Korean Job Discussion Forums

GoingBackOrElse · Joined: 23 Feb 2005

Ok, heres the deal real quick... I am about to start looking for work and want to know the real skinny on moustaches. I have one and wont shave it off... EVER! Will it be so hard to find a job?

GoingBackOrElse · Joined: 23 Feb 2005

sounds kinda nasty now that i think about it!

Wangja · Joined: 17 May 2004 Location: Seoul, Yongsan

99.5% of Koreans are clean shaven. Thise who are not, with moustache and/or beard are working in the "arts", jazz musicians mostly ...

Most foreigners too are clean shaven (well, might have missed only a couple of days).

So facial fungus is the exception. But that doesn't make it wrong or unacceptable.

Don't shave.

hari seldon · Joined: 05 Dec 2004 Location: Incheon

Koreans are such prissy conformists.

Grotto · Joined: 21 Mar 2004

Beard and mustache here. Never had any problems. Most of my students are quite curious about facial hair as they only see it on TV and in the movies.

ThePoet · Posted: Thu Feb 24, 2005 4:26 pm Post subject:

I have a moustache and goatee. I shaved the goat off for a couple weeks when I started working here and my students said I looked better with it. If I shave off my facial hair I look like a chubby 5 year old. As it is right now, I am 42 years old and everybody says I look 30 (a chubby 30).

I've never had anyone look at me with disdain, and I don't think it's ever been a factor in my resumes. I understand that a lot of people say that pictures are more important than the resume for a job, but I know that if I had to rely on work based soley on my picture, I'd be unemployed. As it was, when I posted my resume the first time I was looking for work in Korea (with goat and 'stache) I got 40 offers within 6 hours. Additionally, when I applied to universities for this March, I got a 60% interview response for the resumes I sent out, and I got an 80% offer rate from my interviews.

So, don't worry about your facial hair as long as it's tidy. I don't think it's the facial hair that matters as much as the person behind it.

Poet

sparkx · Joined: 16 Jan 2003 Location: thekimchipot.com

cjonlee · Joined: 30 Sep 2003 Location: Seoul

dude, if you can't spell hair, I wouldn't want to hire you.

dzeisons · Joined: 14 Oct 2004

i would regularly rock up to work one week+ unshaven or variously sporting goatee or beard (depending on how much i felt like shaving) and even though the ploaces i worked were quite strict about not wearing casual attire no one ever said anything to me (surprisingly). i reckon you'd have no worries.

sparkx · Joined: 16 Jan 2003 Location: thekimchipot.com

It's one thing to have a little scruff. It's another thing entirely when you look like the OP

(actual photo)

Derrek · Joined: 15 Jan 2003

Sadly, Koreans hate facial hair. Conservative older people won't hire you for it.

I think Korean men look really cool in beards.

hari seldon · Joined: 05 Dec 2004 Location: Incheon

I'm mustachioed -a compromise from my former bearded self. The little ones like to touch it.

chronicpride · Joined: 16 Jan 2003

mindmetoo · Joined: 02 Feb 2004

With a few exceptions, what normal man has a mustache in Western society? Do women find that attractive? C'mon you're not Lech Walesa. Beards I can deal. Goatees sort of piss me off because it seems to me too many young men go "oh this will make me look just like the Barenaked Ladies". But mustaches? Everyone I've ever known with a mustache has an anger management problem.

mindmetoo · Joined: 02 Feb 2004