Foreign HR: Recruitment Portal for Foreigners Seeking Jobs in China

[Tianjin42]

Finally time to whore myself out and talk about the business I work for. 

 

I think this may well be useful for a number of members here. I have become increasingly involved with a recruitment group dedicated to recruiting foreign professionals for roles in China (and for Chinese groups who are expanding abroad). The group has developed steadily and I am now a partner.

 

If you are seeking work in China (both teaching and non-teaching roles) then feel free to visit us at www.foreignhr.com. On the site you can view current openings, submit your CV and sign up to our WeChat update/ newsletters. 

 

I believe that by numbers of closed positions we are now the main recruiter of foreigners in China. 

 

Roddy, I have read the commercial post guidelines - still have one question. We sometimes receive really interesting roles (e.g. this week we posted jobs with a mobile games group seeking English and German natives in Beijing for online marketing/ community management role) and I think that there are people on the forums who would be interested in such roles. Would it be best to simply post updates occasionally below this post (as a designated topic)? I don't want to litter the forum with commercial posts. 

 

I am happy to answer any questions here but just to try and preempt you:

 

 - There is no charge for candidates

 - Your data is secure and will not be given to any third parties

 - We have a "Race Positive" policy to try and counter racism in professional circles in China. It is complex but we feel we are at least part of the solution.

 - We have a range of checks for new clients relating to legitimacy. If they do not meet them then we do not work with them 

 - As well as finding candidates, we do a lot of work preparing both sides where required (if the client is not experienced hiring non-Chinese for example)

 - Our clients require candidates in China but we actually have a lot of international clients who are here rather than just Chinese groups

 - For non-teaching roles we get back to every applicant. For Teaching roles we receive huge numbers of emails and so try to get back to every applicant but this isn't always possible. 

 - We operate a "virtual network" (by invite only) where we send out new positions we receive and the network of people can recommend candidates to us. If they send someone who secures the position and passes the probation period then that person receives a commission. 

 - We are based in Beijing but host jobs across the country (and beyond).

 

Okay I think that covers it for now. 

 

 

[imron]

Would it be best to simply post updates occasionally below this post

Unless you are envisioning discussion of those posts, it's probably better just to make a new post in Classifieds with a link to your contact information/site.  This way interested parties can check it out, and others can just ignore it.

 

You mention a 'Race Positive' policy both in your post and on your site, but I can't seem to find anything specific on your site explaining the details of this beyond saying you oppose racism.  Do you have anything that explains the specifics of your policy.

 

Regarding the site itself, one small suggestion I have is that you might want to consider a different colour scheme as light grey text on a white background is probably not ideal.

 

Also, you seem to be doing something funky with your links, because ctrl-click which I normally use to open a link in a background tab doesn't seem work - the use case for this is that I'm browsing your available jobs and when I see one that looks interesting I open it in a background tab and then keep going through the list of job openings until there are no more jobs that I'm interested in.  Once I've done that, then I would start to go through each of the background tabs to read the specifics.  Currently, this usage scenario is broken because as soon as I ctrl-click it opens the link in the current tab.

 

Finally, the entire site fails silently if cookies are disabled and there's nothing but a big white screen (there's nothing wrong with requiring cookies, just don't make it fail silently).

 

Well, despite those minor nitpicks, the site looks promising and it seems like it could be a good resource for people looking for work in China beyond just teaching English.

[Tianjin42]

Thanks for this Imron – will post via classifieds as suggested.

 

To answer your queries:

 

Race Positive Policy

In regards to the Race Positive Policy we had a number of discussions on this in the early days. There is only a brief description in the FAQs at present so I will explain a little here. For a number of jobs (especially in teaching roles) some clients would provide a racial preference, occasionally very bluntly. My first instinct was obviously to end discussions or at least to reconsider how we were working. My Chinese colleagues and I sat down and discussed this in order to devise a policy. It is important to note that generally these attitudes in China are down to ignorance rather than anything more malicious (but obviously that doesn’t make the views themselves less toxic).

 

The policy was formed that we would try and engage with these clients and where there was a preference we would discuss why this was the case and provide some case studies that suggested race wasn’t a major factor. At this stage a significant number of clients typically reconsider and at least agree to interview candidates that don’t meet original criteria. Of course when there is contact many clients see that actually such criteria aren’t really fair or necessary. Almost all clients who have hired a candidate this way have then removed racial criteria for the following hires.

 

There is still a major issue here and many new to China will be appalled at the casual racism in professional circles but we have certainly seen some positive development on this side and as unsavoury as it may appear, I do think engagement is important.

 

Site suggestions:

These are all useful thanks (especially colour of text – will get on to that). In terms of the website generally, let me explain that the path we follow is a discussion between Chinese and international staff. In terms of the website it was previosuly for the majority of Chinese staff, simply not something worth spending excessive time or money on. However we are going a middle way and the website’s importance is growing which means we will be able to allocate a few more resources. We want this to be a major platform for foreigners working (or those that wish to work) in China so there is a distance to go.

 

Thanks also for the positive comment. We have assisted a lot of people find work in China (many who went from teaching to non-teaching positions) and feedback is generally good but there is always much more to improve and develop. We are on it.

 

In terms of the company and the industry out here I will try to answer questions as clearly as possible. I think our experiences could be useful for anyone interested in establishing something in China. 

[Simon_CH]

Hi Tianjin, it's certainly an interesting Website, obviously to be expanded.

You might want to explain to your Chinese colleagues that a professional website goes a very long way to attract foreign applicants.

 

So many interesting Job ads here in China are so poorly written that people never bother to apply. And doubly so if the site looks dodgy.

 

Just my 2c

[Tianjin42]

Thanks Simon.

Don't worry, I've had many conversations with my Chinese colleagues regarding the website (amongst other things) and it is about finding a middle way at this stage. The website now is reasonably smart and we have avoided the dense text user unfriendly setup of so many Chinese sites. The reason we have been successful thus far is because we have compromised between the two views on how to develop. The website is one aspect - we also must consider a myriad of other factors, many of which my local colleagues have called better than I could have.

It is important that we develop this way because many western recruitment groups can't deal with the Chinese HR departments (both in international and local groups), and many local recruitment groups simply can't cater to non-Chinese candidates. By developing things slowly in a way that pleases both the Chinese and western members of staff who are deciding policy we are able to marry the two parts and place some interesting roles in a viable arena.

As stated - lots more to do but we have some interesting plans.

[Mouseneb]

I think one of the most important issues around finding work in China right now is getting a legitimate working visa. Do you verify the company's ability to offer a working visa? Adding some info on visas would be a great service that would attract a lot of job seekers.

[Tianjin42]

Thanks Mouseneb, 

 

First of all, we do verify that client groups have the correct certification in order to hire foreigners. The vast majority are Z-visa positions (with some special cases relating to interning whereby an M-visa suffices. Also this doesn't include the short term English camp positions which are a little different). 

 

We originally had more information about visas on the old site but the issue on our side is that though the law is clear, we have seen numerous cases where companies are able to obtain the legitimate visa for a candidate quicker than possible/ without documents that are typically required/ without candidates returning to their home countries (or even going to HK) etc. 

This can differ depending on location i.e. local government, and also the client itself (if a major group then they have sway to secure the visa). We are concerned that if we put concrete stuff up there on the site regarding visas, people will come back to us and say "hey my friend didn't need to do what you suggested". What we do have is a question function on the site (here) and also "The clinic" on our Linked In site (here) where people can ask questions.