If World War III is to be caused by religion, the main culprit is Group Polarisation which we allowed

I see group polarisation (e.g. groupthink) in progress among religious people of some of the major faiths (which is a danger to world peace). This is facilitated even more with an emphasis of unity that created the illusion of no opposing view that made people even more extreme. Sure, you can feedback but there are gatekeepers to control information flow making the condition unable to prevent group polarisation. Many people are not educated in social psychology and have no idea the seriousness of group polarisation thinking it doesn't warrant the existence of 'whistle blowers'. And when you feedback, people up there may not think it is a problem and prevented the information from flowing down. People trust people up there to have the sufficient knowledge to make right judgement and decision so making the illusion of unity even stronger.

SO WHAT IS GROUP POLARISATION?

It is a tendency to make more extreme decisions than individuals' initial plan as a result of being a member of a group. For more details about it, you can read it here. One of it is groupthink phenomenon where people start to make irrational decisions (they do not see themselves as irrational as already 'blinded').

HOW SERIOUS IS GROUPTHINK?

May be you may think it is nothing too serious. But real problems do exist. One famous one I have learned as an example in social psychology module during my undergraduate is the Bay of Pigs Invasion that led to 4,500 killed or wounded. If we are not careful and have policies or practices that encourage the development of conditions for groupthink, we can really see World War III. Social groups that are highly collective and strong centralised control by authority in nature have such capacity.

CONDITIONS FOR GROUPTHINK

Maybe you won't believe it will lead to groupthink. Just see the conditions for it:

1) Desire for harmony or conformity, i.e. group cohesiveness (which harmony is good IF it does not lead to groupthink)

2) Situational context (e.g. panic due to message spreading that requires urgency in dealing with it and urgency can lead people to be less rational)

3) Faulty group structure/dynamic (e.g. how decisions are made which can lead to the illusion of invulnerability, especially if one group thinks "God is for us")

OTHER PSYCHOLOGICAL ERRORS AT PLAY MAKING THINGS WORSE

Message (which lead to both panic and illusion of invulnerability) becomes more convincing when people subject themselves to confirmation bias and randomness error (often used as an argument as sign from God). When initial few subjected themselves to these two, the population of this group grows and then Bandwagon effect comes in. To threaten the message, some 'experts' abuse (intentionally or unintentionally) their status to influence others even if they are not experts of the subject matter. People tend not to differentiate whether or not they are expert of the subject matter if they already subjected themselves to confirmation bias or a desire not to deviate from the group so conform (which creates the illusion of conformity).

MORE DETAILS ON THE PSYCHOLOGICAL ERRORS INVOLVED

1) Confirmation bias: This is the tendency to be selective in information that support your initial beliefs. Even if you try to search for counter-arguments so to be more objective, you will discount all those counter-argument quickly and will accept those that support your initial beliefs quickly. One behaviour of this is to spend hours searching for supportive arguments while minutes for counter-arguments.

2) Randomness Error: Trying to create meaning out of random events, linking them. Sure, I believe sometimes it is really what it is but how can we be sure it is? I often hear people reason "It must be God, how can it be such coincident?" Unfortunately, sometimes it really is an coincident hence there is such thing as 'Randomness Error' found in psychology as based on research.

3) Bandwagon effect: This is the tendency to believe (or do) things because many others also believe (or do) them. Trying to reason "many people are saying the same thing, it must be true" showing that we have not learned the lesson that the earth is not flat despite many people once said it is.

4) Believing the 'expert': You see problems like atheists believing in certain famous atheist scientist's claims on theology on the sole ground that he is a famous top-notch scientist. He knows little about theology. It is not his subject matter. This, religious people can be quick to address but slow to address that they also fall into the same problem of believing too quick in claims of 'experts' (e.g. religious scientists who are in their camp) even though they do not have expertise in that subject matter. Making worse, people are not trained in research hence do not know how to read and critically evaluate the research methodology involved whether it is what it is claimed.

