One dreary winter evening in Shanghai, I had an opportunity to share a
taxi with a young executive of a joint venture company. Stuck in the city's
horrible traffic gridlock, we had plenty of time to talk about a wide range of
topics, ranging from the weather to family to work.
Her seemingly boundless confidence about her future reminded me of the many
young men and women I met in Hong Kong in the 1980s when the economy there took
off in earnest. She talked fast in mandarin, laced with English words and
phrases, and her manner was self-assured.
It made me wonder if we can see in her the soul of an entire generation of
Chinese, or just a member of an elite minority in the mainland's most
cosmopolitan city. I will let you be the judge.
With a journalism degree from one of the top universities in Shanghai, she
got a job at a local television station as a news reporter upon graduation.
After a few years there, she was given the city hall beat supposedly in
recognition of her seniority and capability. But that was not what she wanted
and she quit even before finding a new job.
"I just walked out because I knew that I could easily find a job," she said.
And that she did, within a couple of months.
High staff turnover rate is, of course, one characteristic of a booming
economy. The staff turnover rate at multinational companies on the mainland is
estimated to be as high as 17 per cent. As a result, staff retention has become
the priority in human resources management at many foreign enterprises.
The loss of experienced staff is particularly troublesome to companies in the
services sector. The hotel industry is hit the hardest as many international
brands have embarked on ambitious expansion plans not only in Beijing and
Shanghai but also in many second tier cities. "The demand for experienced staff
in our industry far exceeds the supply," said Anthony Leung, a senior
vice-president of Jin Jiang International Hotel Management Co, one of the
largest hotel chains in China.
Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, Hong Kong, with an unemployment rate
that seldom exceeded 2 per cent, enjoyed virtually full employment. Job hopping
was common among young workers as companies were raising wages to attract not
only managers, professionals and sales people, but also secretarial and other
support staff.
This seems to be happening in Shanghai and some other major mainland cities
and many social commentators have criticized young workers for their fickleness
in changing jobs.
To be sure, frequent job change is not good for one's career and, perhaps,
too many young workers switch from one job to another for nothing more than a
few hundred dollars increase in monthly pay. But there are those, like this
young woman in the taxi, who use the opportunity to find a new career.
This freedom of choice for one's career has to be one of the most welcome
benefits arising from two decades of economic reform and market opening. Such a
choice tends to give young people the confidence to pursue an ever-higher
quality of life, just like my taxi partner.
She talked about buying a bigger apartment in a location closer to the
university where her husband taught. Although property prices in Shanghai have
remained high despite the latest correction, she said that if they didn't buy
now, prices would go even higher in the near future.
That sounded like what a young Hong Kong person would have said before the
outbreak of the Asian financial crisis in late 1997 which broke the back of the
property market there. These home-buyers were not responsible for creating the
property bubble. They were the victims of excessive speculation when the bubble
burst.
Taking a lesson from Hong Kong, Shanghai, perhaps, should try to help these
young people to buy homes with government guaranteed loans at favourable
interest rates.
This could be an effective way of attracting more young people to come to
live and work in Shanghai, where the need for new talent will remain high as the
city develops into a world-class services centre.
Email: jamesleung@chinadaily.com.cn
(China Daily 12/02/2005 page4)
