13 February 2012
Here I am, Singapore, a good place to work, to live and to make money, not to relax though. I came here to seek for job. Singapore may not be my dream place to live, but it is far better than Malaysia.
I had an interview on the Valentine's Day. It made my day so unforgettable. It was a position for IT Recruitment Consultant in one of the job agencies. I remembered I sent the application at night once I landed in Singapore. I received a call the next morning, inviting me for an interview on the same day. The offer was given straight after the interview. Obviously, it was a job that did not really require much technical skills. Meeting the sales target was all they concerned.
Sales-oriented jobs always appear challenging for me as the income is dynamic every month. However, I found it as a good opportunity to shift my career, doing something that deals with people. At one time, I was really keen to take this challenge and said yes. But it is not easy to get a perfection. This is life!!! It required me for a three-years bond which I do not think I could commit at the moment.
I was not desperate though. That was just my first trial in my job search. I took it as an experience. I enjoyed the rest of the Valentine day along the riverbank at the Raffles Place. Here, I saw tall giant buildings and also tourists having seafood meals along the riverbank. Singapore is undoubtedly a heaven for jobs and travelling.
My sister told me that I was lucky to have quite a number of interviews in a week. After the first interview, I went for the second interview at a company located quite far, doing customer loyalty system. This was a position for Support Engineer, responsible to support their operations on 24/7 standby. If worst comes to worst, I would have to give onsite support even if it happened at night time. I was offered quite good salary, but based on 12-months basis and with two year bond. I am not likely to go for this.
The third interview followed. It was a programmer analyst in the giant NCS hub. This was the only company so far that required a technical test. I was quite confident in working with Oracle technologies so I thought the test and the interview should not be a big deal for me as long as I did some revision. I never expected the test to turn out to be so difficult. It is far more difficult than I thought, testing on something that I have not learnt, or have not even heard. I felt so desperate after the test. While I was waiting for the interview, I had a thought to leave but I didn't. The interview was not too bad. I was warned by the interviewers that this positions would carry heavy workload as the team is doing projects for banks. Working till late is common, though it is not everyday basis.
The fourth interview ended quite well. I love the location, the environment, the people and the acceptable workload. The only questions are the opportunity for growth of the position, and the salary. I was told that they have limited budget.
I have two more interviews coming. I am quite interesting in one of them. It is a position for Change Management Specialist. It may be a good opportunity to shift my career from doing technical stuff to do something about management. This is not a popular career. It is rare to see companies are hiring a position in charge of the change management in any online job agency, except for the big companies I believe.
The other one would be with CIMB bank located in Raffles Place. I imagine myself dressing smart formal attire, wearing high heels, carrying a branded bag, and put a thick make up to work in this high class working central. I feel this position is slightly better than NCS's. The agent is very helpful in giving me advice and tell me about this career prospect.
From the performance of my overall job seeking, I noticed that it is not too hard to get an offer. But it is really hard to get a perfect offer which is good in price, benefits, growth, workload and location. And most importantly, it has to come on the right time. I may end up accepting the lowest offer which can be 40-50% different but hopefully it offers the best working environment.