Some may not agree that I post this as it may disrupt 'unity' but I feel an obligation given that I have knowledge of a problem serious enough to warrant me to 'whistle blow'. However, despite my concern, I feel I have no power to do anything to prevent it other than making it known the psychological problems involved. Sometimes I feel like giving up and forsake everything, don't care any more since what I do seems futile due to many constraints.

How Does HR Screen CV?

Often HR is the one that screen CVs and forward potential suitable ones to the hiring manager to narrow down further to short-list candidates for interviews. So how does HR screen CV? I cannot represent all HR but can only use my own experience back then when I was in HR which I relied on certain principles of HRM/Organisational Behaviour to screen. I believe it is likely a common practice. As I mentioned before, a key role of HR is to assist companies to perform through its human resources. 

Performance = ability + motivation + opportunity to perform. You need a person to have the ability for sure but having ability does not mean a person is motivated to perform. A talent can just come to work not being motivated and work very slowly which is not productive. A motivated talent will also need opportunity to perform. If a supervisor always micro-manage, even if a person is talented, his/her ideas will not be put to use as supervisor expect him/her to simply follow instructions. Motivation will not last under such supervisor as well. So generally, HR is likely to rely on these to screen CV to short-list candidates that can perform be it now (people who can perform) or the future (people who has the potential to be developed to perform). But of course it is far more complex than this equation. This equation is mainly on job fit but there are consideration for functional/team fit (e.g. interpersonal skills) and organisational fit (e.g. cultural and values fit). So today I am going to share with you how I screen CVs so that you know how to format your CV to increase your chance of being short-listed for interviews. The principles here also apply generally to all recruitment and selection methods including interviews.

HOW DOES HR CHECK WHETHER A CANDIDATE HAS THE ABILITY AND MOTIVATION?

To check ability, there are a few ways and often the first step is to check your CV. I usually will look at CV and check for education and work experience. Relevance is the key. I will see how closely your CV fits the person specifications as advertised in the job advertisement. This is about your ability. If you have studied something of relevance, that may suggest you have relevant knowledge but whether you know how to apply what you learned is another thing. Knowledge application will probably be predicted by relevant work experience (if not able to apply, probably you will be sacked or stuck without promotion). If one has no work experience, relevant knowledge is still better than nothing (so study what is relevant, not study for mere grades!). I will also look at the achievements you have made during work as they suggest your abilities. 

Another thing to note is that I would not have the time to look at every CVs in great details. What I will do is to screen for keywords with ctrl+f while many big companies have software to help them to do that. So do ensure you follow the job advertisement to have keywords mentioned else risk not being short-listed. Perhaps you may argue this is unfair as there may be good candidates that does not know the rules of CV screening. True, but remember businesses are about profit making. They are not charity. If the screening method is too inefficient even if effective, if getting the best person which takes so much time while a satisfactory person is sufficient, what for spend so much effort right? Will you go to the alps to get the best drinking water or you will simply drink from the tap? Same logic. Have to balance effectiveness and efficiency.

To check your motivation for the job, it will be your employment pattern. If someone says HR is his/her passion, someone with degree in HR and past few employments were all in HR, I will be more convinced of this passion than someone without any background in HR after years of work. Some companies also deliberately have lengthy application form or process to test how motivated are you to get the job as well. I understand that job seekers can get annoyed with spending so much time with the application and may self-select out of the process but those that really want the job will still apply nevertheless. This is a way to reduce the amount of applications and an automatic way of selecting motivated individuals. When it is an employer's market (i.e. high unemployment rate), employers can afford to do that. 

OTHER THINGS TO CONSIDER

As I mentioned, it is not as simple as just ability and motivation. There are other things to consider such as loyalty, managing psychological contract (i.e. expectation), cultural fit, values fit and personality fit as a few more examples.

