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How much a project manager should get?
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Did time in Beijing and HK during my 20s. Would move to Asia again in a heartbeat. Fun adventure and lots to learn. Worth it if you can find a company to sponsor your visa and send you over!
No I was well networked so repatriation was pretty straightforward. Key is to keep contacts with your home country and stay on the radar when you’re ready for a move back
I worked in HK for a while (but in investment banking). It was awesome - more money, lots of action and things to do.
Out of the three, I like SH lifestyle the best as there is a sense of opportunity and movement in the lifestyle with the most interesting culture for me.
SG is safe and stable but kind of boring (good place to work from to expand into more interesting areas of SE Asia though)
Highly recommend Shanghai. You’ll have better living situation than Hong Kong (nicer and cheaper apartments), there’s more diversity in the opportunities (HK is very finance heavy and there’s not much else), the expat circle is very international, and it’s changing quickly. Singapore/HK are both more old school expat cities with less new growth. Shanghai is a little harder to navigate for sure, but the experience will be rewarding
Hey sure. So fyi I'm not American, but I worked on my Chinese in the following ways
1. Using it meetings and comms whenever possible or needed. So most of the people I worked spoke English, but I always spoke of wrote Chinese if there was no foreigner involved in the discussion/work. Basically I'd research/think what I needed to say before meeting, and would search up terms I heard but didn't know after. Also read up on business news and tech content extensively in chinese
2. Dating. Not for everyone, but I was texting and dating a lot which was good to improve local slang knowledge
3. Watching Chinese film/books/music/articles. Would avoid books until highly advanced, but spent a lot of time reading articles (E.g toutiao) and did karaoke with local friends. Helped improve language and cultural understanding
Continued texting/comms with Chinese after leaving and still watch Chinese media
Left EY NYC for new job Singapore end of last year to try life in Asia as an Asian-American. COVID has paused everything but I think it was a good choice. Would pick the other two cities over SG if I had a choice. Taipei is actually a city I'd strongly suggest too. Feel free to DM
I did consulting in NYC before moving to MNC in SG. Heard it's hard to get a consulting gig as some companies dont offer visas in SG
Our firm is recruiting in Taipei and Shanghai. Send me a DM if you’d like a referral
Interested too - do you need to know mandarin
I tried moving to HK for a while but the 50% pay cuts kept me from making a move given they weren’t dream roles either. My brother is there and enjoys it, although he makes finance money (small/no pay cut relative to US) and hangs out mostly with expats. If you can avoid a large pay cut it’s still a great place to be (until China ruins it). One note since you mentioned you wanted to improve your Chinese — if you meant Mandarin you won’t get much practice here.
+1 for Taipei if you can swing a non-local salary. Warm people, fantastic food, etc. Cost of living is low so you can live reasonably comfortably on their super low salaries but really where it shines is if you can live and work remote from Taipei with a multinational company salary. Compared to the other cities on your list you may need to know more Mandarin to get around but that’s relative.
Singapore is a great place to be for doing business with the rest of SEA/AU/NZ, and my read is the level of digital consulting is stronger (and correspondingly more adequately compensated) here than in HK/China. It’s clean and has a nice street food culture, but can feel a little sterile.
Shanghai seems like it has a lot going for it from the one work trip I had there but I have spent minimal time in Mainland China so I don’t have much else to say here.
Currently, I’d still like to spend a few years living/working in Asia (Taiwan or Japan would be ideal) but I also don’t want to be starting a family in my late 30s or 40s so it may not make as much sense for me at this point in my life unless I plan on also finding a wife there.