Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Chaparrastique]

[ippy]

Dear Korea, i might be pussying out again

That Chengdu job i mentioned above. Well, turns out i hadnt really looked at what was around Chengdu until late last night.

Oh my god its beautiful. Its a realy modern looking city which is nice. Small enough to be intimate though (20km diameter). This means i can finally pick up cycling again. And who wouldnt! because mountains are literally on your doorstep. A mere 200km away is the 41st largest mountain on planet earth: Mount Gongga.

Oh and did i mention pandas? Did i mention RED pandas?

Holy crap its beautiful. Its the route to Lhasa as well. Not that ill take advantage of that. Im lazy as all hell. But the gateway to himalayas is right there. Im having a rethink. New plan might be something like this:

Screw working a hagwon for bottom rung pay and ridiculous hours.
Work in Chengdu. See how much i love it.
If its nice but the call for Korea is still there, then apply for EPIK properly (through EPIK) for the September term. Assuming i get it, finish up my contract in chengdu in July, and head over to korea with better finances and right into a public school gig.
If on the other hand i LOVE it, take up mountain hiking/climbing and trail cycling as my new hobbies of choice. Try and also enjoy Xillin ski resort despite it sounding like a massive crap-fest. But at least 5 or 10 days a season should keep me happy so long as i dont trash my board.

[ippy]

I turned down the Chengdu job (though i reckon Chengdu is a top priority location now if i return to China in a few years). I decided to not take the easy way out. Plus, the recruiter called me a dickhead for not having a phone and using skype.

Almost immediately got offered a job in Korea. Turned it down as well (CDI) once the enormity of those punitive clauses sunk in. Man, that contract is BRUTAL. I really wanted to take it, but just couldnt for the life of me.

The past week been applying away. Mixed success. Hear nothing for days, then blam "this school wants to interview you". Bit of a weird climate.

Anyway, im done. IM out. Im no longer looking.

Because i was looking for a job and then i found a job. And heaven knows im ecstatic now.

2.3/gangwon do/elem-middle/really nice director. The contract is also one of the fairest and most balanced contracts ive seen in my time as a teacher. Big positive vibes came from this school right away. Ticked every box, Its not like ive been swimming in offers. Ive had THREE. One i think was actually an accident. I think they meant to send it to someone else since they asked me to send the clip of my 'partner' and never replied to my questions. So by pure luck i jammed the exact job i was looking for. Its right next to Yongpyeong. I could CYCLE to yongpyong.Fortunately i had an annus horribilis last year, so i reckon this is restoring the balance sheet, rather than putting me into karmic debt.

So happy i could honestly burst!

[watergirl]

I also think it's a little bit economy, but mainly, foreigners who are just staying on in Korea more than 1 year now. Witness that so many, I'd say most, of the jobs on craigslist now ask for people in the country.

And, I think they are getting flooded w/ resumes, and the recruiters also are competing w/ each other, and so try and low-ball the job conditions and get the company to go w/ with that way as well.

[basic69isokay]

Way to go. Gangwon bound!
Nice work

[Fox]

[ippy]

Thanks dude. Definitely very chuffed. Going to be a great year or 3 i think

[ippy]

[NinjaTeacher]

Congrats on finding a job.

What method finally worked for you?

Also, did you manage to find the kinds of direct routes you were asking about earlier in the thread? It would be nice if you could let us know if you found any good ones.

Cheers,

Alex

[ippy]

WYSIWYG.

This thread pretty much lists my strategies. I just applied and applied and then when i decided id had enough of applying and was just going to come to korea and pound the pavement, a job fell in my lap (coincidentally with the location, salary and students i wanted). It really was pure luck.

Ive got my resume posted up on another site as well (korea4home or somtheing like that) but nothing at all has come from it. Basically its the same old same old - plug away, send out speculative inquiries. Hit up every recruiter, follow up on placements, hope for the best.

I would say this though, professionalism doesnt feel like its enough. Im mentally feeling my age at the moment. Im in a small office with 2 directors and another native speaker and theyre all so stylish and smart. Ive never felt so fat and ugly all my life. And i promise you, ive BEEN fat and ugly plenty of times. Definitely need to raise your style game. Professional doesnt feel enough. If youre over a certain age, i really think you need to look immaculate and on trend a bit. Fashion will compensate for age to some extent. If you just look like a professional teacher it may no longer be enough. Theres always unintended consequences. So whilst it sucks that image is trumps, that same mechanism means if you are getting on a bit but know how to dress sharp, youre still in with a shout despite your age.