1) Loyalty

Loyalty is rather important for knowledge-based jobs. For low skill jobs that does not take long for anyone to pick up the skill to perform and replacements can be easily found, loyalty of staff is not a concern. But it will be a concern if replacement is not easy to find and lots of resources are invested to develop that talent. To check potential loyalty, I will see your past work history of how long in average you stay in a job. Reason for doing so is to predict how long you will stay in the company if we employ you. If every few months you switch employer, tendency of you being loyal to my company will not be long. I will not consider you unless it is a short-term contract. 

2) Psychological Contract

In HR, 'psychological contract' refers to the implicit assumed agreement about obligations an employer has to employee and employee has to employer. Matching expectation is rather important as if unmet, either employee or employer or both will feel this implicit agreement has been broken and can feel unhappy and may decide to leave the employer-employee relationship. So do not lie! To manage the psychological contract, I will look at both your past position and salary. If it is too high of a position and salary as compared to the advertised role, I may not consider you because there may be a lack of budget to pay what you earned previously. The position may also be too low for you that you may feel humiliating. The inability to fulfil expectation is likely to lead to someone's resignation. No point hiring someone that does not stay for long.

The implication of this is that do not assume that the higher you study, the easier you can get a job. While this may be true in some cultures (e.g. UK) or when an employer is not looking for a performer but a potential leader to be developed like in the case of a Management Trainee job, if you get a qualification far higher than the role requires, you can end up 'overqualified' and not be considered. This is because generally, as one gets higher education, he/she may expect higher pay but employer only needs one of certain education as that role does not need such high level education background. In such case, why should employer pay more for someone that he/she does not need? There is therefore a misalignment of expectations and the employer-employee relationship would not last. This is a concern of many employers except for the really powerful MNCs that has the power to attract talents. Because they are the most preferred employers, employees having no better option will stay with them and employers therefore would not be afraid that an overqualified person would resign soon.

Managing psychological contract does not end with CV screening though. In interviews (e.g. asking you where do you see yourself in 5 years time) and even in annual performance review, psychological contract management principles are still being used.

3) Cultural Fit

In very big companies, HR is given the role to manage or assist in the management of corporate culture. So if a person does not fit the corporate culture, he/she will likely not be hired as his/her entry will disrupt the culture and undermine organisational performance. It is also not in the benefit of any candidate who does not fit in culturally to join. Reason is simple. Such a person who does not support the corporate culture will not be well looked upon and unlikely to be promoted. Sure, a person that does not fit may be a good performer but organisational performance depends on the whole company (and not on an individual) and corporate culture has a role to play. A good performer may not be promoted as well as the next level job may require a different skill set. A good teacher may not be a good principal. What for put someone good at teaching to manage a school ending up losing a good teacher and get a bad principal right? While cultural fit is hard to judge from CV, some tools perhaps will be personality test (which I do not quite like it as its validity is low) and interviews.

4) Values Fit

Not this value!!!

If you are a religious person and believe that gambling is bad and I throw you into a gambling business, will you perform? Unlikely. For the same reason, if your values do not fit with the company's, I will not select you unless there are no other better candidates. I am not supportive of gambling though. This is just an example! Some CVs may have a summary section or may attach a cover letter. If a candidate looks at the corporate values and write something that fits it, there may be a higher chance to be short-listed. But like cultural fit, no point in lying as once inside, if you cannot fit, you will not have a good career inside that company anyway. A word of caution though. Not all companies hold the values they put on their walls! Their values shown on the wall may just be a decoration!

5) Personality Fit

Based on research, conscientiousness consistently show good performance in all jobs generally. Extroversion works well for sales and leadership. Openness is important for innovativeness. Agreeableness is important for teamwork. But personally I do not like personality test or rely on it solely because the validity of personality in predicting performance is too low. But many companies rely on them. So just to let you know briefly what predicts what. You can put them as your 'strengths' under summary section of your CV or list them in your cover letter.

