The first factor that I will use is how much money you get paid, so I would say that anyone earning more than US$200,000 a year scores a 10/10 and anyone earning less than US$20,000 a year would score a 1/10 on this scale. The second factor is your working hours - so ideally, if you only work about 15 hours or less a week and you have unlimited holidays, then you score full marks 10/10 but if you're like those typical Singaporeans who work over 70 hours a week and can't remember the last time you actually took a real holiday, then you score 0/10. The third factor is the fun factor - if you wake up in the morning excited to go to work and you genuinely have a great time every time you're at work, then you score a 10/10. But if you're miserable and hate every single aspect of the job, then it'll be a 0/10 for you for this. Then the last factor is one that I call "pride and aspiration" - if you have been dreaming about doing this job since you were a kid and it is literally your dream come true, then you score a 10/10. But if you cringe every time people ask you the question, "what do you do for a living?" as you're so embarrassed, then you score a 0/10 for this. So for myself, I score 10 + 10 + 8 + 8 = 36/40, which gives me a satisfaction score of 90% in this system. Not a bad score. Allow me to estimate the job that Ricky had in IT: 8 + 6 + 7 + 6 = 27/40, which gave him a satisfaction score of 67.5%, quite respectable indeed. But now as a taxi driver, his score probably looks more like this: 3 + 2 + 0 + 0 = 5/40, a satisfaction score of just 12.5%. So now we have some figures to work with, I want to know why would Ricky go from a job which had a reasonably good satisfaction rating of 67.5% to one that's just 12.5%? Even if he couldn't find a better job or one that was equally good, couldn't he have found a job with a satisfaction rating of at least around 50% or even 40%? So how does one drop so drastically from 67.5% to just 12.5% in one really awful career move and then end up as a taxi driver?
Choaniki pointed out that when older people lose their jobs in Singapore, they face a lot of ageism and thus as Ricky was trying to find another job, he got rejected for practically everything he applied for mostly because of his age (I'm assuming Ricky and I must be around the same age). Another reason was that Ricky had two children and a mortgage, so he could go a single month without earning some money for his household expenditure. Therefore trying to take some time out to retrain in another industry simply was not a possibility for Ricky, that's why in desperation, he turned to driving a taxi as a last resort. Whilst that kinda explains the situation, I did wonder how many people would have done what Ricky did? Now just hold that thought whilst I share another story with you - I have a friend (let's call him Jordan - not his real name) who wanted to get into finance and for him, that would involve switching industries in his mid-30s. So I managed to get Jordan an entry level position in one of the companies I dealt with but sadly, things just didn't work out there as he was overworked, underpaid and he was generally quite miserable there. But Jordan was like, no I tried so hard to get into finance and now I finally have a job in banking, I'm going to tough it out. But I felt responsible for putting Jordan in that position in the first place, so I told him, "just hang on in there, get some work experience and I promise you I'll help you find something better soon." Sure enough, after about eight months in that job, I managed to find him not one, but two companies who were willing to give him a better offer now that he has proven that he can hold down a job in the industry. Jordan may have had a rough period after this career change but things are going to get so much better in 2023. The moral of the story is that Jordan received some help from me because we are good friends, I like helping my friends like that. This does beg the question, why didn't Ricky have any friends at all who were willing to do him a favour or two to help him find a better job? Or maybe Ricky was simply too proud or ashamed to ask any of his friends for help?
