More Jobs Created In Singapore

According to the latest employment figure released by Singapore's Ministry of Manpower, some 61,900 jobs were created in the second quarter of 2007.

According to a report in The Straits Times:

"This record job growth between April and June led to the unemployment rate sliding to a six-year low of 2.4 per cent in June last year. It was 2.9 per cent in March. All the sectors were sprinting ahead with new jobs, with construction leading the pack.

It added 11,400 new jobs, reflecting the property market's scorching pace of expansion. The increase is more than double the gains of the previous quarter." [The Straits Times, July 31, 2007]

Details, here!

Thousands Of Jobs In Singapore

Job-seekers, where would you be when the two integrated resorts -- The Marina Bay Sands and Resorts World at Sentosa -- are up and running in three years' time?

What would you do now if you want to be part of the employment boom happening around that time?

Do You Always Want To Change Your Job?

Thinking of changing your job? Think carefully. "Never make a career move simply because it is in vogue," said a career management professional and adjunct lecturer Dr Kamal Kant.

He said that planning the next career step needs reflection. "Take time out to define your life and career goals for the next decade. What ever the reasons for your intended change, you need a career plan and strategy," he wrote in Cat Recruits, the recruitment companion of The Straits Times Singapore published on July 7, 2007.

I too, want to change my job but before that I need to accomplish one thing -- I need retraining in certain field. I might also need a Master's Degree to propel me towards the career direction I want to venture into. That I will do within the next three years.

It's A Tough Job Being A Monkey Smuggler

In Malaysia, the authorities rescued nearly 1,000 monkeys believed to be either bound for China or Netherlands.

Okay. China, I can understand. But the Netherlands? Why would the monkey be of any use in Holland? Anyway, here's the story from Malaysia's The Star newspaper:

"KLUANG: One of the largest wildlife smuggling syndicates in the country has been crippled with the arrest of four men and the rescue of around 950 monkeys. The monkeys, poached from the jungles of Pahang and Johor, are believed bound for either China or the Netherlands.

Wildlife Department officials, led by department assistant director Celescoriano Razond, found the monkeys in a store on a plantation in Pontian on July 7 when they raided the premises after a two-week investigation.

The long-tailed macaques were found in a pitiful condition in filthy cages and blue gunny sacks. Around 100 dead monkeys were piled up nearby."

It's a tough job being a monkey smuggler. It's not worth it. Better do something else!

No Job? Try Blogging For Money

I haven't earn my money blogging but other people have done it. One of them is John Chow and according to what I've read, he nets no less than $10,000 a month. Now that's a cool money. Who needs a 9 to 5 job with that kind of money?

Cari Kerja Melalui Internet...

Ketika saya menghabiskan pengajian saya di universiti lewat 80-an dahulu, Internet masih lagi belum lahir dalam bentuk yang kita kenali hari ini.

Internet, atau lebih gemar disebut alam maya oleh sesetengah orang, kini merevolusi kehidupan melalui lebih daripada satu cara -- dari cara kita bekerja hinggalah ke cara kita mencari kerja. Jika pada zaman saya dahulu, saya hanya bergantung kepada iklan di akhbar-akbar, kini pencari kerja dan pemburu kerjaya boleh memanfaatkan kuasa alam maya untuk mencapai maklumat mengenai kekosongan jawatan.

Selain daripada portal kerjaya seperti www.jobstreet.com, terdapat juga beberapa portal lain yang menyediakan perkhidmatan kerjaya kepada pencari kerja. Malah, ada juga laman web syarikat-syarikat tertentu yang menawarkan kerjaya.

Semua ini menawarkan banyak peluang untuk pencari kerja bagi membuat pilihan. Tetapi satu perkara tetap tidak berubah -- tidak kiralah sama ada anda memohon kerja melalui iklan di akhbar atau melalui Internet, persaingan tetaplah sengit.

Malah, pada era teknologi maklumat, ia akan lebih sengit lagi kerana saingan bukan setakat rakan seuniversiti di dalam negara, malah juga pemburu kerja dari negara lain. Globalisasilah katakan.

Curriculum Vis-A-Vis Market Demand

Meanwhile in Malaysia, the country's universities have been urged to work closely with the industry to make sure graduates churned by these institutions meet market demands. Quote, from Bernama, the Malaysian national news agency:

PEKAN, June 30 (Bernama) -- Universities must work closely with the industrial sector, including in co-curriculum development, to ensure their graduates are relevant to market demand, Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said today.

The Deputy Prime Minister said the co-operation was crucial to avoid a gap between the graduates churned out by local universities and the industries' needs.

He said university co-curriculum must be compatible and relevant to the industrial sector's requirements.

Excuse me, co-curriculum, you say? But I thought the problem lies with the curriculum, not the co-curriculum, also sometimes known as extracurriculum.

Housekeeping Update

After sleeping on it for some hours last night, I decided this morning that I should limit the scope of this blog to the topics of "Employment Trend and Issues In South East Asia", which is still broad, but I think, at the moment, would be manageable.

So there will be categories about employment in Malaysia, in Singapore and in various other Southeast Asian countries such as Indonesia, Thailand, Philippine, Brunei, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos and Myanmar.

Hmm... talk of Myanmar, this should be an interesting market to explore. We should know if anyone was interested to work in Myanmar.

Unemployable Graduates

There are a lot of jobs in the market, really. Recently I had a chance to flip through the recruitment pages of a major English newspaper in Singapore and, man, there were hundreds of jobs on offer.

Finance executive, finance manager, senior manager, human resource manager, analyst, business development manager, engineer, data management... the list is endless. I believe the situation is the same in Malaysia, yet I read in the news that there were some 60,000 university graduates who are unemployed.

There has been a prolonged debate as to why these graduates are unemployed when at the same time hundreds of openings in the private sector are practically screaming to be filled up, and I'm not talking about low-paying jobs which these graduates were supposedly "over-qualified".

Some argue that these university graduates, or leavers, were unable to find jobs because they were simply unemployable due to severe lack of skills and talent and knowledge, abetted by another fatal weakness -- a very, very poor command of English language, something far far worse than the way this blog is written.

Let's Talk About Jobs

Jobless? Desperate to find a job? Hey, I know how that feels. Been there, done the desperate things to find a job. One damn job. I did find one, that was in 1994 and I'm still working with the same organisation more than a decade later.

I'm not here to give you a job, by the way. This blog exists because maybe I can talk about jobs and career and share with you informations about job opportunities, if I ever come across one. Maybe we can even talk about serious stuff like employment trend in certain countries, employment figures and whatnots.

I shall endeavour to update this blog regularly talking about career and related stuff. You are welcome to share your views and thoughts either via the comment section or by e-mail. That's all for now.