That is all for today. I will not be able to write about interviews next as I never conduct interview in my past HR work. Perhaps in future when I gain experience in conducting interview will I post something about interviews. Do note however, that after HR screen your CV, the hiring manager will screen to short-list candidates for interviews. Getting pass HR is just the first step! HR will not be competent enough to screen for skill set as our knowledge in all functions is limited. For the next post, I will probably write about networking as a tool of leadership and performance. I have just finished the book "The Shift: The Future of Work is Already Here" by Professor Lynda Gratton from London Business School. It is rather interesting and perhaps useful on the topic of networking. I will share what the book says and what I have learned about networking over the years from others as well as my leadership module in my MSc Management & Human Resources at LSE.

To Secure a Job, Market Yourself

People often say what you learn in school has little or no application at work. Being an academic person myself, I do not agree with it. The misalignment between what we study at school and what we do at work is perhaps not real but more of an illusion. In school, we learn about theories. When theory fails to turn out the outcome we expect, often it is not the theory at fault but the one applying it failed to understand the theory hence applying it wrongly.

Today, I am going to share about applying the principles of marketing in managing one's career.

PRINCIPLES OF MARKETING

If you have studied Marketing, you probably have heard about the 4Ps, namely, product, price, promotion and placement. Product refers to the product you are selling, price is the price of the product you are going to sell, promotion is to make known the existence of your product and its feature to attract people to buy it and lastly placement is about where to sell your product making it reachable to your customers. The objective of marketing is to get people to buy your product and often to get to be repeated buyers as they learn about your product as they use it and can recognise your brand.

So how does these 4Ps apply to managing one's career?

PRODUCT

When it comes to job, you are the seller and the buyer will be employers. What are they buying? They are buying your labour service of which is determined by your abilities and motivation. From strategy perspective, they are buying your intangible assets that is your knowledge and ability to apply them to perform contributing to the company's performance and knowledge pool.

Just as you will not buy a product that is not value for money, employers will not employ you if you are not value for money. In marketing, we learn that it is important to know what buyers want so as to produce things that they will buy. In the same way, it is important to know what employers want when looking out for a suitable employee.

A key thing that they want from an employee is performance. As mentioned, performance is determined by ability and motivation from employee's side but a third factor is by employer giving employee an opportunity to perform. So from your part, what you can do to increase your attractiveness as a potential good employee is to increase your relevant ability for the job (can be acquired from relevant education and work experience) and show your passion for it.

For fresh graduates, without relevant work experience is already a disadvantage. Even in getting into relevant internship is competitive. To get in, the first step probably will be relevant knowledge by taking relevant modules. Surely you can read library books to acquire relevant head knowledge as well but you cannot really prove you have such knowledge. Employers usually will only meet you face to face to hear your explanations after seeing your resume. Hence, if you have taken relevant modules, you can note that down in your resume or even attach a transcript (some big companies do request for academic transcript). Your own branding is important too. In a world of information asymmetry, we often rely on brand as an indicator of quality. To employers, that will be the university you are from as well as the grades you attained as there are no other signals that they can really rely on at your stage. But note, some students go for easy scoring modules but employers want relevant knowledge. Some may even test you in interview. No point going for irrelevant modules that are easy to score as even if you get into interview stage, you may not be hired anyway. Perhaps you have real abilities but do not have a good university backing or good grades. What you can do is to ask to work for low wage or even free to show that you can perform. The employer will probably hire  later you as he/she has the information that you can perform.

In selecting a job, do not just consider 'now' but also look in far future of how you can acquire your competencies. As I mentioned that relevant work experience is one way, the type of jobs you do now will affect the job opportunities you have in the future. It is not just a job but a learning opportunity. So do consider that.

PRICE

'Price' in this case will be your expected salary. Consumers always want to buy something that is value for money. If you do not have the ability and motivation that signal you are valuable and you demand a high pay, then you will likely not be considered at all.

