Xu's opinion was echoed by many of his peers.

Liang Lin, 29, graduated with a master's degree in business from a top university. She has changed jobs three times over the past five years, and said her preference has changed as well.

"The first job I had was with a US insurance company," she said. "It was good pay but long hours."

She wanted a better work-life balance, where she has time to do the things she wants to do.

Now she is representing her company, which is an SOE, as it opens a joint venture with a local company in Shanghai.

"I have more free time, and I get a good social welfare package," she said. "I can do things I enjoy."

Zhu, the career consultant, explained that this change is in line with the theory of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Maslow was a US psychologist who published a well-known paper in 1943 that prioritized human needs.

"This shows that an employee needs develop from basic physiological to higher psychological needs, as the theory explained," she said. "Maslow describes this level as the desire to accomplish everything that one can, to become the most that one can be."

Zhu also explained that SOEs, as they have a market monopoly in certain industries, can provide employees with better welfare packages, including hukou, medical care, children's education and perhaps housing. That complete package, which is hard to get even if a worker has a high salary, is more attractive nowadays.

"As a fresh graduate, I believed that money talked, but now I realize the importance of work-life balance, and the process of self-actualization. To do what you want to do and be allowed to do so is truly a blessing," said Li Xinyuan, who has worked with a US law firm since 2010 after graduating with a law degree from an Ivy-league university in the US.

Her monthly income is double that of her peers who work in SOEs but she said she feels that the money alone is not reward enough.

Li is thinking of getting a PhD degree and then teaching.

"That is more meaningful to me," she said.