Suffice for what? Factory workers earn around 1200 a month. Taxi drivers and bus drivers about 2-2.5K. They all manage to live their entire lives, buy a HDB flat, raise and provide for a family on that amount. Depends on you doesn't it?

Yes, she becomes a PR the same time you do as her application (plus any kids) is jointly submitted with yours.

That's pretty good. What do you do?

Titles are not consistent across the board and all industries.

In my company, the "manager" payscale starts at S$14K per month (about 200K per annum including bonuses). Everyone below that is either Analyst or Specialist (if you're in a technical function).

Causes a big confusion when we send our resumes to recruiters or other employers... because as you say... the title is not matching with the salary. But in the end, all that matters is the salary.

Up to you if you don't mind crossing the causeway or 2nd Link frequently.

In my opinion, the only thing you save is rental. Food & groceries... how much can one person eat? For whatever rental you save, you pay for it in wasted time going through immigration. You've got to decide for yourself.

---

Added on June 26, 2009, 2:54 pmChemicals MNC.

How many years of experience... it depends.

Best case scenario (if you're identified very early as a future leader), it'll take you 6-9 years to be a manager after joining as a fresh grad. Probably 1 in 300 junior employees type of calibre and closer to 1 in 1000 if you're not based in US or Europe. These people are groomed to be future senior directors and VPs - from which the global management teams are selected.

If you're identified as high potential, it'll be slightly longer... around 10-15 years.

If you're well above average (but somehow management did not monitor your career from early on... for eg. late bloomers), you'll probably be around 40-45 when they decide they've tested you sufficiently, and you're capable enough to be made a manager.

If you're average... you will probably retire without ever becoming a manager especially if you are working at a small location where the bigger jobs are few and far between.

--- Having said that, lots of the people supervisors (especially those supervising fairly junior people) and heads of the smaller departments are not managers.

This post has been edited by seantang: Jun 26 2009, 02:58 PM

Must be a pretty big project.

What kind of question is that? It's good if you don't have a degree and not so good if you do. More importantly, it depends on what kind of job it is and how much experience you're bringing to it.

What do you mean by 'survive'? Banglas survive perfectly well and feed a big family back in Bangladesh on $600.

Of course you can. Question is, do you want to? Rental's obviously lower of course.

You have a salary of only RM2.5K and your car loan instalment is RM1K? After tax & EPF, it's almost half your take home. Back to your previous question whether you can survive on $1800... based on your track record... I don't think you can.

Assuming money is your motivation, why don't you do a budget assuming you come to Sg and another budget assuming you remain in KL and answer your own question?

If your motivation is not money... then no point asking any of us, no?

I absolutely dislike open ended questions that force you to make a lot of thin air assumptions about someone's personal desires and lifestyle... - unless you want to write a long grandmother story that addresses every endless alternative or possibility.

Generally, I would do exactly that ie. ask for the same S$ salary as what I'm drawing in RM. That's of course if you're doing exactly the same job. When I transferred to Singapore, I accepted the Sg payscale for the same salary level I was at when I left KL. Comparing the payscales in Sg and My, the S$:RM ratio was about 0.9:1. So personally, I think anything from 0.8:1 or better should be acceptable as Sg's effective tax rate is much lower than My.

But then again, you really should do some research amongst your peers and contacts. Find out how much someone with your qualifications/experience and more importantly, someone doing that kind of job - should be getting.

You are right. Employers look at 'the paper' AND your personality & performance. I emphasise the word "AND".

If your selling point is 1st class honours, there will always be competitors & peers who have 1st class honours just like you.

If your selling point is performance, there will always be competitors & peers who have good performance just like you.

The trick is having both a good education AND good performance. Then you're a complete package.

If you didn't do well at school... I'm sorry but to me, you just tied one hand behind your back for the rest of your professional life. You may have great performance but you will always lose to the the guy who also has great performance as well as a 1st class honours.