It is rather unfortunate that private institution graduates generally tend to get lower pay than local university graduates. One of the reasons is brand image. Singapore Universities are highly ranked in the world. Although top universities may not have the best teaching (as professors are too busy with research quite often and care much lesser about the unrewarding teaching), employers still think graduates from top schools must be much brighter. This may be true but it is also because of a lack of information that they rely on branding of the schools as indicator. This issue only applies to fresh graduates. Once you have sufficient work experience, few really bother which university you are from. So if you are from private institution like I do, do not give up. You can get back on track as long as you are determined.

In judging how much pay to expect, you can rely on market salary surveys and see the market rate as a gauge. If you believe you are really capable and can convince the employer, you can ask for higher than market rate. If they are convinced that you are really talented that many employers are after you and that they have the budget, they are likely to be willing to give in to you. If you feel that you are on the losing end, you can minimise the risk of getting even lower pay by being more specific about the amount of your pay. For example, instead of saying $2,500, say $2,450 or $2,550. This will minimise the salary range in the mind of the employer. This is called anchoring bias in psychology. If you give a round figure, the range in the mind of most people will be wider but if you are more specific, it will be narrower. This means that should you say $2,500, that range may be $2,000 to $3,000 in which you may risk getting $2,000 (unlikely to be near $3,000 end if you are not confident of being seen as highly valuable). If you say $2,450, that range may be $2,300 to $2,600. So you can end up getting $2,300 rather than $2,000 as an example.

PROMOTION (Useful as Job Search Tactics)

'Promotion' is about making yourself known. Look at those companies trying to sell their products. You can see their product advertisements on TV, Cinemas, newspapers and even on buses! Often they are targeted also. In a food magazine, you will see food being advertised rather than furniture. This is because people who read food magazine are interested in food! For yourself, it is about increasing your reach to the right employer. There are many areas.

LinkedIn is a good tool. Firstly, the job advertisements are targeted. Meaning if your profile is all about HR, all job advertisements that you see in LinkedIn are HR jobs. Secondly, employers when they post job advertisements, there will be top 20 candidates that will automatically be matched based on what they put in their profile. Employers can also do search for skill set to find people with relevant skills. I find LinkedIn one of the best recruitment tools as a HR practitioner. So do not ignore it.

Other than LinkedIn, you can also use job portals like JobsDB, JobStreet, JobCentral and Monster.com as examples. You can look for jobs there but also can update your profile and make it searchable by employers. When I look for jobs, Monster.com seems to be the medium where most employers saw my resume and called me for interviews. Even reputable companies like Philips Electronics called me up for interview 3 years ago from Monster.com!

You can also go to potential employers' corporate website under their careers page to look for jobs.

You can also look at trade magazines (e.g. HR Asia for HR jobs).

You can also approach recruitment agencies like Recruit Express and Kelly Services. They are free to you but not to employers (which can be expensive). Employers if cannot find candidates and urgently looking for candidates will likely look for them. This is because they are likely to have greater pool of candidates (people go to them, employers also go to them, its like a melting pot).

Consider also about networking or career fairs. You never know that through conversation with a potential employer (or even a stranger you do not know that happened to be a hiring manager or HR), you may capture his/her attention and he/she may invite you to an interview! This is a form of sales promotion.

You can also try walk-in. But frankly speaking, I get very annoyed if people come uninvited unless I am desperate for a candidate cause they disrupt my work.

Referral is a very good tactic. Firstly, if you are referred, it means someone knows you and hence your quality is known. Also, you get to bypass many people, sometimes even before a job vacancy is known to public! Secondly, if someone of high position referred you, HR will likely give more attention to you.

You can also send in a 'cold' email asking for job opportunities!

These are all promotion methods but the content is often your resume! Look at advertisements, they do not dump lots of information but only say what is important and capture attention. That will be the same for a good resume.

The best is to do all the above but there may be time constraint and hence you will have to do targeted promotion. Go to places where your desired career will be located.

