Formosa Living

Formosa Living

I want to share my experience with you about how to get a job in Taiwan for foreigner. I classified jobs into 4, which are office job, language-teaching job, tutor job, and freelance job.

A. Office Job

It's difficult to get a job in Taiwan nowadays. Economic recession hits Taiwan due to global economic downturn. Several thousands of Taiwanese employees are getting laid off this year because of factory closing. So, you have to compete tightly with Taiwanese plus other foreigners in Taiwan. Based from my experiences and from what I have heard, your chances will be higher in getting a job in Taiwan if you:

1. Be able to speak Chinese, at least in regular / daily conversation level, because most of the Taiwan companies still use Chinese for internal meeting.
2. Have a university degree.
• You have received formal education in Taiwan, by means graduated from one of the best universities in Taiwan, especially public universities. Employers assume you have already got used to living in Taiwan.
• Taiwan employers also fancy those who have earned a degree at overseas university in developed countries, such as USA, UK, German, Japan, France, Netherland, etc.
3. Have a special skill needed by Taiwan job market -- earn a degree with major in Computer Science / IT, Electrical Engineering, Chemical Science. Friends of mine who graduate with those majors get jobs easier.
4. Apply for certain companies such as:
• Companies which market their products to your country of origin so they need employees who speak your language to handle those customers.
• Companies whose products sold to overseas buyers/customers. Able to speak other languages, besides Chinese and English is preferably.
• Global companies who have diversified employees of various nationalities so they are more open to foreigners.
• Companies whose products and services sold to foreigners in Taiwan. For example: marketing staff of rental property for foreigners in Taiwan, money remittance service for foreigner in Taiwan.
• Companies who need translator for their migrant workers (labor).

Apply for office job

1. Suggestion before applying job

• You need someone who can read Chinese to help you submitting your CV online, because all of job search engines in Taiwan are built in Chinese; or
• Install web browser that can translate entire website page, such as Google Chrome.

2. Website for applying job (free)

• 104 job bank. The most well-known job search engine in Taiwan. It has over 5 million user registered there. 104 has several search engines for jobs that have been classified into 104 job bank (for white collar worker), 104 tutor (for tutorial job), 104 case (for freelance job), 104 temporary job, 104 hunter, and so on. Their interface is so complex, sophisticated, and a bit confusing. I like their feature for analyzing job applicant competition. With this feature, we will know how many job applicants who have been applied for the same job with us, their latest education level, language capability, and so on. You have to register as a member first to access this feature.

• 1111 job bank. I think their interface is better than 104, because it is simpler. Based on my experience, companies listed on 1111 job bank are relatively more aggressive than 104. I got initiative calls (not the one I have applied for) from companies listed on 1111 more than those from 104, but most of the calls are coming from medium to small-sized companies. Maybe you have different experience? The thing I like most from 1111 job bank is that they put a feature to know the average salary (based on your educational level and experiences) for the position you are going to apply right below the job category.

• Yes123. It is nice that we can transfer our resume from 104 job bank to yes123, so no need to go through long registration process twice. Their website interface is nice too. I like their feature for knowing the difficulty of the job we are going to apply for. And they also provide the average salary comparison table between north, central, and south of Taiwan for similar position. It is easier to understand. They said that 70% of the jobs posted by Taiwan local company at yes123 can't be found at 104 or 1111.

• CareerJet. Someone introduced to me another great jobs search engine, which is Career Jet. Not only can you access tremendous selection of job, you can also upload your CV online and apply for lucrative jobs. Since the job postings are aggregated from various internet sites, job seekers can save their time by not needing to visit each site individually. It's free and best of all, it has English version website, in addition to the Chinese one. Hence, it is really helpful for foreigners who want to find a job in Taiwan.

• Others Taiwan job bank. Others are OkWork ; or ejob. I haven't tried these all before, so can't give any comment. Sorry…

• Jobdb. Ok, It sounds silly to submit your CV to a Hong Kong-based job search engine, but I did that because they have several job located in Taiwan. It is nice because the website is in English. I got 1 initiative call from Taiwan-based-company which saw my CV posted at Jobdb.