My work experience in Singapore is limited as I left immediately after I had finished my NS to study in Europe, but during my NS I did give private tuition in my free time to earn some extra money. It was an ideal part time job that suited me back then and do bear in mind that at that point in time, I wasn't even a graduate yet - I had finished only my A levels and was serving my NS. So on that matrix, I scored 1 + 8 + 8 + 8 = 25/40 which equated to 62.5% job satisfaction. Obviously, that was only a part time job but I yielded a very respectable rate per lesson as I had the reputation as the scholar who knew how to ace those tricky exams but I gave myself a 1/10 when it came to earnings as I was still earning very little overall. I actually had a few nice students I got along well with, so I actually enjoyed the whole experience teaching them - they were willing to fit around my schedule and I actually felt proud that my students (and their parents) had placed so much faith in my abilities to help them perform well in their A level exams despite the fact that I was barely older than my students by only about a year. So overall, I gave myself an 8/10 on all the other factors resulting in a fairly decent overall score. Hence in the case of Ricky, if he has worked in IT at a fairly senior level, then he could have found work teaching young people how to code in order to prepare them for a career in IT? Regardless of whether or not you think there is a future for people working in IT in Singapore, this ability to code is still seen as a rather useful skill to have by young people today. So Ricky could have tried to pursue a new career in that field given that is at least somewhat related to his previous career and thus the score for such a teaching career would be more like 6 + 8 + 5 + 5 = 24/40, that represents a 60% job satisfaction score which is down a little from his previous career, but still pretty respectable compared to his current job of a taxi driver. Now that was exactly the route that another friend 'Chua' took and I shared his story in another post; so did Ricky not even consider teaching as an option? So I have a theory as to why this might be the case.
To explain this theory, I want to share the story of an old friend in Singapore, let's call him Lee and he is a few years younger than me. I got to know him through gymnastics and I got to see him go through his O levels, trying to get a place in a good JC to do his A levels. Allow me to explain how the system worked back then - you took two rounds of O levels, the first were known as prelims where it is a mock exam set by the secondary school before you took the real O level exams which is set in Cambridge and the exam scripts are sent off to be marked in England. The purpose of this system is to not only prepare the students for the real exam, but often schools deliberately make the prelims extremely, needlessly difficult so the students would score poorly and that bad result would shock them into studying extra hard for the real exam, so they would breeze through the O levels exam with flying colours. So if you scored a B or a C in the prelims, then you would almost be guaranteed an A in the O levels exam. Thus the students would first apply for a JC with their prelims results, then when they get their real O levels results they would be faced with a choice. They could: A) stay exactly where they are, B) try for a better school if they had received much better results, C) get kicked out of their current JC because they had failed to perform well enough to keep their place there and be forced to find another school willing to take them, D) stay in the same school but apply for a course/department which has a higher entry requirement. In my case, I chose option D. I transferred from an arts course to the more prestigious humanities scholar programme upon receiving my (much better) O level results. Hence in Lee's case, like so many students, his real O level results were much better than his prelims results, so I thought that going for option B was the obvious thing to do in his case but much to my surprise, he went for option A - he wanted to stay where he was despite me pleading with him to take option B with his much better results; so Lee's explanation for why he had chosen option A over B might help explain Ricky's situation.
Lee's below average prelims results had earned him a place in a JC that was at the bottom of the league tables at that time and I thought, great this is now your chance to trade up and move to a much better school - that is what every student wants, right? Not Lee, at first he claimed it was because he was already settled in this school and he would miss his friends. Bu then he told me that the real reason was that he had found that whole process of applying for different schools, the stress of the uncertainty, not knowing whether or not you would be accepted or not - that was all just too much for him and he hated it. Thus he would rather settle and stay where he was rather than have to go through that whole process again to reapply for another school to take him - this was despite the fact that he actually had much better results for his O level exams. Unfortunately, Lee's parents were quite uneducated and working class, so they really did not care what he did as long as he was still studying - there was literally nothing I could do to make him change his mind. For him, the stress of going through the application process again outweighed any additional benefits of going to a better school. Lee had been disappointed with his prelims results (like so many Singaporean students including myself), struggled to find a school that would take him and the entire process left him very despondent and downtrodden. His results were better but not so good that it would certainly guarantee him admission into any school he wanted, so it would still mean quite a lot of uncertainty and stress in going through this process again. No, he said, I can't face that again, "I told myself that as long as I did well enough to stay at my current school, that'll be good enough and I already got what I wanted." Some people might deliberately set themselves very low targets in life, so they will always achieve their goals and by the same token, spare themselves the bitter disappointment of failing. Thus Lee's mentality might sound ridiculous to you (it left me totally baffled), but in his head, it made complete sense and it was his choice to make.
