dilemma - stay or go?

Here's a tricky one.

 

Sorry I haven't written in a long time, it's taken a while to figure out what my priorities are, and a lot of this wasn't really suitable for public use.

 

Leaving the UK for China, I took a pay cut, and slowed upward progression of my career.  The short term aim was to broaden my horizons, gain contrasting experience and relearn core skills.  The long term aim was to become a strong consultant with experience of both the West and the East.

 

Thing is, it's not so easy to achieve.  The biggest problem is probably maturity of the consulting industry.  Clients don't yet understand consulting well, which means less ambitious projects, more technical projects, and less clarity of scope or requirements.  The consulting firms are improving in terms of capability and reputation, and growing in size.  But they're clearly well behind other countries.  Capgemini has maybe 500 staff in China, compared to 9000 in the UK.

 

My problem now is that I have been offered a position in Hong Kong.  A return to international level salary, which is very hard to ignore, and ability to stay in the region.  Not quite the same in terms of East/West blend though, in a business consulting sense Hong Kong is far more Western than it is Eastern.

 

It's easy to resist temptation from jobs in the UK or elsewhere.  But when they're as close as Hong Kong, which isn't a bad place to live for lifestyle or taxation, you've got to consider it carefully.