Things to know

• Once you have posted your CV online and apply for a job, company will contact you within 1 to 2 weeks (in average) or up by email or phone.
• In average, most of Taiwan companies need 2 times of face-to-face interview before they officially hire you. Bigger and more demanding companies need up to 2 times of interview plus several tests (psychology, character, English capability, or even your work related-knowledge test).
• If you are not really sure if the interview will be conducted in English or not, then you should ask.
• If a company calls you and offer you an interview chance for a job you didn't apply for, you can ask them where they saw your CV from. If you are not familiar with the company name, you can ask them to send an email to you first and tell them you will give them a confirmation whether you will attend their interview or not as soon as possible. Then, you can goggle the company first. Don't waste your time in accepting and attending all of the interview offers from companies you don't like. Transportation cost is not cheap if the interview is held in other cities.
• Try not to skip reference section because most of Taiwan companies concern on this section a lot. You can put the name of your supervisor, ex-senior, co-worker, or professor.
• Get ready for long working hours, especially for those who want to work at IT or ODM companies. My husband works for an IT company and he works for 11 hours per day in average (of course without overtime payment). But, some companies may allow their employees to get off work on time (9 to 5 job)

B. Language Teaching Job

As foreigners in Taiwan, we can do teaching job, especially language teaching job, mostly English. For teaching English, Taiwanese prefer:

1. Foreigners who come from English native speaking country such as: USA, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, etc. I heard my friend that it is possible for other foreigners who are non- English native speaker to get English teaching job in Taiwan, such as Pilipino. However, they receive less paid than other English native speakers.
2. Taiwanese prefer to hire someone who has a degree. You should attain a university degree, since the competition becoming an English teacher is tight in Taiwan.
3. Having English teaching experience is preferably, but if you don't have any teaching experience, try to get a TEFL/TESOL certificate.

The example of most well-know English cram schools or international schools are Kojen English Center, HES International, International English Village, and so on, or you can found related information at esl base website. Your working place is not limited to English cram school or international school only, but you can try to apply for English teacher job for employees in a certain company.

Become a private tutor can be another choice too, especially if you want  flexible working time or you don't have any university degree. You can try to apply through 104 tutor job and post your CV online. Besides English, Taiwanese also love to learn Japanese, Korean, German, French, and many more.

Apply for language teaching job
Website for applying language teaching job:

• Chinese Website: 104 job bank, 1111, yes123, etc.
• English Website: ESL Dewey,tealit, reachtoteachrecruiting, and many more
• Tutorial Job: 104 tutor

C. Tutor Job

As I have mentioned before, tutoring job can be found at 104 tutor. Besides becomes languages tutor (English, Japanese, Korean, etc.), you can also become a tutor in other areas, such as academic subjects, music (piano, violin, guitar, etc.), dancing, computer (AutoCAD, Flash, Dreamweaver, graphic design, etc.), sports (swimming, basketball, yoga, etc.), make-up, acting, singing, photography, or even babysitter for toddler.

However, 104 tutor is not free. Without payment, you are still able to post your CV online, but you can't get access to student/parents contact information on tutor-wanted announcement. In this case, you can only wait until students or parents who see your CV posted there contact you.

With payment, you can apply tutoring jobs as many as you want by yourself, without waiting. The membership price is around NT$ 399 for 90 days. You may give student to try your teaching method first before they make decision whether to recruit you become their private tutor or not. The tutoring location can be in your place or in students' home.

D. Freelance Job

You can check 104 Case, there are plenty of freelance jobs available in Taiwan. For example: graphic designer (logo, poster, book cover, ads), book translator, on-site translator, website designer, package designer, presenter, photographer, 3D Designer, Apps creator, PPT slides maker, interior designer and so on.

Same as 104 tutor, become a member of 104 Case is not free either. You have to pay NT$ 3,800 for 180 days membership and NT$ 6,700 for 1 year membership. Paid members have access to company contact information (usually email) and apply for freelance jobs they are interested in. You can also upload your works/ personal portfolio (file, pic, or web) for company reference.

I have tried this before and I paid for 180 days membership. I applied for translation, graphic designer, and PPT maker freelance job but I had no luck. I got contacted by a company once and we met at their office. They said they want to take a look at my work first by making PPT slides for the first chapter of their book. After I finished and sent it to them, they never contacted me again. Maybe they didn't like my work...

Gud luck for your job hunting! You can share your experience too  :)

Source of information: Self experience, friends experience, 104 job bank, 104 tutor, 104 case, 1111, yes123, CareerJet.

Formosa Living

Source: http://formosa-living-guide.blogspot.com/