Job Discussion Forums

[Dagmar]

I have had several job offers, and because I didn't jump the second I received them, I lost them..though I was very interested in several of them..The reason I have been given is because I check back:- to what the company is like, what my conditions will be and let them know what type of teacher I am...to fit in with their opening/ company.
I cannot believe that professional people are so self-obsessed that they consider checking the job out first as time wasting.
Especially considering the situations I have seen with my own eyes at places where I have worked, from these people who run over to China in a mad frenzy, with some sort of imagined picture (before I went on my first trip, I did a 'Teaching in China' Course at a University..)
Let me tell you what happens next...at one place where I worked, a group of the unhappy F/T's spent most evenings after lessons and during the day, discussing how terrible the job, the chinese, the pupils, the conditions etc etc were, and how they hated it and how good things were back at home. I stopped going into the canteen to eat, as there too, unless I was lucky enough to be seated next to chinese, this constant theme would continue to be thrashed around. Whilst I spent my time trying to find my way round the chinese society, see as much as I could, they spent most of their time complaining. Several times, people ''disappeared'' altogether. They found it was so different from what they had imagined that they couldn't stand it, depression took over and they absconded. Another problem was on paper, these would be adventurers, painted themselves very brilliantly and when it came down to the nitty gritty, they were somewhat lacking.
In another place where I taught, the caucasians, except for me at that time, kept together in a little bunch, eating, drinking and complaining together as they sat in tiny groups round tables.
ALL THIS COULD BE AVOIDED IF MORE OF THEM DID SOME 'TIME WASTING' MY STYLE....We are all different and just because that guy or gal you met three years ago, told you they had a wonderful time (most of the moaners had after they leave!) does not mean it will be down your street.
Anyway, it seems the Chinese have now become aware of this childish enthusiasm and trait and are also getting carried away by it, so instead of taking on people who check things out before hand, they fear to give anyone who is serious a place. It is as much their fault. They will not bend either, at one place I wanted to start a 'Dickens Group' at lunch and a Poetry writing group, all in my own spare time, but was told classrooms could not be found. Excuse me, but I saw endless empty classrooms!
Either they have a lot to hide or the system has gone a bit mad! Well, that is a truism, people have learnt a little psychology, over there as well as over here, and you know that saying-- applying a little of something which you don't totally understand and using fancy psychological terms which are not totally clear to the user, creates even more long term disasters.
Anyway, hope you all have a good stay. I am no longer in, though I never moaned or groaned and just got on with what I found..maybe that is just too uncomplicated for most admins and business people!