Guys/gals, if you're in a technical field, being an expat is also another way of earning good money provided you have the necessary skills and experience.  Malaysian Ringgit is weak, so earning foreign currencies can potentially translate to loads of RM.

what is 'VP'?

Don't you guys think of working from 9-5 will get you rich? I guess the risk of NOT getting rich by working 9-5 job is much higher compare to start your own business with innovative idea.

Please always keep in mind, working 9-5 won't get you rich at all.

I think u people are a little TOO focused on wanting to earn the big bucks.  Shouldn't the focus be to learn and be exposed... esp now that u are at the beginning of your careers being young and dynamic individuals?! *scratch head*

honestly $$ isnt everything,
u can get a really bad shape job work like a dog and earn the 5 figures or the 5k++

but there is no life to it

comparing to a 2.5-3k sallary thats enjoying and makes u want wake up and cant wait to get into office

ooicic...any examples of those??

so how much is ideal for you ?

Also the ones that really make big money are those who go offshore and are directly involved in the field work, not the support staff in engineering or admin or IT, plus the money is not only from the basic but from the allowance when offshore.

Few years back when I was just a programmer age 24 earning RM4k/month. That's it. Cannot earn more cause tied to desk. Income power is limited. So I choose to move out even though my interest is in programming

He has my salute     

Care to elaborate on the age discrimination....don't really understand that.
The only fact I knew about is when one's salary got higher and higher, eventually it gets harder to jump to another company as the other company partly could not sustain giving out the expected salary afraid of messing up their salary structured (especially when one is at a young age).
But do not really know about O&G industry.

This is not age discrimination (yah, excuse, the HR should not even mention it!  ).  Shell is very very careful about any kind of discrimination.

Your colleague probably applied for a job that is in the Job Group 7 payband (engineer position?).  That payband has a maximum ~6.3k.  Anything higher is not justifiable.

If he goes for a technical lead (JG6 ~ 7k) or Manager position (JG5 and above - 10K to unlimited cash  ) he'll find the payband is very much higher.

Which brings me to another point here - to illustrate an example: no matter how good your Windows technical skills are (i.e. troubleshooting, solving issues, implementation) you'll find it very hard to go above 6k unless you improve yourself with managerial skills.  From a company's point of view, it's not how good your skillset is, it's how rare your skillset is.

Why do you think Unix/Oracle consistently earn more than Windows/SQL people?  Or why SAP has so high pay, or Project Mgmt? But people in helpdesk, one-leg-kick troubleshoot in small companies don't earn that much?  It's because more people can do some jobs than others.
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One more thing I forgot, your colleague will likely not be happy with Shell, because due to their increment structure, since he hit the maximum payband his yearly increment will likely be 1%, no matter how well he performs

@tishaban,
I can sure understand your friend's frustrations!  And if you're frustrated, can you imagine how much more frustrations he has? *grins* 

I wouldn't comment on Shell, but generally the ceiling had been set whereby a department or the company as a whole can still maintain their expenses whilst not risking their profit.
That's the hard cruel facts that us as employees to certain corporate had to live by.
I wouldn't call all this as discrimination per say, more incline towards strict company policies that made us feel discriminated.

But what is considered a lot of $ and what is considered young? 

Now tell me, are we supposed to pay Malaysia tax if we are working oversea most of the time since we have to fork out for work permit & visa and pay oversea tax while we are working there.