PLACEMENT

Placement is not so applicable in this context as you are not a stationary product on a shelf at specific location. Nevertheless, something relevant is consider the location of work. Look beyond your own country and that will increase job opportunities. Instead of waiting for employers to come to you, go to them.


The 4Ps do interact with one another. They come as a package. Do not treat them in isolation. For example, where you plan to work (placement) will affect the salary you get or can expect (price) and your salary is also dependent on your own competencies (product) and how you deliver such signal and message in your resume and interview (promotion).

My next entry will be sharing how I screen resumes back then as HR. Perhaps from there you can see how you can increase your chance of being short-listed by drafting a good resume.

Managing your Career: Where to go now?

During the period when I was still studying at Singapore Institute of Management (SIM) for University of London International Programmes, I attended this wonderful workshop on career management and since then I planned a lot for my career. I shared about this career management technique briefly during the networking session at SIM last week and shall share more here with a few discovery I made myself.

MANAGING YOUR CAREER: LOOK 20 YEARS AHEAD & PLAN BACKWARDS

We were told to think about where we want to be in 20 years time after we graduate, then look at the relevant job advertisement of that position and work backwards. So for example, if I want to reach the position of HR Director in 20 years time, I will go and search for a job advertisement (best to be a few for better accuracy of the generic competencies required) on the position and look at the person specification on the requirements for the role. So if it says HR Generalist experience, I will have to think how to reach this stage. Either I can work as a HR Business Partner or have job rotation within HR function to get overview of the whole HR function. If I want to do HR consultancy in future also, then I might want HR Specialist route with internal rotation for generalist experience. Reason is because Compensation & Benefits experience will be useful for HR consultancy. Once I decide on the pathway to take for middle level, then I will continue to do the same until entry level and link everything together. As a student, I will then see what are the requirements for HR entry level and try to fulfil them as much as possible to close the gap to increase my chance of securing the job. If it is relevant work experience, then either work part-time in HR or do HR internship or HR temp jobs during holidays.

IF YOU PLAN TO CLIMB TO THE SENIOR MANAGEMENT OF THE WHOLE COMPANY...

To be a good senior management staff, you probably need to understand the whole company operations. This is why there are management trainee programmes for many big and successful companies (e.g. MNCs) as a means to develop their future leaders. In these programmes, graduates get to be exposed to a few job roles in different departments over the time span of 2-3 years (some companies have different strategies to develop future leaders though). These programmes serve a few purposes. Firstly, for you to understand the whole company operations so that next time as you head a department, you know how to coordinate with other departments (as you know what they are doing). Secondly, for you to find out your interest. It is important not only to have the ability but also the passion to perform well. Thirdly, for management to see which area you are more suitable for and to see your leadership potential. If they see you as one with potential and good performance, they will put you into their succession planning consideration to be next in line for higher position. Lastly, for you to network. When you know people from other departments, it is far easier for you to get things done much faster and easier. Such network is also a source of knowledge. It is impossible for any individual to know everything. You need to tap into others' knowledge. Of course, there may be other purposes as well but so far these are what I can think of.

Management trainee also can serve a purpose for fresh graduates who are unsure of what they want. It is perhaps the only way to jump from a job function to another to explore your interest without ruining your resume. You can always give the excuse that it is the programme in which you rotate, not because you do not know what you want.