Of course, lots of people with a lower end education are still very successful... no doubt at all. But I'm willing to bet with you that they are very aware of their educational disadvantage and are always positioning themselves to make up for it. You won't find them simply dismissing their weaknesses by saying "it's not very important".

And if you're just starting your career, education is more important than you think. If you have 10 or 20 years of solid work experience, then you can say that you have proven yourself despite a poor education. Employers can accept that because your track record is longer and more recent than your education.

But if you're a fresh grad or have only a few years of experience, employers will think this way... this chap has 3-4 years of good experience but he messed up 10 years of education (secondary + uni). The impression will be that you're not a solid dependable person. Out of the last 14 years of your life, you've managed to screw up 70% of it. Then they will start doubting whether your 3-4 years of experience is really as strong as you made it sound in your cv and during the interview. Why? Because your allegedly good work performance is completely inconsistent and opposite of your poor performance during your education. Can a leopard change its spots? A suspicious person will choose to believe the more objective evidence (ie. your "paper") rather than what you said during your interview.

Lastly, whenever you look at the programs or brochures for professional seminars or forums, the speakers or presenters always list their educational qualifications (including the honours, distinctions and which unis their degrees came from) besides their professional experience. Why do you think they do that? If it's not important, why don't they just leave it out? It's part of their overall package. Their personal brand. You want everything in the package to look good.

This post has been edited by seantang: Jul 4 2009, 12:59 AM

My intention was not to scare him, but it's the situation my Singaporean colleagues and I are facing now.

My company just bought another company and now we are combining the employees of both companies. But to achieve savings, some employees of course will be let go.

There are already quite a few cases where 2 or 3 competing employees have been rated excellent performers, all are rated high potential and the differences between the candidates are so few that it eventually boils down to which school they went to and what results they got.

That's because when you're going through a thousand people across the region, it's impossible for the senior managers to know everyone. Therefore, "performance" becomes subjective because each manager will see each employee differently. So to come up with an objective review, the simple HEADLINE items matter... what class degree you have, which uni it's from, what role you have now, how big is your job scope, have you ever received official recognition awards... everyday "job performance" becomes a secondary consideration because it's so subjective and uncomparable.

This post has been edited by seantang: Jul 4 2009, 09:45 AM

I applied for PR almost immediately after I got my EP.

IMHO, PR applications are approved on a case by case basis. If your application is strong enough (ie. you have good qualifications, good work experience (not only in Sg but anywhere)), they'll give you a PR because you're young, highly fertile and of the most... ummm, acceptable nationality & ethnicity (assuming you're Chinese or Indian Malaysian).

This post has been edited by seantang: Jul 4 2009, 08:17 PM

I'm pretty sure there aren't many applicants from this category.

Anyway, it's unsaid of course, but Singapore uses immigration to make up for the low birth rates of it's ethnic Chinese population, and to a lesser extent the ethnic Indians. The Malays in Singapore have much, much higher birth rates.

And Malaysian immigrants are the most favoured. We assimilate very quickly and very well into Sg society. Our backgrounds are easily checked, our schooling easily confirmed... making our applications quite easy to verify.

Search the CPF website under withdrawals.

Lee Kuan Yew doesn't agree with you. Perhaps you should read his memoirs.

I also recommend reading "Ousted!" by Patrick Keith.

The railway land was an afterthought... neither the cause nor the incentive for Singapore's separation from Malaysia.

Not sure I see the point of waiting. How different will your qualifications and professional experience be now vs 3 months later?

Recommend a firm to you, or recommend you to a firm?

Audit firms usually no difference.

Anyway, you need chess_gal.

Why confusing?

What's the downside of being a PR if you don't want to stay long?

It'll be under the info for contributors section. Anyway, explore the site a bit lah.

I can't show you the exact link without searching the site myself. I rather you spend your time exploring the site instead of mine.

Hmmm... I thought I was pretty direct.

Btw, if you want to quote what I say, quote it in totality so that you do not misconstrue the context in which I said what I said.

I said "The impression will be that you're not a solid dependable person."

The keyword is IMPRESSION.

