What I Learned When I Recruited in China (PRC)

//Disclaimer: All opinions are my own//

This conversation was inspired by the recent post by John Vlastelica about areas of recruitment that don’t get talked about enough. Because we all know the hot topics of the recruitment world – ChatGPT, diversity hiring, neurodivergence and disability – but what are our blind spots? My immediate thought was about hiring in East Asia, especially in countries that have significantly different culture around work compared to what we know in Europe and the US. With the Moon Festival just around the corner (September 29th) it felt appropriate to write about my experience hiring in the PRC.

I want to thank my Booking.com colleague from Shanghai, Cecily Liu, who was very kind to help me with this article. She filled in the gaps and shared some information about the recent changes on the country labour market.

A quick word about the country names. My article is about hiring for an office based in Beijing in the People’s Republic of China (PRC). As opposed to the Republic of China, often referred to as Taiwan. I’ll use the term China as a shorthand for PRC, because it’s more recognisable to the Western reader.

Internet is Not the Same

The first important thing to know about China is that many aspects of the business and life are heavily regulated. One of the restrictions has to do with the Great Firewall. In very simple terms it means, that the population of the People’s Republic of China cannot access a lot of websites and services popular in Europe and in the US. Some examples are: Facebook, Youtube, Wikipedia, or messengers like Skype or Whatsapp. Of course, human ingenuity knows no limits, and a lot of younger Chinese people use VPNs to get around the firewall. However, the access via VPN is usually slower, and not as comfortable. Additionally, Linkedin recently had to pull out of PRC due to a combination of regulatory requirements and strong competition from the local players. But it wasn’t very popular in China even when it was still available. When I used it to connect with potential candidates, I got a very poor response rate (about 5 out of 120), and those were people who were originally from elsewhere. The Great Firewall also makes it harder to use popular chat messengers, so people in the PRC use locally developed alternatives. The most popular Chinese messengers are QQ (similar to Skype or MSN) – it’s actually very cute. And it tells you what year of the Chinese calendar you were born, which I thought was a nice touch. The Chinese replacement for Whatsapp is called WeChat. I didn’t really use it, but I would strongly recommend it as an additional communication channel. Apart from the convenience for you and your candidates (no VPN means better connection), it also signals that you’re flexible and candidate focused.

Job Boards

I mentioned earlier that Linkedin didn’t yield the results I hoped for when I tried to source in China, and that it had to leave the market for good. Cecily has shared that the niche of recruitment platforms in now occupied by Maimai. It’s the main destination for people looking for jobs in the digital sector or Internet-based companies. Another big name in hiring tech professionals is BOSS Zhipin – right now, it’s the biggest recruiting platform in China by monthly active users (in 2020 it reached 200 million registered accounts. I didn’t use it back in 2016, but now it’s the preferred place to go if you want to work for in the Internet sector. The third platform to mention is lagou.com. This was my friend for those few months in 2016 when I looked for mobile advertising professionals in China. I had some challenges with this platform initially: there is no English version, and the automatic translation from Google would make sense to about 60%. However, once I had my job posts out (with some help from my colleagues in Beijing), I was very happy with the functions and the engagement I got. The main user buttons were intuitive (you could reject an applicant, or move them on in the process, as well as message them). It was almost like using an ATS, and overall the best channel to reach candidates. One of the hires I made back then applied through lagou.com.

Agencies

If we talk about recruiting channels, I have to say a few words about agencies. There are some big international companies on the Chinese market, and their employees have both great local expertise and excellent language skills. There is, however, one big difference to many agencies we have on the EU and the UK market: here, smaller agencies are happy to negotiate the terms of their contracts and their fees. Agencies working on the Chinese market are much more rigid in the phrasing of their agreements and their rate structure. They usually work with the 30% fee, and no negotiations could bring it down. I have to acknowledge that the partnership worked well, and we ended up hiring one of the agency candidates. But it’s expensive, and I wouldn’t recommend this route unless you’re short on recruitment resources and time.

Culture

A few words should be said about the work culture and how you can compete with local employers.A lot of Chinese companies follow the 996 working hour system. It means working from 9am till 9pm 6 days a week. This schedule has been adopted by a lot of companies working in the digital sector, Internet start-ups and IT enterprises. Some examples of companies with this policy are ByteDance (the company behind TikTok), Alibaba (the PRC equivalent of Amazon) and the telecom giant Huawei. In comparison, most European and US companies offer their Chinese employees the regular 40hr week with 2 days off. This work-life balance is what attracts a lot of professionals to the Western companies, in addition to less hierarchical organisation and more equality in communication. Chinese companies often offer higher compensation and a more generous overall package when they make offers, but this comes with the expectation of gruelling working hours. At the same time, some of the older and more established Chinese companies can be better with work life balance, but they may not be as exciting as the Internet industry.

Conclusion

I have leave out a few other topics, like English proficiency, international exposure, as well as the benefits structure or national holidays. If I don’t this article may never come to an end. Every recruiter knows that the best part about our job is learning new things every day. My time hiring for the office in China was challenging, but also rewarding, and I’m grateful that I had this opportunity. ?

Happy ??Moon Festival?? to everyone who celebrates it!