Help Wanted: Top Managers in China

By ANDREW BATSON April 29, 2008; Page B4 WSJ



BEIJING -- U.S. companies in China say recruiting talented managers for their local operations has become their biggest business challenge, a finding that highlights the continuing gap between the skills taught in China's universities and what businesses here are actually looking for.
A joint survey by three U.S. chambers of commerce in China showed "a continued worsening of human-resource challenges as companies expand," said J. Norwell Coquillard, chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai. Difficulty in finding, training and retaining managers was named as the top operational problem by 37% of the 324 companies responding, more than issues such as regulation, bureaucracy or piracy.
U.S., European and other foreign business executives in China have grown increasingly worried about talent issues as they have expanded their local operations. "The rapid growth of the domestic economy has created a fiercely competitive business environment that is driving rapid cost increases," Mr. Coquillard said Monday. "Demand for skilled, qualified staff still outstrips supply, and this key operating constraint shows no sign of easing in the near term." He estimated that managers' salaries are rising at 8% to 10% a year.
Foreign and domestic companies in China are increasingly competing for the same relatively small pool of trained Chinese-speaking managers. While the government has greatly expanded university education in recent years -- schools turn out about four million graduates with bachelor's degrees each year -- quality remains an issue.
In their annual white paper, the American chambers of commerce said the Chinese educational system's heavy emphasis on rote memorization "does not translate well" to the challenges employees face in jobs at foreign companies.....