Last year, Vladimir Fedosov visited China for the first time on a business trip, and decided to shake up his life.

"I loved China - liked the people and their culture," he told the Metropolitan from Moscow, where he currently lives. Some of his good friends have found work here, and he has decided to try to do the same.

"I find work in China is not only interesting, but also very promising," he said, using a QQ instant messaging account that he set up to aid his job hunt.

Fedosov speaks almost no Chinese, but feels there is a niche for him here. "I know well the Russian mentality, culture, and tradition. I have a good reference point on the Russian market and can be very useful to China."

However, he is not sure exactly how to start looking for work.

"For me to find a job in Beijing is very complicated! I don't know where to look for the right job and which websites I can search for job information," he said.

Over 200,000 foreigners are working in China, a number that has been increasing annually by 10 percent since 2000, according to government figures.

By far, the easiest jobs to find are teaching English. Jobs in other fields are available, but generally require advanced skills, Chinese fluency, or both.

Alok Joshi, an experienced recruiter for a multinational company, says it is hard for foreigners to find jobs outside the teaching field.

Foreigners must "show they can adapt to the local culture and are willing to share knowledge and skills with Chinese people," said Joshi, pointing out that speaking the language is very important.

Foreigners are needed in the automobile, software, construction and electronics industries, to work as designers, engineers and marketing staff, says Liu Huizhong, of the job site Foreign HR.com. Among the most recently posted jobs, eight are for English teachers, and four are for engineers with 6 or more years of experience.

"Chinese language is not a necessary skill for senior positions," says Liu. "If candidates have good technical or management skills, companies could hire people to be their translators."

Ma Dandan, who has worked in the human resource departments of foreign companies for 12 years, said that one way for foreigners to find jobs is to browse the companies' websites where they want to work and pay attention to the microblog service Weibo.

Ma suggested the best way for foreigners to find jobs is to join HR forums like hrsalon.org and bbs.hr369.com.

"But the information is written in Chinese, so they should know Chinese or have friends who can help them," noted Ma.

Some details of the resume are a little different than in the West. Joshi suggests sending a two- or three-page resume formatted to A4 paper size, and including a photo.

The most important thing, according to Ma and Joshi, is that foreigners insist their employer companies help them to get a work visa first before they start. Otherwise they will be illegal workers, and their rights can't be guaranteed.

In 2011, around 20,000 foreigners were expelled for illegal entry, illegal residence or illegal employment.

Fedosov has been searching for work here for one month with no success, but he has not given up hope. He is now struggling to use his rudimentary Chinese to register with Chinese job hunting websites and navigate the Chinese search engine Baidu.

He says his lack of Chinese is the biggest barrier for him finding a job in China, but feels confident he can pick it up in three months if someone gives him a chance to work around people speaking the language all day. "Of course, it would not be a good Chinese, but it will be sufficient for me to understand," he predicts.