Allow me to try to understand what happened with Lee in this case - he had many people in his life including myself who saw that he was a very bright student who had the potential to do very well in his studies, that was why he really worked hard on his O level exams. However, he wasn't prepared for the amount of stress that going through a major exam would bring and unlike some of his peers, his family simply were not in any kind of position to help him through this process since his parents were simply uneducated. Thus Lee simply thought, "I am so tired of people having high expectations of me and that brings with it too much stress - if I could pass off as a mediocre or below average student by staying at this school full of other below average students, the next two years will be a lot less stressful and I'd be happier." Let's examine the outcome of Lee's decision: in the short run, he will be less stressed as he would be one of (if not the) smartest student in his class and his teachers would be praising him - contrast that to if he went to a much better school where he turned out to be the worst student in his new class, he would be under a lot of pressure to keep up with much smarter students. So yes in the short run, less stress would mean a happier life but in the long run, choosing a worse school would lead to Lee not being able to get into one of the world's top universities - again, he would opt for a less stressful course at a university much lower down the league tables which would lead to far worse employment prospects. In this case, you need to have the emotional maturity to realize that the short term sacrifices would lead to long term gains and in Lee's case, he had made a bad decision because he was only thinking short term without considering the long term implications of his decisions. This is actually common: if I go play basketball instead of studying for the exam tomorrow, today will be a lot more fun, but that long term damage on my career prospects will haunt me for many years.
Thus in Ricky's case, it is possible that a transition to a taxi driver is the easy, stress-free option as he already has a driver's license and the barriers of entry are very low. He doesn't even need to know the best route to get from A to B given that modern GPS can do the navigation for him. Could it be possible that Ricky did exactly what Lee did back in the way: he could have gone for a more difficult option that would have brought with it far more reward in terms of money, prestige, better working conditions and personal pride, but instead, he preferred the option that meant less stress? It would make sense if Ricky had the same mindset as Lee - focusing on the short term gains rather than the long term benefits. Thus we have two ways to look at the situation, do you think Ricky is in this state because it is all his fault or if he is an innocent victim? Is he driving a taxi today because he really wants a better job but has been denied all better opportunities because of ageism in Singaporean society? Or does he shoulder part of the blame for not pushing himself harder, such as by asking all his friends for help to get a better job? Or perhaps the answer is a combination of the two: yes he is facing some ageism but he could have tried a lot harder to find a better job, but he has simply given up trying? Or has Ricky made some effort to try but he simply didn't try hard enough to secure a better job? It boils down to just how hard Ricky tried and if he could have done more, within reason of course. To be fair to Ricky, even the latter could apply to me. I am doing well now as a self-employed consultant within the investment management industry, I have enough clients willing to pay me good money for my services but could I be getting even more work, even more lucrative contracts? Yes I can, oh of course, like I could be working this weekend instead of having a long weekend in Austria to celebrate my birthday in style. I could also be networking a lot more aggressively instead of taking the time to write yet another entry for my blog or going for my gymnastics training. After all, I just wanna be fair to Ricky at the end of the day.
Thus I don't want to judge Ricky too harshly, like I don't even know the guy's real name so I'm not in any kind of position to pass any kind of judgment on him, until I do get more information about why he is in this position today. But what do you think when you see someone seemingly fall from hero to zero in one step like that, what is your first instinct? What kind of assumptions do you find yourself making when hearing a story like that? Do you feel sorry for people like Ricky or would you blame them for not pushing themselves harder to find a better job? What would you suggest Ricky try to do instead of driving a taxi, given his years of experience in IT? How well do you rate your current job according to those four criteria and do you think you can find a better job, or are you guilty of settling for a less than ideal outcome? Have you ever met someone like Ricky? Please let me know your thoughts, leave a comment below, many thanks for reading.
