Effective China recruitment of Chinese employees is a skill. Finding and employ the right people in China is a never ending project but nesseccary to operate profitable in China. When entering the Chinese market or when starting operations in mainland, recruitment in China will be involved.

China recruitment is recruiting Chinese

You are recruiting in a unique , historical and very perserved cultural country. The Chinese people are having unique characters and work in a structure developed out of own Chinese characteristics. As a foreign company recruiting in China, awareness that you are recruiting Chinese people instead of people like yourself is very important. Understanding the Chinese culture, social norms and personalities,  motivations and thinking ways becomes a basic necessity with recruitment in China. Understanding that these Chinese characteristics are different than you are used to creates fertile land to build on.

China recruitment platforms

Compared to other countries, China is a more closed country with closed communities. Wechat, the most important social platform in China, is a social management platform only communicating with friends which you added. Not like Facebook or Instagram where you can be found by the public by keywords. It is a similar case in terms of recruitment in China. Where job platforms in most of the countries are also accessable by the public, the biggest recruitment platforms in China are closed communities with paid access. Making it harder for foreign companies to find and access recruitment platforms and to find the right people. Popular recruitment platforms in China are Job51, Zhilian Zhaopin and BOSS. These platforms play a key role in recruitment in China.

More valuable information involving hiring personnel in China such as personal income tax, social insurance rates, high rotation of employees and more, can be found here.

Legal status being able to recruit

Recruitment in China comes with a legal status. By the China employment law, an employee can only be legally hired when social fee’s an income taxes are paid by the company that employs in China. To be able to pay those social fee’s and taxes you need to be a local entity, having legal company status named as a WFOE or Representative office. There are companies in China who don’t pay social fee’s and taxes, but just pay employees from foreign accounts or by cash. Which is not in conformity with the China employment laws and can be labelled as illegal employment.

Competitive salaries when employment in China

Foreign companies entering the Chinese market and start employment in China often find difficulties in locate and access to resources such as recruitment platforms or employment markets. Not always knowing very well where to search. Resulting in employment of the available people in their surroundings. Very often foreign companies just to hire people who are able to speak English, met in a hotel where they worked before. Translators used at trade fairs are often hired very quickly as foreign companies just don’t know where to find people. The consequence of not accessing recruitment platforms and therewith the country’s human resources is that foreign companies are often not aware of how much a competitive salary would be, what contract terms are reasonable, productivity and performance compared to others in the market and so on. Often resulting in paying too high salaries, low productive staff and depending on staff which is not selected to be best candidate for a position in China.