At the end of the day, when you look at a resume, you look for consistency. If your academic performance doesn't agree with your job performance in your resume, it raises a red flag in my mind. I'd naturally ask why.

If you're going for a technical job like accountant or lawyer for example, I fail to see how someone who flunked Accounting 101 can all of a sudden be a good accountant without a damn good explanation. Or someone who failed Basic Contract Law can be a good lawyer without an intervening factor.

That doesn't mean that they can't be good at their jobs. Especially if they are in more EQ driven roles like Marketing or Sales or Customer Service. Just that the %s and probabilities are lower.

Again, you're missing the point.

I did not say that a 1st class guarantees a successful career. I said that having a 3rd class puts you at a disadvantage compared to someone with a first class.

Both 1st class and 3rd class holders can fail in their careers. But for those who have the talent to succeed, those with 1st class will have a smoother path in front of them. The fact that many companies give 1st and 3rd class holders a different starting salary alludes to this. And the fact is that employers play the odds. And the odds are that someone with a good education typically stands a better chance of producing good results.

Of course there are exceptions, but try to remember I'm talking about probabilities for the overall population. You said you've seen a lot of 1st class students crash and burn. I have as well. But I can also tell you that I've seen more 3rd class students who don't even get the chance to get off the ground.

You are contradicting yourself.

You say doing well in school is DEFINITELY an advantage. But in the same breath, you say that if you don't do well, it will NEVER be a deterrent. How do you reconcile your ABSOLUTE positive argument and with your ABSOLUTE NEGATIVE one? If doing well in school is definitely an advantage, that means that it has to pose some deterrent if you don't do well (ie. means you are disadvantaged to some extent).

If you mean for your statement to be a form of encouragement instead of a statement of fact, then fine.

I absolutely agree. Don't be deterred. We can't change the past. But don't make excuses or psyche yourself to ignore it.

If you don't have a strong academic background, recognise the fact that you will be competing with those who do. Recognise the fact that you will have to make up for that disadvantage in some other way. You may have to work harder, do more, speak up, be more aggressive, be creative... whatever. But never forget the fact that this is a race. The point of racing is to beat the other runners. And you are starting 20m behind some of the other runners. However, there will be others who did worse than you in school and start even farther behind.

But if there's one thing I've learnt about working, is that the race is a 26km marathon. Not a 100m sprint. At some point mid-race, your work history and track record will overshadow your education as your career headline. The trick is to keep up with the front runners until you get there.

Your assertion has one problem.

You assume that only you can produce good results 5 years down the road. What makes you think that the chap with 1st class honours will not equal your performance or even exceed it?

Let's say you're the boss and you have 2 machai who are equal in terms of performance. The difference is one has a first class honours from say... Imperial College. And the other has a pass degree from TARC. You have one vacancy for a manager, and this manager will deal with consultants, clients and investors. Who will you promote? Who looks better on your company's biodata sheet? Who looks better in the prospectus? Who will you send for forums and conferences?

Or if you're hiring a mid-career professional and you have 2 candidates. Both have excellent track records with a string of achievements. Both are well spoken and personable. Again, one has a first class from Melbourne U. The other has a pass from UPM. Which one would you hire?

And using the example of a fresh grad. If a company hires 2 fresh grads... one with a first class and the other has a pass. Who do you think would tend to be given higher profile assignments and projects (which would usually offer more opportunities to showcase their abilities)?

If degrees and qualifications do not matter, as you say, 5 years down the road... why would successful managers with 10-20 years experience, successful entrepreneurs etc still take the trouble to obtain MBAs or DBAs etc? The fact is that perception matters. And people simply have a better perception of you if you have a blue chip education.

Like I said previously, I'm not saying it's all doom & gloom if you happen not to have a top grade qualification. I'm just saying that you'll get much better results from your career if you plan to deal with it rather than ignoring it and hoping that other people will ignore it too. Trust me, they won't.

This post has been edited by seantang: Jul 7 2009, 09:43 PM