Of course, none of this is necessarily true, and like me you might just completely luck out or in fact score a job based on your skills and qualities as a human being. But having come here, i can now see what they want and why they want it. So dont fool yourself, youll never hurt yourself by looking better than the rest of the people out there. Superficial or not, this is a super competitive environment. I walked around the block of my house and there are 6 English teaching hagwons. Most are small mom and pop, but still... this isnt downtown. Im in the suburbs here.

So in one respect, you need to understand that competition. If youre the pale-face they need to push out to get the parents signing on for 6 months of classes, the confident and friendly looking 24 year old is going to be pulling in the numbers with the moms, whilst the grizzly 40 year old ESL lifer dude is kinda hurting their business. As the aforementioned 40 year old, i sort of feel bad that they picked me. Im an amazingly good teacher, but i know i could look better.

You, of course might well be different and have no issues. This is in no way definitive. Im just explicating what i see after a mere 5 days back in the country. It feels very different to the last time for me is all.

Whilst this may seem doom and gloom, just try and wrap your head around this one dumb point: 7 hagwon in a one block radius (6 and my company). In a suburb... of a not all that big town... that doesnt even have a railway connecting it to Seoul.

Im backabeyond in a lot of ways here. So if you were thinking of starting your job hunt inside korea it seems like you could just pick your town, work from the downtown area, then spiral out. One or two towns per day and something is coming up within a week or so in your chosen region.

I wish i had something genuinely useful to tell you... unfortunately as nice as people were to respond, there wasnt anything particularly helpful. I found a gangwon do facebook site if that helps:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/116563248443085/
and one for korea:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/273451999799/
and one already mentioned from another thread for gwangju/joella:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/154136797947014/

I assume if theres one for gangwon and gwangju, then theres probably ones for most regions or big cities.
Craigslist was pure garbage.
I scored my job from bccing every hagwon posting one day with the same spam email. One recruiter mentioned gangwon. I replied, heard nothing, then about a week later followed it up and bish bosh! Blam! Kapow! Job.

Oooooh! i will tell you this, jay from Koreaconnections is far and away the nicest recruiter out there. Heres a secret tip: the boe he works for requires an apostilled birth certificate. I couldnt get it done. And to be honest, after the absolute misery of getting my CRC apostilled (took over 2 months and then DHL lost it on the final step - they found it a week later when they realised the delivery driver didnt hand it over when it was signed for by the front desk of my apartment building), there was no way i was going through all that again. Since its not a common thing to have done, anyone with an apostilled birth certificate probably jumps to the front of the queue in Chungnam. I expect more epik positions to start with this as well soon enough. So like with TEFL, if youre ahead of the curve...

Anyways, take all of this with the understanding its just what ive worked out based on very much incomplete information. Hope it gives you some ideas or strategies. But honestly, none still beat the age old one of mass emailing, chasing up jobs, and if that fails switching out your profile pic and doing it all again.

[ippy]

Oh, i will mention one more thing. August and September arent for people outside of the profile.
I noticed a decided increase in interview offers as we hit late october (the year before i also noticed a distinctly more positive june/july application period). Id been applying all through September as well. I have a very strong feeling that it goes like this:

June/July: Filler up. Anyone applying gets considered. Could be a sweet spot for September. People looking for something to do after graduation may only now be starting the docs process. If you have your docs ready around now, you could sneak in.

August: Dont bother. This is for the profile. You need to either match the image, or match the time requirements (start in a week).

September + first half of October: You have a massive build up in applications from july through september. Schools get their pick of it here. So proper buyers market. If i knew then what i know now, i wouldnt even bother applying in September. You either hit that spot three months in advance (risking the CRC timing) or you wait out the zerg rush.

October + November: I noticed a distinct increase in both call backs and interview offers late in october. Im assuming the same thing applies in November as well. I have a feeling that the number of new applicants has now plummeted, the people who were going to get placed, are now placed, leaving the B-team.

As November goes on, the pool of applicants isnt exactly refilling itself, so we move to the C-team.

Ive NO IDEA AT ALL ABOUT ANY OTHER MONTH. I didnt apply then.
Maybe you guys can update it. But it seems pretty much in the winding back up phase (though nowhere NEAR as bad as the summer build up given graduation dates in the West - id expect the february/march build up is realistically more about people moving around within the country that coming from outside it. Though still, i may be incredibly wrong about this.

