Technology drive

Introducing international talent, especial high-level talent, has long-been recognized as an ideal way for Chinese companies to absorb advanced technologies, especially in the technology-based sectors.

The automobile industry, for instance, has been developing rapidly in recent years, but has been grappling with a severe high-end talent shortage. Several Chinese automakers, such as Chongqing-based Changan Automobile group, have been tapping the international markets to mitigate this problem.

When the financial crisis broke out in the US in 2008, many of its talented auto professionals were rendered jobless in Detroit. Pang Jian, vice-director of Changan Automobile Engineering Research Institute, was one of those Changan Group recruited from Detroit.

After working for Ford for more than 10 years at its US research and development center, focusing on the noise, vibration and harshness (NVH) sector, the chance to work in China offered a new life and more growth opportunities for the experienced engineer.

"The Western automobile industry is well developed and mature, yet the fast developing Chinese automobile industry, which is relatively less developed, attracted me very much," he says. "I wanted to change my life path and immerse with the development."

For Pang, 50, the group has been living up to the kind of promise it held for him when he first moved there.

"It was enthusiasm that brought me to China to work for the Changan Group," says Pang. "The phrase 'strong growth' sums up my experience and observation of the Chinese automobile industry since then."

As an expert in the NVH sector, Pang belongs to the 1,000 Talents Plan list. Changan has 12 experts whose names are on the list. These experts have brought in the much-needed advanced expertise to the group. For instance, under Pang's instruction and guidance, Changan's R&D strength in NVH has improved since 2008.

For some companies, what matters more are creative thinking and frontier concepts brought in by the overseas talent.

Mi Junren, deputy chief architect of the Beijing Institute of Architectural Design, a state-owned institute that has designed many of China's symbolic buildings, such as the Great Hall of the People and the National Center for Performing Arts, agrees with this point.

"Since China's reform and opening up began, many international design firms have participated in the designs of some big projects in China, which means we have to compete with both local and intentional companies," he says, adding that for the past four years, the institute has either hired or worked with about 10 foreign designers.

"When we work with international designers or designers who receive education overseas, their different mode of thinking and working methods are quite a change."

New Oriental Education Group, a Beijing-based private education provider, has attracted more than 500 foreign talents. Nearly 3,000 of its employees have overseas experience, and account for more than 10 percent of the whole group.

"Generally speaking, teachers with an overseas background will adopt more interesting and attractive teaching methods, which could be attractive for us to rope in students," says Zhang Ruguo, the company's HR manager.

To facilitate the recruitment of more overseas teachers, New Oriental group set up the foreign teachers' management center last year, and the group is eager to seek more management staff globally.

High-end challenge

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High-level talent can also bring in new management styles as well as international enterprise culture for some companies.

It took three years for the Beijing-based Pulead Technology Industry Co Ltd, a company that focuses on lithium-ion batteries, to bring in an expert in the industry, Lahrs Thorsten, former CEO of Phostech Lithium Inc of Canada, to take up the position of vice-president at the company's Qinghai branch.

Ye Jing, HR manager of Pulead Technology, says that although the company spent a lot of money recruiting Thorsten, what he has brought with him is worth it.

"As a leading figure in the industry, there is no doubt that he is of immense help when it comes to technology issues," Ye says. "More importantly, he has also helped change our management styles and influence and cultivated a group of young technicians in the company with his serious working attitude and advanced technologies."

For other companies that want to expand overseas, what is needed is international talent that can best understand customers, help expand overseas channels and deal with the challenges posed by different cultures and legal systems in China and elsewhere.

Kang Lang, HR manager of the Shanghai-based conglomerate Fosun International Ltd, says the company attaches great importance to attracting international talent and started its hunt about three years ago when it saw investment opportunities overseas.

The company now has investments spanning Europe, the US and Africa, in several industries including travel, insurance and coal mining. At the company's Shanghai headquarters, there are about 400 workers, of whom 30 are foreigners and 90 are overseas returnees.

Dara Life Lounge of Beijing, a furniture company founded in 1998, has always employed foreign furniture designers, as most of its customers are people with an overseas background in China. It has employed about 30 designers, eight of them foreigners. More than 80 percent of its employees also have overseas experience.

"The design industry in China was relatively new, and there were not too many mature designers," says Zhang Jun, co-founder of the company. "Foreign designers can understand our international customers' needs better, and their designs go well with global fashion trends."

Fu Junsheng of the State Administration of Foreign Experts Affairs, says that his center holds at least four job fairs targeting foreigners every year in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou. Last year, for each job fair, about 1,500 foreigners participated, of whom, more than 70 percent were from Europe and the US, while about 5 percent were from Africa, and the rest from other regions. Sometimes, foreigners would fly to China after seeing the recruitment website, he says.