Macau Casinos can play on job satisfaction

Friday 21st October, 2005 AS MACAU RACES to become the Las Vegas of the east, companies in the enclave are trying desperately to fill vacancies. Employers in sectors linked to the booming gaming industry are seeking candidates from Macau, Hong Kong and beyond. Human resources professionals said that while salaries in Macau might not catch up with pay scales in Hong Kong soon, openings there were more likely to provide job satisfaction. They said that employers should focus on this aspect to lure recruits. Choi Siu-lin, a Hong Kong-based associate director at Mercer Human Resource Consulting, said employers there should not think that the only way to attract staff from outside of Macau or retain existing employees was by offering high pay and benefits. Many people were becoming more amenable to accepting challenging, but less lucrative, jobs, especially in Hong Kong. "The job market in Hong Kong is not so good. Since 1997, Hong Kong graduates are more realistic," said Ms Choi, who specialises in performance, measurement and rewards. "For example, if they go to work in China they know they will not be able to command the same level of salaries. Instead, they might go for experience, or for training and development." Ms Choi said many professionals from Hong Kong and beyond were interested in working in Macau because they wanted to be part of its emergence as a major gambling hub. Employers are expanding their recruitment drives beyond Macau because of a shortage of skilled labour in the gaming and supporting industries. But while Hong Kong candidates might speak better English than those from Macau, they should not think that they have the edge, said Humphrey Ng, consultant at Levin Human Resources Development, a consulting firm based in Hong Kong with offices in Macau, Guangzhou and Zhuhai. "People assume that young employees in Macau constantly jump from one job to the next because there are so many opportunities around," Mr Ng said. "But we're finding quite a number of down to earth candidates from Macau who stick at their jobs," he added. Mr Ng has interviewed job candidates from Macau and Hong Kong. He said those from Hong Kong sometimes focused too much energy on giving sharp, witty responses to questions. "In contrast, Macau candidates pour their hearts out during an interview," he said. "They give honest responses and talk about their career plans and goals." "Negotiating with a Hong Kong candidate is like deal-making. With a Macau candidate, it is trust-making," said Samson Lam, the legal adviser and chief executive of Levin Human Resources Development. Vaishnavi Muralidharan, associate director of Mercer Human Resource Consulting, said that employers must be prepared for a certain amount of staff turnover and they should think long term. "They have to position themselves and Macau is attractive enough for people to come, so their cost of recruitment can come down in time," she said. She predicted that job-matching agencies and HR professionals would soon be established in Macau to help these employers. Crying out for staff Macau's labour shortage affects not only the gaming and hospitality industries, but also sectors such as retail, transport, telecommunications and storage. With a population of about 440,000 people, Macau has traditionally had relatively few retail outlets. The sector has expanded to cater for the growing number of tourists and gamblers arriving there, but now faces a shortage of sales staff. Data from the Macau statistics bureau showed that the retail sector had 1,264 vacancies in June this year, 39.2 per cent of which required upper secondary education or above. In the year to June, average salaries climbed 4.7 per cent to 5,714 patacas. There were 555 job openings in the transport, telecommunications and storage sectors in June, according to the statistics bureau. Among these vacancies, 28.3 per cent required upper secondary education or above. As for language skills, 50.8 per cent of the vacancies in the retail sector required knowledge of Putonghua. In the transport, telecoms and storage sectors, 68.4 per cent of vacancies required Putonghua. Sio Chi-wai, vice-president of the Macau Importers and Exporters Association and a retailer of sports apparel and footwear, said his fellow retailers were focusing their energy on retaining their most experienced employees. "Because we're an industry with a low entry barrier, employees with one year of experience become an integral part of our daily operations," he was quoted as saying by the Chinese-language Macao Daily News. "Our focus now is how to reward them satisfactorily so they will stay," Mr Sio added. Easy pace appeals to the senior executives MACAU IS INCREASINGLY seen as a desirable posting for senior executives. After all, not every city gets to be transformed into Asia's Las Vegas. Trevor Sunderland, permanent and executive selection services manager of Manpower (Hong Kong), said Macau's easy pace of life was an attraction for senior executives. "The cost of living is not high, though rents are starting to creep up," he said. "But in a lot of cases it's not about money." Manpower had helped arrange for a number of Hong Kong executives to join the gaming and hospitality sectors in Macau, Mr Sunderland said. Postings in Macau do not necessarily require previous experience with casinos or hotels. Instead, the entire infrastructure of expertise is being built in areas such as information technology, human resources and finance. "The gaming industry has mushroomed significantly in the past couple of years," Mr Sunderland said. The addition of the American-operated casinos had brought new professionalism to the industry. "It needed significant expertise, predominantly in IT," Mr Sunderland said. Before the handover, Macau was ridden by crime and an economic downturn. It would have been difficult to entice Hong Kong managers to relocate there. However, in 2003 when Hong Kong was still dealing with the aftermath of the Sars crisis, Macau rebounded. A wave of senior managers moved to the smaller neighbour in search of opportunities. "There were no opportunities in Hong Kong at the time," Mr Sunderland said. "Hong Kong's hospitality sector is now regaining growth, but some people in the industry are still looking to Macau because of its easier pace." Despite the opportunities Macau offers, salaries still do not compete with Hong Kong. "We are not seeing expat-type wages in Macau for Hong Kong staff," Mr Sunderland said. "However, rentals and everything else are still relatively low. And it's definitely not a hardship posting." from www.classifiedpost.com