Recruiting in China

A Chinese job seeker, identified only by his surname Li, has filed a lawsuit against mobile phone giant Nokia Dongguan, a subsidiary of Nokia China, for not employing him because he is a Hepatitis B virus carrier.

The job seeker says that Nokia Dongguan cancelled plans to hire him after a physical examination. Li believes that as a big company, Nokia should have better understanding of the disease and should not refuse him employment because of his illness. Li is asking Nokia to employ him and pay him RMB500,000 for mental suffering.

Nokia's global employment policy states that the company will not turn down job applicants because of chronic illnesses unless they can't do the job or if they impose serious danger to others. A spokesman for Nokia has told local media that Nokia is investigating the case and they will take necessary measures to correct any wrongs if the Dongguan company has really made a mistake in refusing Li employment with the company because of his illness.

A vaguely written Chinese law in 2004 does forbid discrimination against Hepatitis B sufferers in most areas except in the food industry.

ChinaForum

With the right credentials, the opportunities for chief financial officer candidates are wide open in China. But those credentials are very different than expectations in the United States or Western Europe. Success is linked to the ability to set up processes and systems, as well as the ability to thrive in the local environment.

Demand, supply

When foreign companies move their manufacturing operations to China from nearby Asian countries, moving regional headquarters follows. Then the banks come along. This migration has created a huge demand for qualified financial professionals and a special demand for a unique type of CFO.

Thomas Zhou, an executive recruiter with DaCare Executive Search in Shanghai, told ChinaForum, “On the corporate side, the hiring activities are quite busy because all companies need a CFO or controller. Financial management helps them grow the business. We do quite a lot at the controller and CFO positions.”

Other recruiters see the same. In a recent article “Hiring Days are Here Again,” consulting firm Wang & Li says, "The greatest need area that we are getting is for candidates with strong financial management backgrounds who are able to take on CFO and Controller positions.... In addition to being familiar with both international and China GAAP, such a person must also have very strong experience in setting up financial systems and processes."

To underscore the importance of systems knowledge and process, a study last year by PriceWaterhouse Coopers and CFO Magazine said that one reason CFOs in China find financial reporting a struggle is incompatible IT systems and poorly trained staff. Ting Liu of PWC’s advisory group in Beijing was quoted as saying, “The key reason that the finance function in China is not up to world class standards is mainly due to a shortage of qualified professionals as well as the advanced techniques coupled with state of the art IT systems.”

At smaller companies, Wang & Li, which specializes in placing international caliber bilingual professionals, points to a disconnect between the international environment expected by many CFO candidates and the localized environment of the businesses that need them. "Typically, the direction and intent of both the board and executive management team is there, but the day-to-day operating realities are quite a different story. Therefore, it requires a person who really understands how to get results and bring about fundamental change in a highly local Chinese company environment."

Some companies take the route of not hiring a CFO at all. Lehman Brown, for example, provides outsourced CFO services for companies that have good finance teams in place but which lack the resources to hire a full time CFO, or which have only sporadic oversight requirements.

Credentials

Most CFO candidates Zhou sees have their CPA credential, which they typically earn in China. Although an MBA is not always necessary, many have earned graduate degrees and certifications overseas in the U.S. or U.K. Some candidates are trained by their companies or they are promoted to the Asia-Pacific level (Hong Kong, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur) and are trained there, he says. Other recruiters say companies like to see candidates with both an MBA and CPA, although finding such a candidate is rare in China’s tight job market.

Special skills

At a multinational company operating in China, bi-lingual fluency is not only an advantage but a necessity. “The person has to be able to speak English and Mandarin very well,” Zhou says, and be able to read and write both languages. “English is a must because he will have to report to headquarters in Europe or the U.S.”

Fluency in changing accounting regulations and market knowledge is also important. Not only must candidates be very familiar with the U.S. GAAP and China GAAP, but they should understand the China market and the U.S. market.

Soft skills are also important, Zhou told ChinaForum. “They should be able to manage a team. And personality is always very important. You have to be able to communicate very well.”

David Yeoung, a partner in the CFO and professional services practice of Hendricks & Struggles in Beijing, says that IPO experience is also helpful, given the number of overseas IPOs, although it’s not absolutely necessary as most investors know that IPOs are driven by teams. It is more important for the CFO candidate to have run the full financial function.

Ambition, a recruiting firm with offices throughout Southeast Asia, reports a trend toward “exact fit” hiring of CFOs, leading to a more rigorous selection process, which can take six months. With CFOs in China now highly visible after recent accounting scandals, and with responsibility far beyond accounting, the risks of hiring the wrong candidate must be avoided. One of those risks is simply not fitting into the corporate culture, which is why “internal candidates” are often perceived to be the right choice for regional CFO positions.

Meanwhile, Ambition is also observing in China new “governance roles,” which support the CFO in compliance and financial reporting matters. New roles are leading to job creation and increased opportunities for senior level financial professionals beyond the CFO title, often at high rates of compensation. Ambition describes this as a new governance support profession.

