3  SOME THOUGHTS ON THE RETURNEE MARKET IN CHINA

By Ms. Jane Yu, Managing Consultant, Shanghai Onpress

Ms. Yu graduated from finance in Beijing; she then joined Pricewaterhouse and worked there for over 3 years.  She joined Onpress as a recruiter and consultant 3 years ago and has been promoted to her current position for over 18 months.

In recent years, along with the economic development in China, more and more “returnees” appear in the domestic human resources market. They can be classified into 2 categories: the returnee who has resided abroad permanently as a migrant and a resident, and that who has studied and resided abroad  temporarily as a student.  The former has a job and stable income while he/she wants to come back to China for further development; the latter is that someone who has just completed his/her MBA or similar courses and is prepared to come back to work.  We define both as “returnees”. Their advantages lie in their good exposure to the multinational operating environment and the western culture, with a clear understanding of the professional way and management concepts as well as their foreign language skills.  In addition, the exposure to simple western management concepts such as team work, taking initiatives, saying “no” with reasons, and social skills is most valuable.

The multinational companies in China and the Chinese private companies will be in need of these people.  As a recruiter, we would like to present as many returnees as possible to our clients.  However, we do face a number of problems in this practice.

For the first type of returnees, they would consider it too risky if they give up the current job abroad and come back for career opportunities in China.  Most of them therefore just want to “have a look around”.  It’s very hard for us to present this kind of candidates as they are not able to give us, or our clients, any firm commitment in their intentions and plan.  From a practical point of view, a face-to-face interview will give rise to many issues and difficulties such as costs, location, logistics, etc.; and in this sense, the returnee will be at a disadvantage relative to the locals.


In addition, nearly all the returnees have relatively high expectations.  They expect a more senior job title, a higher remuneration package (of similar standards as in the USA/Europe), or even an expatriate package.  Based on our experience, many companies will not provide such favorable  employment terms, especially when they are under great pressure of cost reduction in recent years.

We believe that returnees should develop a longer-term view on their career development.  Although they might start from the same level as many local employees, their careers, employment benefits and pay tend to advance at a much faster rate than locals.


Onpress has paid much attention to and operated in the returnee market for some time.  We have established an interactive web site, www.Chinareturnee.com, from where the returnees can submit their CV in details and in confidence.  Companies and potential clients will be welcomed to contact us if they wish to search for specific talents and skills from the returnee pool.