China firms in quest for PR-savvy staff
Mainland firms, including financial institutions and technology businesses, are seeking to recruit more professional communications staff to handle public relations as they expand into new markets, according to a specialist recruitment consultancy.
Katrina Andrews, director of VMA Group in Hong Kong, said the exposure of labour problems at technology giant Foxconn had made more mainland companies aware of the need to be media savvy, and they were willing to recruit professionals to deal with the media and the public.
'It's all about reputation management,' she said, adding that the days of a press officer just writing press releases and organising events are over.
Claire Tuffin, group managing director, said, 'corporate executives cannot say something here and not have it picked up in a nanosecond. It's an absolute global market.' She said companies were realising they had to be truthful or they would be caught out.
Andrews added that the growth of social media outlets such as microblogging site Sina Weibo had also changed how communications were viewed by companies. She thinks that while popular websites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube have become an important focus for firms in their media and promotions planning, mainland and foreign companies operating in China are wary of using Weibo in a similar way. This is because it is seen as an outlet for the public to voice discontent.
Companies were 'trying to work out what the potential is for China', Andrews said. She added that despite this uncertainty, mainland and Asian firms wanted press and public relations staff with experience of social media but it was difficult to find such recruits in Asia.
Andrews said 'corporate communications is still in its infancy in Asia' compared with countries in western Europe and North America.
And, while the recruitment company receives 'a minimum of five resumes a week from Britain and Europe', there was also extensive interest from within the Asian-Pacific region.
'What is interesting for us is that candidates based in Beijing and Shanghai are willing to come to Hong Kong. People also don't see it as any great deal to relocate between Hong Kong and Singapore,' she said.
'Where we do struggle is recruiting people for jobs in the mainland because of the pollution,' she said, adding that despite Hong Kong's pollution woes people were not deterred from moving to the territory.
