Quote: (03-05-2015 06:53 AM)KonstantinAbroad Wrote:
Quote: (03-05-2015 06:34 AM)Suits Wrote:
Quote: (03-04-2015 07:05 PM)KonstantinAbroad Wrote:
....Bachelor of Arts in International Business Administration....
....would recommend other cities such as Shanghai, Beijing, Bangkok or even Taipei?
What skills do you have that would allow you to do a job that a local employee wouldn't happily do for 1/5 of the money.
How competitive would you be in your home country employment wise?
Do you speak any Asian languages?
Do you have some sort of competitive advantage?
Hey Suits,
I have learned Mandarin for one year at my university before heading to China for an internship.
Then it's safe to assume that you're years away from speaking Chinese at an acceptable level for business. Therefore, you can't be part of any Chinese work teams, unless of course your value as an employee is so great, that you're worth hiring a translator.
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Moreover i could already gather experience in regard to chinese business culture during my internship and i come well along with chinese people too. I would say i have a really outgoing personality and that's defenitly one of my strenghts.
If i got you right you recommend me to work on my chinese language skills? I could travel abroad and do a language course for a while and meanwhile start networking. Can you recommend me any good cities to do this?
If you want to learn more Chinese, that's fine, but what I really want you to understand is that even if you learn Chinese perfectly, you're still no more valuable than any other university graduate in China....except you won't work as cheap as they will.
It's a misconception that "foreign-ness" gives a person an intrinsic value in China (or Asia) and there "foreign insight" makes them highly desirable. This used to be a bit of a thing, but it isn't any more.
Most jobs fall into three categories.
(1)Things that have to be done for a company to function. Employers (being rational) will hire a person competent enough to do the task at the lost cost possible. This means that they will hire a local and not you. The only exception to this rule is if you can do a necessary task that no local can do competently. Think specially qualified engineers, certain doctor specialties, etc.
(2)Sales. Companies don't spend much money to hire people to do sales with products that practically sell themselves. Why spend cash to encourage sales when there is no need? The vast majority of sales jobs relate to products that people don't want. If you can change people's minds and convince them to buy something they wouldn't otherwise, you have utility.
A company will pay you the minimum amount of money they think you will accept to sell a product for a certain amount of profit.
I've been told that there are some sales job in Shenzhen that require high level English (a skill locals usually do not have). Beijing and Shanghai probably do not have very many jobs like this.
Hong Kong already has many high level English speakers as does Singapore. They can hire students out of university to do this. These recent graduates live with their parents and do not pay rent, so they can work for much less money than you can.
(3)Management. Managers jobs are usually to get people to work harder without paying them more money and to makes sure that they aren't slacking off so that the company isn't paying them to sit on their ass. Your pay for this is based on your proven ability to save the company money by motivating your underlings to work harder that they get paid to work.
If you have no management experience, it's unlikely anyone is going to pay you much money to do this, even if they hire you at all. Generally, people enter management jobs as middle management and that pays barely more than non-management entry level jobs. If you can't even speak Chinese (or any other relevant Asian language), you can't manage people who don't speak English comfortably, because you won't be able to motivate them by dancing like a monkey).
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In regard to your question on competition in my own home country i would say that i don't belong to the best but for sure i'm not bad at all too.
You are as good as your ability to help the employer make money. How good are you at making other people money?
It comes down to skills.
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The point is it's hard to score a job from somewhere abroad when you are not inside the country to present yourself in person.
Come to Beijing to look for jobs and I'll show you around the city and get you acquainted with life here. Earn some rep points by meeting other forum members and I'll probably let you crash on my couch for a few days if you don't want to shell out for a hotel.
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As you already pointed out they will find someone who is cheaper and he will be available just in the moment they need someone so why wasting time with Skype interviews with a potential canidate who is 8000 miles away and than there comes the whole visa hassle on top of that too,
Unless you are highly desirable for some special skill (or skills) you have, it's going to be hard to get a job anywhere here in Asia.
I've decided that working for other people is not a good use of my time, because they will hire me to enrich themselves, not to enrich me.
Fortunately, I have a useful skill. I understand the TESL market in Asia very well and am willing to hustle.
After graduating a year ago January, I moved to Beijing at the end of April and spent the last 10 months working my way through a series of day time teaching jobs until I found a stable one that always paid on time, didn't require many hours and was low stress. Most importantly, it didn't require any day time hours or weekend hours, which leaves me free to pursue additional employment.
Currently, I earn $25K USD a year (after tax) just working 17 teaching hours a week with no office hours. I'm don't by 3PM or earlier every day and sometimes don't start work until after 10AM.
I do this, because I don't want to waste my daytime hours doing nothing and I want a stable income to pay rent and expenses with and provide me with a steady visa.
As of tonight, I am beginning some new part time jobs with evening and Saturday hours. Once I fill up 13-17 hours of part time work (depending on the pay) each week, I'll be earning double my current income for a total of $50K USD a year, after tax. Not bad for 30-34 hours of work per week (I need to do very, very little lesson plan, because I know how to minimize that work to nearly nothing and still be highly effective).
Is teaching English in Beijing a dream job? Absolutely not.
But it's a job and I don't mind doing it.
It pays for my lifestyle, which for me in Beijing is a dream lifestyle and more importantly, it will earn me enough cash to significantly pay down my $50K US of student debt and also bank cash to start my own business in about 3-5 years.
If you want to live in Asia, it can be done. The only question is whether you're willing to do what must be done to make it happen.