The point is that theres two big peaks. So theres two big troughs. The key for those on the peripheries is to time your application to those troughs rather than the peaks. Maybe. Or get in earlier so recruiters can close the deal and schools can have the comfort of a guaranteed sale on the peaks.

More waffle from someone who has spent less than 2 years of his entire ESL career in Korea.

[jleblanc]

@ippy, wow, thanks for all that info! That actually is really helpful for those of us not in the sweet spot. I think you're dead on with the fashion thing. I'm an older woman (41 as of yesterday), and this is the kind of info I've been curious about. Congrats on your job, and keep up the great posts!

[creeper1]

Great news! Moral of the story - you will ALWAYS get a job if you don't give up.

All that's needed now is voyager to get a job and everybody is happy.

[NinjaTeacher]

Great info, thanks man. I'm going to make a video based on some of the stuff you mentioned

[ippy]

Maybe... i wouldnt bank on it. Its tough to be honest, and if you are of a certain age, race or ugly/fat, your options arent great. Theyre much less than they used to be, thats for sure. It took well over a month and a half of constant applying to score this. And genuinely it feels like pure luck. I could have had a job earlier. I turned down two prior to this, but youre really talking bottom of the barrel stuff.

If you do have experience and you do feel like you bring value for money, its sort of insulting to be offered 2.1 or 2.2. You certainly can work in korea, but the big question is why? And i dont mean that in the cynical way, i just mean you need to understand that theres probably a massive trade off. You get to live and work in korea and all that offers, but youre on base salary and its likely you wont be shooting up any time soon. In fact, as you age, you lose value. This of course doesnt relate to those of you with flexible home lives/visas that can take 2 part time gigs and throw in some more hours in supplementary classes. This is your bog standard e2 visa owned by your school and with the legal requirement that you work only in x-workplace.

So the 'why' is important. If you have a good reason to return, then realise you will be making a bit of an effort if you dont have those connections set up from before. You really need a genuine reason to get back here. For me, its mountains, pay, the lifestyle, EPIK, my friends, and the return of my driving licence. Thats why i really wanted to get back. So it was sort of worth the risk. But if its just to see Gdragon or eat chicken and hof, then maybe china would be less of a pain in the ass. Pay is similar, but china still has a bit of catching up in that regard, its still a wee bit lower than korea (ive just boosted about 500,000won/month plus free housing from my 11,200 (inc housing subsidy)). So realistically savings will be a little compared to my chinese gig.

I know people will tell you that 10,000 is on the low side. Possibly true... if you live in Beijing/Shanghai and have your networks in place, but for public school its actually a bit high (most advertise around 8000 for 22 hours or so which is WAY below epik). Most chain schools also pay around that 8-10,000 mark. So its comparable outside Beijing. No schools near my school paid any more. And i know this because my friend/colleague did the job hunt before signing with us.

Beijing/Shanghai is a different ball game but it comes with its own increases in cost of living and other commuting/housing/lifestyle issues.

10,000 is a decent expected wage on China, you can get more. You can get less, which puts it at a fair rate to expect on day 1 arrival. You can supplement it pretty easily though, but honestly, one job is more than enough for me. I dont look for extra work and always refuse the offers when they do come.

So not much to call at the end of the day. Lifestyle is comparative. Health is clearly an issue. But they also dont have the ever present threat of war i guess (a very unlikely threat ill grant you - but it is still there). Pay is near enough with cost of living to guarantee decent savings of around 10,000US/year or so. People are super friendly and very kind. Students are motivated and committed to learning. Any city over 1,000,000 will have stuff you need to get by. Its all fairly easy.

So that why is important. China isnt perfect, but nor is korea. If korea was as easy to break into as China, then maybe itd be an easier choice, korea is the more developed and healthier place to live. The pay is also higher on average.

But its not though. If that was the case, we'd all be off to Japan anyway. Nowhere is easier and more comfortable to live than Japan. Its why you aint breaking in there. No one needs to recruit from outside the country when you have an endless supply of applicants from the JET programme looking to stay on (along with the lifers and the eikaiwa slaves looking to upgrade asap on their self owned visa).

Anyways, not sure of the point of this ramble. But ive written it, so im going to bloody well post it