Management trainee programmes are not easy to get into. Some of the criteria include having at least a Second Upper Honours degree from a reputable university, leadership skills and etc. As Management trainees are considered as talents that will be developed as future leaders, employers do not mind spending money to ensure they pick the right candidates for the role. Often, the first round would be some tests such as numerical, diagrammatic and verbal reasoning. Some may even ask you to write essays etc. A few may ask you to do personality test as well which I do not really like it as the validity of personality predicting performance is really very low and personality tests are not cheap. They can cost hundreds of dollars for a company for each test. Because the tests are not free (due to licensing rights, copyrights etc.), some companies may not even let you do the test unless you are deemed 'talented' in the first place. So coming from a reputable university background with good grades is important for such role. Other than these tests and interviews, there may be assessment centres where you will be placed into groups, given a task to complete as a group and you will be monitored how you work as a team, how you lead the group and how you solve the problems. It is not so much about the final result but more on the process as I was told by HR professionals in sharing session about assessment centres during my MSc Management & Human Resources at London School of Economics. Even if in the end your group gets first but in the process everyone keeps quiet and a person dominates the whole discussion as if its a one-man team, that person may not be considered as he is unable to get people to volunteer and help out. Imagine a CEO who keeps talking and the Management all keep quiet and do nothing. Can such company survive?

Also consider which company to join. There is a trend in Singapore that Singapore graduates prefer joining western MNCs than Singaporean MNCs. To them, it seems more 'prestigious'. But this may or not be a good move. If you really want to climb to the very top, notice that many MNCs will have their top management filled with their home country nationals. When I studied for my Globalisation & HR module for my MSc Management & Human Resources, I do notice that this is a common trend. A big bulk of operations are still in home country of MNCs and top management mostly filled by home country nationals. There is far greater advantage for home country nationals to climb to the top than others. 'Home country' refers to the country that the MNC originated from. For Singaporeans, if you want to get into top management, it is perhaps easier if you join a Singaporean MNC (e.g. SIA, ST, PSA, ComfortDelgro, Keppel, Sembcorp and SingTel).

That is all for today. I will write more about how to increase your chance to be even considered for an interview next time.

My New Blog!!!

It has been a long time since I blogged. Previously, I used to have a blog at multiply.com until it was removed. Not too long ago, someone encouraged me to blog about my achievements to encourage others and so here it is!

ABOUT MYSELF, MY CURRENT STATUS

I have just completed my MSc Management & Human Resources from the renowned London School of Economics & Political Science (ranked no. 2 in the world for Social Sciences & Management by QS, no. 11 for Social Sciences by Times and no. 14 in Business/Economics by ARWU for 2014)  and just received an offer for a Management Trainee position.

I am still in the early stage of my career. Prior to my MSc Management & Human Resources, I have worked for two years as a HR Generalist at Bridge Mobile Private Limited, a joint venture company of 10 leading APAC Telecommunications companies including SingTel, Optus Australia, Globe Philippines and etc.

I am eager to learn. Beside my MSc Management & Human Resources, I hold a BSc Business, a Diploma in Employment Relations and a Diploma in Horticulture & Landscape Management. My passion is in HR but I am also very keen to understand how a company works as a whole hence I applied for Management Trainee Programmes where I get to be rotated around the company to learn the whole operations. This will prove useful in the future when I head a department. This is because when a company gets big, functions get specialised but the more specialised roles are, the more coordination is required. You cannot coordinate well if you do not know other departments well. This is probably why you can see that there are big MNCs having management trainee programmes with job rotation across the whole company where they will groom future leaders from.

My interest in HR was developed mainly due to my interest in the social sciences especially Social & Applied Psychology and for managing my own career as well as to help others in their career.

MY BACKGROUND

It may seem that I am among the elites having graduated from an elite university. However, this is not always true. I did badly for my primary four streaming examinations and ended in EM3, the worst stream and appealed to EM2 later. Though successful in the appeal, my background as EM3 cannot be denied. My Primary School Leaving Examinations (PSLE) aggregate score is only 160 out of 300 which is not very good. I entered Normal Academic stream. Though I did attain first in class every year, I did not score well enough to go Express stream and ended taking 5 years to do GCE 'O' levels instead of 4 years. I did quite well for my GCE 'N' levels being the top scorer in the school but it came with a price. I pushed myself too hard, ended in depression and even thought of quitting school at that time before my GCE 'N' levels. It was due to my mom's and form teacher's encouragements that I continued studying (and addicted to it later on lol...). I did not bad for my Diploma in Horticulture & Landscape Management scoring GPA of 3.2202 out of 4.0 but that was not good enough to enter Business School in local universities like NUS or NTU or SMU in year 2008. Hence, I applied for the next best alternative which is University of London International Programmes' BSc Business at Singapore Institute of Management Global Education.

