February 18, 2009
The employment situation for college graduates is a staple of the Chinese media. And as the current economic downtown stirs up more anxiety, the issue takes on greater weight.
Translated below are excerpts from a story that ran in today’s Shanghai-based Oriental Morning Post under the headline “Employers encounter embarrassment: students are too choosy”:
Some students habitually reject jobs with “sales”, “customer service”, and “marketing” in the description. Even those students who intend to have a career in the marketing sector tend to shy away from a sales person’s job: “If marketing means being a salesman, then I won’t do it.”
This seems have embarrassed employers who had intended to hire the graduates. A number of human resources managers said, “We hope that graduates would take their job hunting more seriously.”
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Feng Lijuan, a job consultant, said that it is understandable that most graduates don’t want to take sales jobs. These jobs are generally stressful and provide low starting salaries. You have to be prepared to meet customers who are not very nice. This can all be very intimidating to new graduates. Even those students who do want a job in sales would prefer to work for a big, prestigious firm. Also, some parents do not want their children to work in sales.
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A manager at a real-estate company that is seeking to hire 20 people told the newspaper that unfavorable perceptions of real estate sales positions are often unjustified. Many think that it is a tough job that requires no other skill but being able to talk. “But for a recent graduate, it is also a good opportunity to obtain invaluable social experience.”
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According to Feng Lijuan, students from big cities like Shanghai and Beijing usually come from well-off families and are not very eager to work. “These fresh graduates have a low desire to work.”
In a separate article in the multi-page feature, one of Shanghai’s municipal officials ran some numbers:
Hu Yanzhao, vice mayor of Shanghai, said that the city has about 158,000 university graduates leaving school this year. About 28,000 will take the entrance exams for graduate study and another 3,000 graduates from vocational colleges will study another two years to get a bachelor’s degree. That leaves 127,000 graduates who need to find a job. Right now Shanghai can provide positions for about 80,000 of them, meaning that 47,000 students will need help from the government.
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Hu maintained that everyone will finally be able to find a job as long as they are not too choosy.
The comforting news about jobs for everyone appeared in Beijing newspapers yesterday. The top headline in the Beijing Youth Daily read, “Beijing’s graduates will have 100% employment.”
According to the newspaper, every graduate who has Beijing residence will be “recommended” by the government at least once. Employers will not be allowed to reject the government’s picks.
- Oriental Morning Post (Chinese): Employers feel embarrassed by choosy students, Shanghai students can all find jobs if they’re “not choosy”
- Beijing Youth Daily (Chinese): Graduates from Beijing will have 100% employment