With spring almost here, job hunting and recruitment activities are becoming increasingly frequent. Video interviews have become a popular way for many companies in Pudong New Area to recruit new workers due to the outbreak of the novel coronavirus, while previously the system was only used by large internet companies for job applicants who lived far away. 

CloudWalk, a local facial recognition technology company, recently posted many sales job vacancies in fields such as education, finance, security, and transportation, and said they will give video interviews to avoid face-to-face contact. 

According to a survey by Zhaopin, an online job recruitment platform, during the epidemic control period, 68.2 percent of companies said they would like the platform to offer matchmaking services to help them find the most suitable resumes, and 55 percent of companies said they would like the platform to offer video interview services. 

"We posted our recruitment notice on various platforms and received more than 1,000 replies every day," said an HR worker at the company, adding that they have already recruited several workers through video interview. 

In addition, companies have also been training new employees online. Among them is iTutorGroup, a local online education platform.  

The company posted two jobs, Course Consultant and Teaching Assistant, and allowed job applicants to interview, receive job training and complete employment procedures online at home. Employees can also choose to work from home after they sign the contract. 

A trainer at the company can give lectures to employees all over the country simultaneously through 36 electronic screens. 

"Hit by the epidemic, many offline service companies have to shut down. As one of the biggest online education companies in China, we hope to take advantage of the internet and help people weather the hard times," said Lai Rongming, a manager of the company in charge of Chinese mainland operations. 

Despite the epidemic, many companies are still active in recruiting new workers. According to Zhaopin, enterprise service and consulting service industries posted most job vacancies in the first week after the Spring Festival holiday, accounting for 6.18 percent of all industries, up 1.5 percent year-on-year. The proportion of jobs posted by real estate, construction and engineering industries also increased by 1.46 percent.