Job Discussion Forums

[talentedcrayon]

To land a decent job in China how many resumes do you usually send out?

What kind of response rate do you think you get?

Do you apply for jobs in a specific city (Shanghai, Beijing?) or do you tend to keep your options open and apply to any/all jobs in China.

Do you apply to jobs with specific conditions (pay, students, subjects), or again do you keep your options open?

I am curious because I think it would be useful information for most job seekers in China to know where they stand and what it takes to get a decent job.

I'll probably do more polls later.

Thanks for your feedback.

[Shroob]

I sent out quite a few speculative CVs/cover letters.

It's a lot easier to find out things when you're on the ground in a city you know.

I only want to work with universities - so I went to wikipedia and found a city I wouldn't mind working in, looked at the unis and found an email address. Most didn't get a reply but a number did, probably 25%. These were not advertise positions, I just sent out emails so it's understandable.

A few interesting offers but the majority weren't what I was looking for.

[Piper2]

[Janiny]

I answered the poll 1-10, but this last time around it was recruiters and even individual schools that called me after I posted my CV here at Dave's. You ought to give it a try.

[talentedcrayon]

I posted a resume on Daves a while ago. I think I had about 10 responses at the time.

I am not asking so much for myself, but more because I want to get a better understanding of the teaching job market in China.

In my case, I am thinking about teaching accounting in China. There are not many jobs out there for that. But, there aren't many applicants either. I don't have much choice but to apply for the 4-5 jobs I can find.

[naturegirl321]

Has anyone posted their CV recently on Dave's? Last time I did every response I got was from a recruiter. And they paid about the same.

[Alien abductee]

A lot of job boards have been inundated with recruiters these days because (educated guess) schools find it easier to pay a recruiter to find someone than to do it themselves. As a result recruiters very actively seek out employees, the schools much less so. If you don't want to deal with recruiters then you'll need to find and contact the schools directly yourself. Some job sites are better for this than others.

[Non Sequitur]

I think we have to divide the resumes sent out idea into a) those sent in response to ads and b) those sent speculatively.

[talentedcrayon]

That's true Non Sequitor. I was actually just thinking about responses to ads.

[Non Sequitur]

That's probably the right approach at this time in the hiring cycle.
At other times when job ads are fewer, you can send out speculative enquiries.

[talentedcrayon]

A recruiter lowers the cost of recruiting for schools in several ways. If ten schools post a job ad on Dave's thats at least $500 for job posting. But, if one recruiter representing the same 10 schools posts once on Dave's, it is $50.

Recruiters are a great resource, but once you are in the country (Korea, China, whatever) I don't think you need them anymore unless you live somewhere you can't really network.

[Listerine]

This time around I sent out about 20 but they all seemed to find their way to the same four or five recruiters. In the end I got my new gig by walking in off the street and asking the first white dude I saw where the foreign affairs office is. Quick 5 minute interview with my jeans and t-shirt wearing ass, heard nothing for two months and then got an email at the start of May that they'd take me.

[Non Sequitur]

[Listerine]

[Non Sequitur]

A agree with Listerine.
The ad fee whether on Dave's or other is minuscule compared to the fee received for placing a teacher with an employer.
The really opaque issue is whether the FAO or the recruiter, or them combined, skim the money budgeted for FT salaries.
In other words do schools budget RMB6500 per month for the average bog standard FT but only RMB5500 reaches the poor sap at the chalkface.