Foreign Job Seekers Move to Shanghai

Not all foreigners end up with good jobs in Shanghai. I personally had a very well paying job in Shanghai but was getting tired of the job. Unfortunately, Shanghai is still very racist in that they still prefer that foreigners have a white face. I look Chinese, my race is Chinese, but I am not a Chinese citizen, and therefore don't have the same culture. I found interviews even at foreign organizations, very difficult as they were always expecting me to be white (since I sound like it on the phone!).

Many of the Indian taxi drivers have a university degree but can't find the equivalent work in America because they lack local experience.

Many Asian looking foreigners (that don't speak Chinese) in China/Shanghai have problems looking for high paying jobs because there is a bias towards how you look, instead of how you perform. The Shanghainese mentality is that IF YOU look white, you have an excuse to not speak their language, but if you look Asian, you SHOULD speak it because China is the center of the world...

Yea, It's natural since Shanghai is the first name when they come across china if not Beijing.
In fact, it should be more foreigners to come, cuz it's open up and have decent opportunities for the newcomer.
It's good for Shanghai when the new culture comes in, I think it will make it more like Hongkong.

@John
If you look Asian, we'll feel that you're same with us, so it's understandable that we'll expect that we can talk to you in chinese, can you imaging someone in UK who look like British but speak chinese all the time.

learning chinese is not a easy job , especially in shanghai.

local resident still use shanghai dialect more often than mandrin.

Why would people in their right mind want to work and live in Shanghai with the air and water pollution levels well over the levels of sanity? If I have a choice, I would prefer to live and work in a smaller, medium-sized city such as Hangzhou or Xiamen. What do you think?

Darkdukey, I think it's more than that. I'm an ABC but oftentimes when someone in China realizes that I'm of Chinese ancestry and that I can speak a little Mandarin, I'm treated like I supposed to denounce America and love China. One university student blatantly told me, "You're Chinese, not American."

University students. They are the ones that want to start wars with Taiwan, Japan, Indian, Vietnam, or even Russia. That probably consist松 half of China's neighboring countries. Maybe it is true across the whole world, university students are all full of hearts but no brains. In Chinese we have a specific word for them: "愤青"

Dear Posters,

I am an asian-amaerican, and with respect to John's comments I've felt this discrimination too. I've been in SH for just over three years now, and finally found that high paying, high profile job ( equivalent to 120k USD gross per year). Yes, I dreaded sending out CV's and talking to people on the phone, only for them to be ' disappointed' when I came in face to face. It was quite discouraging for a while, and I even gave up looking for a job, and just felt like settling in my cushy/no pressure teaching gig. I believe that talent + perseverence = luck (in most cases), and its funny that the company that finally hired me was managed by a fellow yankee. :-) Good luck to those in the same situation, and don't give up.

Darkdukey, do you think all the white man in the are the same? Try to tell a French man the is English (British). You will be lucky if you don't get smack.

hmm... questions for all... if you think a person look Asian he/she is consider chinese. What about Japanese and Korean? They can look Chinese if they don't speak :) However, they have very high respect in Shanghai... especially Korean

JS, regarding the sub-topic "Going Out is Easier".

I remember about 20 years when China started to open and people has the chance to go out of the country, my family invited my granduncle who was stranded in China before World War 2 to have a return visit to his born country. It was so much hassle that we had to go through. However, it is worth it... finally we managed to fulfill his wish had him return home at least once which is his last visit too.

I agree with DC - A significant number are quite racist in their views.

They also seem to confuce ethnic origin from nationality. "Chinese" seem to be interchangable between "of Chinese parenthood" and "Chinese citizen".

On the other hand I get quite embarassed and slight offput by people thinking I'm Japanese or Korean. I met people saying "Chinese don't dye hair of weird colours", or "Chinese don't get piecings and tattoos". As if All ethnic Chinese should come out from a mold and forbid to have any individuality.

