Looking for a job in Beijing your experience

[Concer311]

Hi Guys,

 

I've been in Beijing now for about 3 months~ doing my masters here at CUC. During this time I've been looking for a job quite intensively and had 15+ interviews however most of it was just waste of time. Recently after being accepted I was asked to provide a medical check up which has to be done in one of the major hospitals here. Another company asked me to provide all the documents which I have regarding my former employment diplomas etc. and sign a two years contract.

My point is to ask if it's totally normal here to deal with such red tape and if there s anyway around it? (especially things like med check ups which I dont want to waste me time on especially if i ve got one already coming here). I've heard as well that Chinese companies usually force employees to sign long term contracts and in case of breach or termination they require to pay a large sum of "ransom". If someone had any experience with this? 

Looking for a job I've been told by some foreign companies that they arent actualy allowed to hire foreigners as interns nowadays.(working in an internianal company would be the best way to avoid all the problems) and that working in China nowadays is only legal on working visa (at my university they told me that it's legal for me to intern).

Hope someone can give me some hints or a piece of advice!

Regards

Jan

 

 

[roddy]

Welcome to the site!

 

I'm a little confused - are you looking for full-time work for after your Masters, or part-time work now? What kind of work are you looking for?

 

Also - we just had someone post about doing a Master's a CUC - would be great if you could post there and help out. 

[Concer311]

well it could be part time or full time even now given that the schedule will be flexible. Best it would be a corporate job or at least an internship in a professionaly ran start up. Marketing, journalism or something requiring knowledge of many languages will be fine. My question is however about general environment when looking for a job. I've been told that I dont really wanna work in a Chinese company by Chinese students in Europe, since the environment there doesnt really faciliate anything positive and as far as I can see for now it's a bit true. From my experience though, even westerners here become a bit dodgy when it comes to doing business and looking for employees. Or was I just unlucky?  

[roddy]

Maybe it's legal for you to intern, but not for companies to give you an internship - the rules on interning are a bit of a mess. One problem might be that no legitimate company will want to risk hiring you without giving you a work visa - but I'd assume your university will expect you to stay on a student visa. 

 

Generally when students work it's an informal, cash-in-hand set up. Anything else could be problematic. 

 

Thanks for your post in the other topic. 

[imron]

This thread might be of interest.

[Tianjin42]

Imron - thanks for the link.

Concer311 - it is difficult and does very much depend on your situation. As Roddy said - the intern situation is a mess (lots of new rules came in previously but it is the old problem - they aren't enforced uniformly).

From my side - we have seen much stronger enforcement of certification checks and medicals, in Beijing especially.

Feel free to PM me if required.

[imron]

Or feel free to keep discussing things in this thread for the benefit of future readers wanting to know the answer to the same questions

[Tianjin42]

Ha - yes good call - feel free to ask questions here. 

[Simon_CH]

Hi Jan

 

I'll second the above opinions that it's pretty difficult to find a job in China the "traditional way", i.e. applying for job openings by sending CVs etc. Difficult but not impossible, depending on your Chinese. But for all those who have managed it's been a hassle sorting the Visa question, unless you are employed by a foreign company and sent to China for a limited time (business Visa) it will be a real challenge to obtain a Work permit in Beijing. Even established staff who are sent to China have some issues to sort, some are just refused Work visas despite ticking off all the boxes (employed for 2 years by same employer after obtaining degree etc...)

 

I think you need to be really determined and focussed on living and working in China to make it work, plenty others have managed, but more have resigned and returned home.

 

edit: I take my judgement mostly from what I see and hear from work, related companies and friends. The consensus among my friends is that lots of people are leaving over Christmas/NY