Hiring

Zhou’s search group is typically used by foreign companies doing business in China, generally the Fortune 2000, and including such companies as Intel, Microsoft and EBay. When a company seeks a high level executive or CFO, his firm is able to attract candidates by presenting the company well and offering an attractive package, which can mean more than straight compensation. In China, he notes, the job title is important. “More and more candidates like to see their career progress while they are working in the company.” Rather than the title China CFO, many would like to see the title CFO- Asia-Pacific, according to Zhou.

And whereas China has a reputation for being a low-cost labor pool, hiring at the CFO level is an area where scrimping doesn’t work. One mistake that corporate executives typically make is thinking that they will be able to hire financial talent cheaper in China.

In a June interview with the Dallas Morning News, Martin Tang, Spencer Stewart’s chairman for Asia, said that some companies think they can hire a CFO in China for as little as $40,000, but learn it may cost five times that, or more. Not only that, but wise companies over-hire to sandbag against employee dropout.

Tang described five talent pools from which executives are chosen: (1) Western expatriates, (2) Asian expatriates, (3) Chinese natives who return after earning graduate degrees abroad, and (4) Chinese locals who have remained in China. Of these, the most valuable are the Chinese who return from abroad, according to Tang. That’s because they have education, knowledge of both cultures and the advantage of being Chinese themselves.

When multinationals can’t find these returnees, Hendrick & Struggles’ Yeung says they should consider foreign CFOs who have worked in China “for a meaningful period of time” rather than hiring expatriates. Ambition reports that it is “extremely rare for a full expatriate package to be offered to a CFO hired locally.”

In Zhou’s experience, half the candidates are coming from the Mainland, half are expatriates. Local candidates “can have a good degree, be well trained in the Big 4, also have some industry experience and work long enough in the local markets for a multinational company. Even if they don’t have overseas background, they can get small or medium size CFO positions.”

In terms of pay, the CFO title in China doesn’t guarantee a large salary, except in certain industries that require specialist knowledge. Increasingly, CFOs are expected to demonstrate a record of success. Ambition reports that corporate governance concerns have led to a general scrutiny of CFO pay packages, with compensation trending toward performance based incentives.

Retention

Churn at the CFO level remains relatively low. According to Zhou, “Turnover rate at the CFO level is not that high. I won’t say that’s a problem in China. I would say that’s a stable position.” The Ambition recruiters concur, especially for non-Chinese speaking CFOs who may be reluctant to move on because they see the “dwindling demand for non-Chinese speakers.

BEIJING: Google, owner of the world's most-used Internet search site, is planning to more than double the number of engineers it has in China to help win users in the world's second- biggest Internet market.

The company aims to have between 200 and 300 engineers in the cities of Beijing and Shanghai in a year's time, Google China's president, Lee Kai-fu, said after a press briefing Friday in Beijing. Google has more than 100 engineers in the nation, he said.

Google plans to hire "thousands of people" for its Beijing development center to create services for China's more than 137 million Internet users, the company's chief executive officer, Eric Schmidt, said last April. The Mountain View, California, company added online map and Internet spreadsheet services last month in a bid to catch Beijing's Baidu.com, which has a China market share three times larger than Google's.

"Google is already hiring people away from Baidu," Florian Pihs, assistant vice-president at the Beijing-based researcher Analysys International, said Friday by telephone.

"Google is after people who are highly coveted not only by Baidu," but by Microsoft other companies, Pihs said.

The search company is planning to open a development center in Shanghai this summer, Google's Lee said, declining to provide further details. An announcement about the center will be made in a few weeks, he said.

In the fourth quarter, Google's share of the Chinese search market rose to 17 percent from 16 percent in the previous three-month period, according to Analysys. Baidu's share rose to 58 percent from 57 percent, while Yahoo!'s was unchanged at 13 percent.

Google on Friday began offering a service that allows users to search for information in Chinese-language books, Lee said. The company began offering search services for mobile phones in December last year in partnership with China Mobile, the nation's biggest wireless carrier.

In January, Google bought a stake in Shenzhen Xunlei Network Technology, a Chinese company that helps users download movies, music and software from the Internet.

Baidu's search revenue could grow 15 percent on a quarterly basis during 2007, slower than Google's rate in China of between 20 percent and 25 percent, according to a Feb. 2 Credit Suisse report.

By Dune Lawrence and John Liu Bloomberg

By Frank Mulligan - Recruit China

By now I am sure you have seen the headlines. ’Chinese stock plunge sets off a worldwide sell-off’, and ominously, ‘It began in Shanghai’.

If you haven’t been paying attention to this story maybe it is time to take a look. It looks and sounds like the beginning of a Hollywood thriller except that this time it’s for real.

Putting aside the negative consequences of the world-wide stock sell-off, it is clear that China has come of age. Ten years ago, or even five, no one paid any attention to the stock markets in China. There was little incentive to do this as the exchanges in Shanghai and Shenzhen were inaccessible to foreigners. Additionally, the stocks themselves were not of sufficient quality to grab anyone’s interest, and the market was extremely opaque.

It was more akin to gambling than investing.