Reading WJS's blog is always interesting. I rarely read blogs about foreigners in Shanghai, but JianShuo's blog looks like a perfect place for those people.

With all respect, experience of all your guys are new to me, a local Shanghainese.

Hi, I found this website VERY helpful. I am from Minnesota, USA moving to Shanghai the first week of January. My office is located in the Hong Qiao district. I want to live within walking distance to the office because I will be without a car. I am 33 years old and very social. I want to live in an area that has: a great nightlife, a good expat presence, in my age group, good restaurants/shopping, and easy to get to other parts of the city. Is Hong Qiao a good place to live? I have seen some very nice apartments in that area. I am allowed $15,000RMB per month for living allowance. It looks like it will get me a very nice, furnished apartment for that amount of money. If anyone has advice, please post back. Thank you!

WJS, You've been at MS for almost 10 years, and I'm wondering about something. For a local Chinese with your amount of experience, how much do you make? I see you've previously posted about some locals making 300-500,000RMB (per year). That's almost $75k/ yr. USD! Most people in the US don't make more that unless they have been working for MS for ten years...:)

I can't believe even a US firm paying a local $75k (who has never lived or studied outside of China), unless they were a very unique individual that could speak English very well and had a lot of industry experience. I know those people are far and few, as to find someone with that level/ years of experience, you're looking at someone in the mid-late 30's who grew during a time in China (even Shanghai) when very few people spoke English and opportunities for foreign influence were rare.

I'm still trying to get a feel for what locals get paid vs. foreigners and where the value/ experience vs. salary matches up. I just don't see how a 35 year old local could possibly get paid as much as a 35 year old foreigner (who can speak Chinese fairly well) in Shanghai or even the US for that matter.

Hello All

I have the experience of working on Hutchinson project as Zone Roll Out Manager in Nokia Siemens Networks indonesia and i also have the experience to work in Pakistan on a major project UFONE in Siemens Pakistan. I want to relocate for job Shanghai
Please inform me if you have the jobs available

Thanks for attention.

i am a landscape gardener from england seeking some form of work in china i speak no chinese is this a crazy idea please tell me and also if anyone is reading this that has knowleage of work in china please contact me on my msn Jay.Smurf@hotmail.com thanks bye

Hello!I got the most valuable information about career job seekers and getting the job you want requires more than a powerful resume and a dynamite cover letter. You have to be able to sell yourself in person, as well as on paper.Thanks!

IMPORTANT!! PLS READ!! DON'T GET CHEATED!!

Hi All...

Talking about Shanghai experiences, i have few bad experiences. I am a foreigner from South East Asian and have been living and working in Shanghai for 6 months. I'm the one who is in charge with company's funds.
On mid December 2007 evening, we (ten of us)celebrated my boss (foreigner) birthday by having dinner at a chinese restaurant named Western Style Xin Jiang Exquisite located at Hong Mei Rd. Gubei area.

One of my coworker ordered the foods and i was the one responsible for making payment. When i saw the receipt from the waitress in a messy handwriting, i didn't really bother to look at the details (that was my mistake). The total amount was Rmb 2620. I paid cash and counting the money in front of the waitress 2 times before handing the money to her and told her that i needed the invoice (fa piao in chinese). After making payment we still sat there for half an hour before leaving. When we left, i went to the cashier to collect the invoice and saw there was only invoice amounted Rmb 620. I told the waitress that the invoice was wrong, still RMB 2000 less. THe waitress told me that according to the receipt, the charge was only RMB620 instead of RMB 2620. The number "2" at the very front actually represented yuan in Chinese character.

Ok, that's fine. So i asked her to return the excess RMB 2000 back to me. Surprisingly that she denied receiving RMB 2620 from me. She told the lady boss that she only accepted RMB 620 cash from me! And another ridiculous thing was her boss protecting her without trying to clarify it. The lady boss told us that she was the only waitress working for her and had been working for a year and so far never happenned such a thing.

