It’s a shame really. I am having a hard time finding company that have great data infrastructure which in turn can enable me to grow further on my career path but I’m hitting this wall at this point.

Most of the companies within Malaysia just doesn’t have that kind of backend infra to cultivate this kind of job.

It's a growing field, certainly. Most startup here have pretty basic data infra (some data scientist still only have excel to work off from), but consider it another way, because its so new, that is where you have an opportunity to stamp your mark on it.

For FAANGs, a lot of them rely on internal referrals via other employees, so you would do well to go contribute to areas where you can get visibility, like opensource forums, start a blog about data science, contribute to sites like stackoverflow or where ever data scientist contribute to.

I used to help in hiring for software engineers, and most of them got in because they already have a good rapport with the current heads / colleagues, other than some that came in with very niche skills or languages.

Malaysia is a greenfield in this space especially with data (from governance, to business knowledge, to the maths and finally programming). It is ripe for the taking and you can definitely make a name for yourself here locally. I used to talk to the chief data scientist at my past company (bank) where he used to tell me that data folks have 3 bubbles of skills, maths, programming and business. Most of them tend to be strong in 2/3 but its very rare to find someone who is strong in all 3 (he was one of them but depending on your experience and field of expertise). At the end of the day, he used to tell me that it was through building things up from scratch is when you truly get to know and grow yourself to fill out the 3 bubbles.

Personally I’ve worked in start-up tier company and e-commerce with Alibaba backend support (worked closely with Alibaba team actually) and currently with one of the largest international bank with strong Asia presence.

I would say I have experienced through 3 tier of analytic infra. First is the messy but are working toward proper datalake/data warehousing. They have the data and you can get the data easily if you know the right place to ask for. Most of the SME/startup are currently in this stage.

Second is one with strong backend support (Alicloud) with proper data governance. Something FAANGs would have. The more established companies I can see in Malaysia with this sort of infra that isn’t FAANG is Shopee, Lazada, Grab, AirAsia and probably some telco like Axiata. There are more choices in SG as well such as Gojek and bytedance, but still very limited by nature.


Third is one with huge amount of data, but with all the legacy tool and the massive amount effort needed to consolidate them causing it to move extremely slowly. On top of that, regulated industry makes it even harder. This type of company requires a huge amount of time dealing with bureaucracy. Most international companies is at this stage.

Personally I still prefer the second type because of the ease of access to data and tooling, where you can achieve the most with the least effort in trying to hack through everything just to get the result.

Currently I’m looking to develop my skill set on building ML model that can productionize, which is the main reason why I’m looking for FAANGs as the next career jump.

Most of the existing SME does not need this level of model and do not have the proper data pipeline that can make it work as well. BI would be a better use of their resource as compared to data science. This leaves me with second and third type and bureaucracy is an unnecessary blocker for technical development.

Sorry TS might have swayed away from your AMA.

This post has been edited by LovelyPotato: Feb 28 2022, 10:06 PM

Very true sharing.
Thanks a lot for your insights.

I just checked on the jobs site for one of the FAANGs, plenty of data science roles available on the job portal for Singapore. Which have you tried applying for?

I’ve tried applying Meta, Google, Apple, Twitter and Amazon. Netflix have very limited DS role in SG. Unfortunately none of them gotten back to me.

I’m also currently trying to apply to some other MNC within SG to kickstart the move to SG first, which will then make the next step easier as compared to jump directly from Malaysia.

I guess a referral really makes the most difference here.

Any recommendations?

Some brief background about me:-

1. 2+ years in auditing
2. Accounting degree in local U
3. With ACCA

Should I continue with my current job to get the title as a certified accountant (need to have at least 3years of experience), or should I try out in other places? i.e. commercial firm

Quite stressful currently 😶

how likely the employer will accept someone from one industry jump to another industry ( manager level) but same job function .

Yesss. Not only Malaysia; many international companies are offer >10K fully remote roles for full stack dev.
there is a global shortage for software engineers.

FAANG - check out Blind for fully remote jobs. plenty of them but you need to master Leetcode (correct me if 'm wrong?) My company has a dedicated Recruiting team in Singapore hunting for SWE in SEA to ship over to California under H1B visa as SWE are soooo expensive to hire in Silicon Valley.

Really depends on what you're looking for - I can't really advise what's the best career move if I do not know you well enough. If you want to move out of audit, leave as a AM? It gives you better choices out there. An auditor with 4 YoE can practically go anywhere and still get hired.

If you're looking at monetary gains, I'd go for the FP&A/Financial Planning route vs Accounting. Most accounting roles are now taken over by COE in Cyber and can be pretty mundane.

Hi there, thanks for your willingness to share.

Can I seek your kind indulgence in sharing:

1. What made of the better CVs? How do you consider one's CV as good or bad?

2. Is asking for a sign-on bonus practice common in the Malaysian landscape?

Thanks.

Edit: Sorry, didn't go through the entire thread and not sure if this has been asked before. I will read it up if it has been posted before.

This post has been edited by tehoice: Mar 4 2022, 12:28 PM

Hi, thank you so much for opening this. I have a few question on mind and am wondering whether I am in the right direction, and how do I compare with peers around my age and those who are in my industry?

I am 26 years this year, currently just got an increment to RM3.3k. started with RM3k and worked for almost 2 years in this company.

However, I just got head hunted of an offer of around RM 4.1k, with health benefits that is 8x better than my previous company.

The role I am in is the finance field (invoice processing etc.).

I am looking to advance in to an Analyst(Credit/Data) role in the future, thought of getting myself certified with Tableau first. Will this assist in better opportunities in the future?

Really appreciate it your time!

Thanks!

Actuarial Science student breaking into investment bank here

I've had an internship so far in a small firm with a CEO that has quite a name in the industry

During my last year I may go for big/prestigious names like Creador, Aberdeen or just the big banks like CIMB/Maybank and etc

Any idea what other companies like those PE firms like Creador or names like Aberdeen that isn't well-known to go for?

Also, what do they want to see in interns and maybe perhaps even fresh grads?

Another thing, kinda pai seh to ask for salary as fresh grad, but companies will use it as a benchmark when you jump, so im stuck on this too haha

Thanks for your advice and time sifus, unkers and senpais

Do you know why recruiters approach and speak to candidates on LinkedIn and immediately want to gauge the candidates interest on the vacancy without first even sharing job descriptions?

I also wonder why as well as I always get this treatment from recruiters on LinkedIn (they give very vague descriptions about the job, no mentions about the salary)

The worst part is they insist on getting my phone number to call me even after I told them that I would only to talk them via Google Meet/Teams/Zoom..
(the recruiter ignored my request and emailed me her phone number for me to call her instead.. in the end I ignored her cuz I've checked her agency's website for those positions she shared and they don't interest me)

This is an interesting thread and thank you for sharing your experience.

May i know what is your input for project management especially in the technology sector? How is the demand abroad? I'm just keeping my options open.

Tbh, internship means nothing much when we are doing hiring. Most of our hires are either internal referrals from employees in IB, or those that impressed during road shows and those coming from MT programmes.

Don't worry too much about fresh graduate salary given you haven't even secure your first job.

I don't think Credor or Aberdeen is considered top tier here, given their relatively small presence locally plus, they have lesser openings for hire. Big banks is bit hard just that's partly because the usual overseas grads or top local grads then to opt to join them and they can offer a more competitive salary.

Yeah of course there are CVs that are better written than some, especially those who highlight their key achievements and show good career trajectory.

Sign-on bonus is more common for senior hires, but this usually need an additional layer of approval - When you ask for it, be sure to justify it with a reason (could be missing out on upcoming bonus/promotion/increment).