Hello!I'll be joining Accenture as a new hire in the summer. I wanted to get a perspective from those experienced in international work. I want to gear my career toward China and I'm a fluent mandarin speaker. If you work at ACN, what are some ideas you can give me on how to look for these opportunities, and if you are with someone else, could you give me your perspective on how you got to do international work in China? Is there usually a level where you must reach, or is it up to luck sometimes?

International work here depends upon a lot of factors - business need, skill set, level and location. I have heard of people going to the Far East, but these were manager or above - with many years experience at the company, generally with some key skills in SAP for example. More likely you will be working around Europe. But, saying that, stranger things have happened :-)

We have a fair amount of work in China. We also have ambitious plans, however they are unlikely to be realised soon because of 1) serious inability to get enough of the right local staff due to the market, and 2) the clients still buy on price, not 'value'. If you are interested in working in China you can get transferred there quite easily if you are willing to accept local salary (probably under 20000RMB/month). If you are in strat I think they need people to transfer, which would be on better than local conditions. Currently even at Manager level you can only transer to China on local salary unless you have some particular skill and/or the firm asks you to go. This may change in a few years, plus China salaries are increasing. You've got to make plans and decide whether you are willing to buy the China work/life experience in return for a less money. If you are really interested in China then foriegn lawyers, accountants, bankers and recruiters are more in demand over there at the moment than consultants.

I'm sure there's a program called uk/china connect with the f&pm service line. I saw it on monster jobs. find out about it or try HR. a few yrs here then move to china. I'd also love to get out to Asia but our disgusting billing rates/expenses just don't merit it when compared with the locals. I'd totally take local salary to do it though.

there are some ways to work in the far east, I know people who went for some projects only, some transfered to a chinese office.rule of thumb: it gets easier the more experienced you get. I would expect that you will have a serious chance after 4-5 years with ACN UK, depending on the network you build of course. it´s all about knowing the right people in acn.but hey, do you first years as good as you can, they will not be easy and sometimes you will hate it, but it´s worth it overall. welcome and good luck.