The situation has changed a lot since then but it is still hard to come to terms with the fact that the Chinese stock exchanges were the first to fall and that they triggered a world-wide panic. It’s a bit like growing up. Suddenly you have all these additional skills but don’t know how to use them.

The source of the sell off appears to be the idea that the former US Federal Reserve Chairman, Alan Greenspan suggested a recession in the United States, and soon. The good news is that if you look at his comments, he did not specifically say that he expected a recession in the US. What he said was ‘ While, yes, it is possible we can get a recession in the latter months of 2007, most forecasters are not making that judgment and indeed are projecting forward into 2008 … with some slowdown’.

Not exactly the sky falling down, is it?

Here in China the upside of this is that the narrative of a recession and a falling stock market may cause companies in China, both foreign and local, to hold back investments in new factories and offices. Big companies are like that. Staffers don’t make strategic investment in uncertain times.

This should trickle down to a slowdown in hiring, albeit small, just at a time when it would normally increase rapidly. Candidates might also absorb the current headlines and become a little more conservative. The net effect might be an increased stability in retention patterns. So look out for a little fewer resignations than usual, which is a definite positive.

On the flip side you may have a harder time convincing candidates to join your company if you are new to the China market or the role is risky.

Here at Headcount HQ, we're always interested in tales from the high-rolling, globetrotting executive recruitment market – especially when they involve mysterious companies like Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd.

A high-level network architect recently recounted a strange tale in which he was recruited by two corporate recruiters and a half-dozen Huawei managers, only to end up with an offer that was roughly half of what he earned in the States. To take the job, Huawei also wanted him to relocate his family to China and live in Huawei's corporate housing – without a relocation package or an education budget for his kids.

Something got lost in translation.

"What a waste of time," said our source, who described the Huawei recruitment process as some sort of "Keystone Cops" experience.

The failed seduction started when our source got a call from a Huawei recruiter in Beijing. Our source says that after he expressed interest, he was quickly bounced from recruiter to manager to manager, back to recruiter, and then eventually to a manager at Huawei's FutureWei subsidiary in Texas.

Not only was nailing down the exact requirements for the job difficult, says our networking expert, but none of the Huawei executives could agree on where he should be based. The office proposals ranged from Beijing to Shenzhen. Sydney, Australia was mentioned, too, and that's a long drive from Futurewei's office in Plano.

Finally, our source asked for a formal letter with a formal offer. What he got was a letter asking him to take a laughable pay cut and pack his bags for a company dorm in Shenzhen.

Headcount hopes this yarn serves as a warning for execs everywhere: A bit of fragrance clings to the hand that gives flowers. Actually, that wasn't the lesson at all. That just came up in my Chinese proverbs desk calendar. Oh, well...

HONG KONG, March 14, 2007 (PRIME NEWSWIRE) (PRIMEZONE) -- China Career Builder Corp., (Pink Sheets:CCBX) a Delaware Corporation, is focused on outsourcing human resource services and staffing in Hong Kong, China. The company is pleased to announce a plan to acquire Asian Career Company of Hong Kong. The company is expected to complete the transaction in the next Two (2) to Four (4) weeks. All additional information will be available upon finalization of the acquisition. The company will make further announcements in coming weeks.

About the Company

China Career Builder Corp. is a provider of outsourcing human resource services and staffing. The company provides recruitment services focusing on the professional, management, clerical, administrative, IT and industrial market in Hong Kong, China. Its services include screening, recruiting, training, workforce deployment, loss prevention and safety training. In addition it supplies pre-employment testing and assessment, background searches, compensation program design, customized personnel management reports, job profiling, description, application, turnover tracking and analysis, opinion surveys and follow-up analysis. It conducts exit interviews and follow-up analysis, and management development skills workshops. The company markets its recruitment services by way of a combination of direct sales, telemarketing, trade shows, and advertising.

Safe Harbor Statement

Certain of the statements set forth in this press release constitute "forward-looking statements." Forward-looking statements include, without limitation, any statement that may predict, forecast, indicate, or imply future results, performance or achievements, and may contain the words "estimate," "project," "intend," "forecast," "anticipate," "plan," "planning," "expect," "believe," "will likely," "should," "could," "would," "may" or words or expressions of similar meaning. Such statements are not guarantees of future performance and are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause the company's actual results and financial position to differ materially from those included within the forward-looking statements. Forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties, including those relating to the Company's ability to grow its business. Actual results may differ materially from the results predicted and reported results should not be considered as an indication of future performance. The potential risks and uncertainties include, among others, the Company's limited financial resources, domestic or global economic conditions -- especially those relating to China, activities of competitors and the presence of new or additional competition, and changes in Federal or State laws, restrictions and regulations on doing business in a foreign country, in particular China, and conditions of equity markets. The Company disclaims any obligation subsequently to revise any forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date of such statement or to reflect the occurrence of anticipated or unanticipated events.

CONTACT: China Career Builder Corp.
Mona W. Y. Yim
852-3527-0661

Xara Group of Consultants Ltd.
Investor and Public Relations
Nixon Lau
302-261-2421