The Shanghai municipal government is considering offering
high-ranking positions to foreigners who have experience of working
in foreign governments or for big-name companies.?
Foreigners that meet the requirements will be hired as advisors
in the initial phase, said Huang Weimao, chief of the international
cooperation department of the Shanghai Municipal Personnel
Bureau.
Such foreigners, who must pass strict tests set by the municipal
government, may work as advisors for the Municipal Development and
Restructuring Commission in the initial phase, Huang said.
As staff members, qualified foreigners may be hired in the short
term for positions that will be designated for them in the long
term, Huang said.
Positions to be offered will be from the level of division chief
up to deputy directors of bureau. Hiring foreigners for higher
positions is not being considered yet.
Analysts said competition among Chinese cities for outside
skills is likely to urge local authorities to consider hiring
foreigners sooner than generally expected.
Huang vowed Shanghai would lead other cities including Beijing
and Guangzhou in the introduction of overseas personnel.
According to current plans, the municipal government will open
governmental positions to overseas Chinese for the first time.
More than 300 posts in local governments will be available for
overseas Chinese by 2005.
While offering the positions to overseas Chinese professionals,
the city also welcomes high quality professionals from Hong Kong
who want to pursue their career development in Shanghai.
Shanghai has offered 1,015 posts on the Hong Kong human resource
market after signing the Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement
between Hong Kong and the Chinese mainland.
Officials in charge of recruiting skilled people from Hong Kong
said up till now, they have received more than 2,000 applications
with resumes.
Meanwhile, page views on the website which provides all the
details of these posts have exceeded 100,000 per day.
The first 11 people from Hong Kong have already settled down in
the city and the second group of 33 have signed contracts with
their employers.
Fu Minsheng, one of the Hong Kong residents who have settled
down here, said the city offers better career development
opportunities as it is growing at a tremendous speed.
"The living standard here is almost like that in Hong Kong. I
find it easy to adapt to Shanghai's environment,'' he said.
The Hong Kong professionals, as well as the overseas Chinese
professionals working in the city, enjoy the same treatment
Shanghai citizens have in terms of their lifestyle, work and social
security, according to the Shanghai Labor and Social Security
Bureau.
Sun Luyi, director of the Shanghai Municipal Personnel Bureau,
believes more professionals with international perspectives working
in Shanghai will help the city become one of the world's leading
cities as soon as possible, for it is able to adapt to economic
globalization.
The city will open its door wider to professionals from all over
the world, with human resource administration departments busy
designing campaigns to attract professionals and top-level
graduates.
After winning the bid for World Expo 2010, professions related
to the exhibition industry "are still in great need,'' including
architecture, project management and interpretation, said Sun
Luyi.
The demand for professionals in the financial, logistics,
advanced manufacturing and urban planning sectors is also on the
rise.
"The need coincides with the aim to build Shanghai into an
economic, financial, trade and shipping center,'' he said.
Though Shanghai has many top universities that provide many
quality graduates annually, it still requires more professionals
familiar with international practices.
Shanghai launched a big project on August 31, 2003 to attract
more than 10,000 overseas Chinese professionals. The first part is
to provide 1,600 posts by 2005.
Many will have educational and working backgrounds in the
world's major cities such as New York, London, Paris and Tokyo.
Among the 1,600 positions, over 20 percent are at the middle
level and above posts in the local governments.
"If comparing the 1,600 posts this year (2004) with those
offered to the talents in the previous years, the major change is
that most posts are in the state-owned enterprise sector,'' Huang
said.
The positions in state-owned enterprises will make up over 15
percent of the total.
More than 50,000 Chinese professionals who received an education
abroad had settled down in the city by 2003, 2,600 of whom had set
up more than 2,400 companies with a combined investment of US$400
million.
(China Daily January 7, 2004)