Actually, this lady boss is one of my boss friends. She didn't even want to share the responsibility for her waitress's act (such as splitting the cost for her business's name sake). At the end, i have to pay the RMB 2000 using my own pocket money.

I'm really sorry to hear that, meouw! That's such sad story. I can imagine how you feel because something similar happened to me when I was travelling alone in Suzhou. My loss amounted to approx. 2,000 RMB, too. There's no point in going into details.

Since I know that it's practically hopeless in such a situation to try to get the money back (the police won't help you and other guests would never dare to butt in), I have sworn that I would one day go back and have my vengeance then. Of course, the amount itself is ridiculous, but I can't tolerate being deliberately cheated in such a mean way. I don't care if this is legal as long as the lines between what's illegal and legitimate is blurred in China.

In some cases, taking the law into one's own hands is the only way for "justice". And this, by the way, is the positive side about China. In Germany, if the law doesn't bring justice, I would have to accept that. However, in China, I'm not afraid of using violence to fight for justice myself.

@ SuperDave:
Just came across a German news article (http://www.ftd.de/karriere_management/karriere/:Kampf%20Fachkr%E4fte%20China/302137.html) stating that currently, the average gross salary for a CFO in China is USD 195k, though I think this figure applies to the tier-1 cities only. And please note one thing: You definitely don't need to have foreign experience to fill a CFO spot in China.

You can't compare the tip of the iceberg in China with the average employee in the US. Sure, a graduate in China usually starts with a gross salary of ~3-4k RMB/month, while his US counterpart starts with ~3-5k USD/month. But after working for 10-15 years, China's best people will earn more than the average US employee in ABSOLUTE TERMS. An ordinary foreigner (regardless of his education and work experience) coming to China can't base his salary expectations on what the very best locals earn.

i just want to work abroud just to have a change of seem in my life.

I am a holder of a B.A English degree based in Zimbabwe and have taught English as a second language at high schools and Africa University in Zimbabwe. l really want, even at shot notice, to go and teach English in China with my wife who is also an english expert. Any help on the way foward is greatly appreciated in advance.

South East Asian Country Female, looking for a job. Would any company care to hire her for a decent job? Speak Indonesian, English & Chinese. No cash related jobs. If so, please contact me... Cheers,

PS: However, she will not or hope that careless again to let RMB 2000 to be cheated on her as she was cheated by her landlord for RMB 1700! However, we of course should be very carefull with our money or regarding money related no matter what nationality we deal with.

Hi everyone, especially J,

J, i just saw ur msg on March 16 and was wondering are you now in Shanghai already? Would u mind giving me ur personal email add so that we can correspond thru there? I'm a Malaysian who is looking for a job in Shanghai too. Any recommendations? I'm 24 years old and currently working in a bank. I can speak fluent mandarin an english. I would like to look for a bank job in Shanghai too if possible.

Appreciate for the help. Thank you.

HI, my name is Marlon, I'm 35 married, I got a little girl 18 months.I really what to have the chance to move to china, to work as a marketing assitant.

I got about 15 years, on the telecommunication field that is jus something that I considered a good addition to my personal experience.
I used to work for Kimberly Clark, CARE International, Lucent Technologies and CBN Canadian Bank Notes as a System Manager.

Now, I got my own business in my country I got a company that bring solutions on the Packaging Industry bringing a diversified products from China to Honduras
I have been involved in the sales area of international trade for two years, and that had brought to me the idea to look the oportunity to get advantages from that issue,
due my current relationship with many business people in china.

I got the skills, I speak fluent English/Spanish, French 50% and actually I have been learning German for one year.

I'm willing to work a full time job overseas, and I'm pretty sure I can be a really good choice in order to be part of your company and grow up together.
I can be very useful on looking new customers and contact from honduras to china and Vice-verse.

Feel free to contact me via email: marlongcolindres@hotmail.com

hai ,

this is manjunath from india. i am interested towork in the ship. i am also a hard worker.