Some of my friends advised me against going University of London International Programmes saying it is very difficult and that some of their friends failed examinations or even dropped out. I did not listen and went ahead thinking their friends probably did not work hard and did last minute examinations preparation. Indeed, I did not fail any modules and attained 2nd Upper Honours for my BSc Business eventually. The passing mark was 34% which seems very low but nevertheless, it was in fact very challenging. I in fact failed half of my modules in my first year mock examinations! I am not someone that is dumb having been a top scorer for GCE 'N' levels and a Diploma GPA of 3.2202 out of 4.0. The system is just different from Singapore and has different marking scheme which caught me off guard.

After graduating with a BSc Business, I went ahead to hunt for jobs in HR. It was not easy where I have to compete with local universities graduates who in the eyes of employers are more preferred. So, I took the temporary job route thinking if I performed well, the employer will likely convert me to a permanent role since they have seen my ability and would prefer me over some stranger that make claims of their abilities that are yet tested. Indeed, I was converted. My previous company is really not bad. I received a lot of exposure and made a few achievements that I can put in my resume that proved useful for my application to LSE and the company that just offered me a position.

I have always dreamed of getting into a Management Trainee position as it is the only way I can think of to be exposed to various job functions without ruining my resume as if I have a lack of direction jumping from a job function to another. Also, Management Trainee position grant me more development opportunities. It is not easy to get into one. It is very competitive with lots of tests beside interviews (assessment centre for some!). As distance learning tend to be discriminated against with employers preferring either local universities graduates or top overseas universities and that to get into most Management Trainee programmes, you cannot have more than 2-3 years of work experience (as they are afraid your mindset about work is fixed and hard to shape your mindset to fit into their corporate culture), I decided to look for a way out. As there are no postgraduate HR programmes in Singapore from local prestigious universities, I looked elsewhere.

Initially I have never thought of taking Masters degree or going overseas. What actually happened was that I received an email from SIM saying I'm eligible for scholarship and so I applied for it but a criteria is to get an offer from a university. So I applied for both the scholarship and tried my luck with LSE. I have received the offer from LSE but not the scholarship. I was thinking "Oh gosh... LSE! Its not easy to get in!" However, my family was not too supportive at that time. Lacking of funds, I rejected the offer and reinstated my application, trying my luck for scholarship for a second year of application. While waiting, I took up a part-time Diploma in Employment Relations to acquire HR knowledge in Singapore context as I lacked of HR knowledge given that BSc Business is quite general. In the second year, I received the offer but no scholarship. Family became supportive and I had some savings by the second year. And so I went! I made a gamble thinking it will be a positive return and indeed it has! Initially I was concerned as it was not cheap. The whole cost was S$70k (GBP 35k). But my ex-boss encouraged me saying when I am still young without much responsibility and able to travel and explore, go ahead. "Money is not much an issue, you will earn back eventually... next time if you have money and look back, you may regret!" as he said at that time and so I took courage and went. Now my exciting journey has just began! I am truly blessed by God and by family members and friends that helped me along the way. Getting into this management trainee position is also a wonderful birthday gift (it is a birthday gift cause I'll start work on my birthday itself!).

ABOUT THIS BLOG, ITS PURPOSE

I named this blog "My Thinking Cap" as I like to think and analyse, noting down my thoughts (that explains why my facebook is being flooded with my thoughts where I think quite 'loudly'). A key purpose of this blog as mentioned earlier is also to write about some tactics to help people with similar background as I have to compete for jobs and improve their employability.

In the next few posts, I will write about how to increase employability and competitiveness in job market. I will update the tactics as I gain more experience as well.