Hey Alex. I actually know some people like "Ricky" because I went to a wealthy private school where some of my friend's parents had it good at one point, but may have lost their status in almost a blink of an eye. Thus is the nature of capitalism, you're only really secure when you cross a certain wealth threshold that you're an owner/operator rather than a wage worker, even if you are highly skilled. I had this one friend named "Robert" whose dad used to work in the oil industry on an expat package. Robert's dad wasn't earning a lot salary wise, but his company paid for his house(in a rich enclave too), 2 cars, and international private school for his 2 kids. But after high school, Robert told me his dad suddenly got laid off, and he tried everything he could to apply to similar roles at other oil companies, but nobody would hire him. Because he was an expat and had no permanent visa status where he worked, Robert's dad had to relocate the family to Australia where he was originally from. Moreover, Robert's dad had to start from zero and accept a survival job as a counselor at a drug and alcohol rehab. In Robert's own words, he describes the situation as "falling from grace." But even though Robert regrets being lazy in high school and not getting good enough grades for a decent Australian university, he's not too dissatisfied with downward mobility. Robert was never really ambitious to begin with, or obsessed with money or status.
ReplyDeleteAnother similar case was another friend "John" whose father worked for the United Nations and was also on an expat package similar to Robert's family. However, one day John's dad suddenly fell out with his boss because of some internal office politics, and was promptly fired. The family had to move back to Jordan and start from zero, so John's dad bought a carpet wash to manage. John, unlike Robert, is extremely bitter about the situation, because he's middle class in a poor country, which feels poor compared to being a rich expat. At least in a rich country you can attend a good university with little money if you have good grades. I think John is more dissatisfied than Robert because John actually got good grades in high school and was expecting to be an international university student in a rich country like the UK, US, Canada, or Australia, and have access to good job opportunities afterward. Robert at least was lucky enough to be born with a good passport, Australia has very good labor conditions. John did at least go to university for computer science, but there's just no good jobs in software in Jordan because it's a poor country, so he really resents his job and paycheck now as a working adult.
In Robert's case, his dad did try to get another job, he just failed, probably due to ageism. In John's case, the United Nations is such a specialized job that the only other jobs that are similar would be to work for governments or NGOs, but neither would pay nearly as much as the expat package they were used to. I don't want to criticize Robert's dad too much because he's was my dad's friend and he raised a very nice son, but my dad had a habit of noting the occupation of every single parent of one of my friends, and he said there was always a stark difference between "employees", "upper management", and "business owners." The former makes the least and are in the most precarious position, that much is obvious. But to my dad, he argues the former are precarious because they are the least social savvy. Not because they're bad at their jobs, but because they don't do things like network or play office politics well, and can't see the writing on the wall when they're about to be canned. The phrase "it's not what you know, but who you know" can be expanded to say "it's not what you know, but what people think of you, how well you can tell what people think of you, and how well you can influence what they think of you." The upper management/business owner types are very good at playing this social game, they're the ones who are out drinking with clients and making connections/deals at the country club, and always eyeing their next big deal to get a promotion or another better job. The employees like Robert/John's dads just do their job 9-5 then go home to their family. It's less work, but more precarious, even if they pay you well in the mean time. I suspect Robert's dad couldn't find a job because he was seen as an older worker who would demand a higher salary than a fresh graduate, he was already in his late 40s when he was canned. If he was an upper management type, then he would at least bring in unique connections, something a fresh graduate does not have at all because they're too young.
ReplyDeleteHi Amanda, in the case of Robert's father, I know of people who have taken on well paid jobs in the oil & gas industry, one of my gymnasts has a father like that who has been sent to some very remote locations in Africa to work - the daughter has been sent to very expensive boarding schools in the UK and she is now in university, so once in a while she'd disappear from training for a few weeks and then say, oh I've been to visit my father who is now in Nigeria working on an oil project. I'm like, okay that's what you have to do to put your kids through the best in the UK education system, it costs a lot of money to provide for your children's education. But what if the father returned to the UK, would he be able to get a decent job as an engineer given that he has had plenty of experience in the oil & gas industry? Is any of that experience transferable? Or would he end up like Robert's dad working in a totally unrelated job earning peanuts? Jordan isn't too bad compared to some of the other countries in the region, at least it is peaceful. Lebanon's economy has imploded and is in free fall, Syria has been in civil war for a long time, Iraq's totally unsafe and even Turkey's economy is in deep trouble. Jordan is poor but stable - it's not quite Dubai yet though. If John plays his cards right, he can easily get a job somewhere like Dubai as there are so many Jordanians working out there, looking for better opportunities.
