preferential policies for business startups, vocational training and internship plans for fresh graduates.

HONG KONG - ELECTRONICS manufacturing giant Flextronics International said on Tuesday it will hire more than 6,000 migrant workers in mainland China this month because of a rise in demand ahead of Christmas.

The company will also take on an additional 1,000 workers in the next two months, Valerie Kurniawan, senior communications director for Flextronics Asia, told AFP.

'The demand is coming from all over the group, it's all segments and industries,' Ms Kurniawan said.

Flextronics makes parts and equipment for the automotive and mobile phone industries among others and its clients include Hewlett-Packard, Motorola and Microsoft Corp. The company's latest hiring spree has focused on its Zhuhai Industrial Park in the Pearl River Delta in the south of the country.

Chinese factories have been rushing to hire migrant workers laid off during the global crisis as they ramp up production but analysts have warned that the labour shortage stems from a short-term rise in demand from Christmas orders rather than a recovery in China's key export sector.

Nearly 20 million migrant workers lost their jobs at the start of the year as factories closed or slashed production in response to plummeting export orders from key markets in Europe and the United States.

Wang Dengfeng works as an interior decorator, but he is never splattered with paint at the end of the day and he has not once hurt his back moving furniture.

Instead of decorating stores and homes in the three-dimensional world, the 31-year-old designs and beautifies shops in the virtual world, making them appealing to online shoppers.

The career earns him between 5,000 yuan ($735) and 10,000 yuan each month, an income considered handsome, even for white-collar workers in big cities.

Wang is among an increasing number of Chinese young people earning their living online.

According to a recent popular online post, there are at least 36 kinds of online jobs, including online hourly workers and online shop assistants.

It is not known how many people make their living in the online world. Many work online part-time.

One of the most successful online workers is Kuang Baoqiang, from Yangjiang, Guangdong province, who earned more than 100,000 yuan last year as a professional blogger.

Kuang started to write blogs about basketball on sina.com.cn in 2006.

He has posted some 1,200 blogs, and attracted more than 38 million visits so far.

His popularity earned him a contract last year from a domestic firm that makes sports products that wanted to advertise on his blog.

Vivian Lin, from Jiangsu province, failed to secure a satisfying job after she graduated from college in 2005. Last month, after being unemployed for six months, she opened an online shop "Lin club" in the hopes of following in the footsteps of such online success stories as Kuang and Wang.

"A satisfying job is not easy to find nowadays," she said. "But shopping and web surfing happen to be my two hobbies, so I decided to give it a shot."

The shop has not got off the ground yet, but she has high hopes.

"I have much more to learn before I can make real money through this job," she said.

Experts believe online employment will become increasingly important for unemployed young people.

Chen Xinming, a professor with South China Normal University, said young people should be encouraged to explore the option. But Chen said more study of the growing sector is needed to make sure young online workers are not exploited.

During the first six months of 2009, Hong Kong was inundated with retrenchments, salary cuts and hiring freezes, but the third quarter saw optimistic signs of a recovering hiring market.

The number of bank positions available swelled by about 20 per cent in Q3, with most of these jobs in the front-office.

Mainland Chinese banks in Hong Kong, for example, are already aggressively seeking to increase headcount in their global markets divisions. They report a high demand for relationship managers, sales professionals and retail brand managers to meet their growing needs.

Such developments are largely due to China’s advocacy of a “two financial centres” model. Hong Kong’s free market economy, together with Shanghai’s broad integration of mainland business and legal traditions, create an environment which is both competitive and complementary and which will assist the future growth of a financial infrastructure in Greater China.

However, despite the general recruitment surge, many banks are only cautiously optimistic. Although the number of bank job opportunities has increased, employers have imposed stricter hiring requirements during the selection process. Most notably, the number of interview rounds each candidate now goes through has increased to at least four or five, up from two or three in 2008.

Meanwhile, candidates have more or less tempered their salary expectations. Many unemployed job seekers see the value in being more flexible in terms of their total compensation and benefits packages, and some are even willing to accept a lower salary than their previous position.

By contrast, those who are already employed still expect increments of 10 to 15 per cent before they will consider jumping ship. But the problem here is that employers - even those which have increased their hiring - may not necessarily be able to offer such salaries. And to make things even more difficult for hiring banks to woo exceptional professionals, many rival firms are equally determined to retain their talents.

SHANGHAI: A survey released by 51job Inc Wednesday, a leading provider of integrated human resource services in China, showed that over 70 percent of enterprises which have been affected by the financial crisis have seen a gradual recovery this year. Some have maintained the same revenue they did last year and some have even achieved higher revenue, the survey showed.

Online game, e-commerce, food and commodity industries invested more in employee recruitment and training, said Feng Lijuan, chief HR expert of 51job Inc. A total of 100 enterprises have been chosen the best companies in terms of human resource management.

"The award will be presented to those whose human resources practices have made significant contributions to their corporate development," said Feng.

Through the award selection process, 51job Inc discovered that over these past few months, HR managers had turned a time of crisis into an opportunity to demonstrate the growing value of human resource management, she added.

"Today, human resource management is not only a partner to business strategy and development, but also an effective tool to manage economic slowdowns," Feng said.

The 100 best HR companies cover 19 industries, with IT at the top, manufacturing ranking second and finance third. Most face fierce competition for talent. Among them, foreign-funded companies occupy a majority and there are more State-owned ones than private ones, she said.

"Foreign-funded ventures were largely impacted globally by the economic slowdown, but their business in China has achieved the fastest recovery," Feng said.

The 100 winners have taken some actions to decrease the staff turnover rate by the preference of internal recruitment and rotation, according to Feng.

"What's more," Feng said, "the reinforced performance management they have made enables them to keep a higher salary level for employees."

Salaries of the 100 winners increased by 4.92 percent in the first half of this year over the same period last year. Among them, 52 companies increased salaries by five per cent to 10 per cent.

Jiang Jianqing is head of Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, the world's largest bank by market capitalization. His 2008 earned compensation totaled $234,700.

On the other hand, there's the pay of CEOs in the US that needed billions in bailout funds from the US government to stay afloat after taking reckless and over-leveraged bets. The largest US bank CEOs earned in 2008: JP Morgan - $19.6 million, Bank of America - $9.9 million, Wells Fargo - $13.7 million and Citigroup - $10.8 million.

This is the ultimate in heads I win, tails you lose. Long have we justified higher CEO in America pay because of their outperformance compared with banking institutions around the world. Yet, to operate in a capitalist system, executives cannot be able to realize such compensation when their bets go sour.