DeleteWell the UK at least has North Sea oil drilling, my father has been to Scotland and Norway a few times for business. It's just that for employees rather than business owners, the hardship pay wouldn't be as much. I also had friends whose parents were diplomats, and they told me an American diplomat posted to a nice country like Singapore would be paid a lot less than one posted to a developing country like Bangladesh. But fair play to your gymnast friend's dad for living overseas to provide for his family.
DeleteAs for John... yes he is bilingual in Arabic and English, if he can get a high paying software engineer job in the finance industry in Dubai, he would do very well for himself. Unfortunately, according to John his parents are assholes, they take advantage of him, don't encourage him, yell at him a lot, and don't want him to leave Jordan. His parents sound like slightly richer versions of your parents come to think of it. John also has some attitude problems, lack of humility is one of them. You only really notice these traits and how bad they are after high school, because John was a childhood friend of mine. John just seems overall bitter with being stuck in Jordan while his childhood friends are wealthy and highly mobile, also wallowing in self pity over having shitty parents. We had a friend in our batch whose older brother(let's call him "Hank") worked for HSBC as an investment banker after finishing undergrad in Denmark, then he moved to Morgan Stanley 3 years later. Also, Hank's dad was an investment banker too. My family also lost their wealth and status after my dad died in undergrad, and my mom is a narcissist. I could also be bitter like John and jealous of Hank and not do anything with my life, but I'm not. Sure Hank has had it easier, but there's still a lot me and John can do to get ahead in life.
North Sea oil is very limited and running out within the next few years, before 2030. In any case, we're looking at production there winding down, not ramping up if supplies are dwindling and even the engineers working in the North Sea are thinking, I'd better start looking for a job soon rather than wait till I get made retrenched when supplies eventually dry up. Sure you could take that offshore oil experience to somewhere like Senegal or Angola, but it means going to work in a rather exotic location again, far from civilization and getting paid for that kind of sacrifice. But going back to Ricky - he had a good job, then he became a taxi driver, hence hero to zero. John never had a good job to began with, his situation is actually very different from Ricky's story. It is this "fall from gace" that made me think, was this entirely his fault? His situation is more akin to the fathers of Robert and John.
DeleteOh I didn't know that about North sea oil. That explains why Norway has such a large sovereign wealth fund, they know that oil isn't gonna last forever. It also explains the megaprojects Dubai has up and running, and the Saudi vision fund.
DeleteJohn's story is the case of what would happen to Ricky's kids, if he has kids. But Sg's universities are pretty good if you're a smart but poor kid, unlike Jordan. But you're right, John was never successful to begin with, he didn't earn the wealth he grew up with, so why is he bitter and jealous of Hank?
Do you know why Ricky was laid off? I know why Robert's dad lost his job, it's because oil prices fell in 2014. Was that his fault? Probably not. And since the whole industry was cutting costs he probably had nowhere to go because he worked 20 years in oil. Btw Robert's dad is not an engineer, he worked in some middle management/sales role. My dad said his bachelor's degree was in business. Maybe he could've transferred that expertise elsewhere, but they probably wouldn't have paid the same amount he made before. Still, that's better than minimum wage.
Oil doesn't last forever, once you pump it out of the ground, the reserves will be depleted. It is completely random just how much oil you have in your country, some country like the UK and Japan have a little bit, whilst others like Saudi Arabia and Venezuela have a lot and then there are plenty of countries which have none at all. The UK got lucky, we have a little bit of oil - better than nothing, but that isn't going to last that long. Even countries like the UAE will run out of oil one day and they need to diversify before that day comes. Back to the topic, Ricky has 2 kids, I have no further information, you'll have to ask Choaniki for more info on Ricky's background but he did mention about the two kids. Ricky was laid off because in the IT industry, it is always easier to outsource the work to somewhere like India and China where the same kind of work can be done remotely by someone working for a lot less money. I can outsource some coding to an IT expert in Chennai and pay him a tiny fraction of what I have to pay someone in Silicon Valley for the job, it will be done on the cheap and that should make all Americans working in IT in California very nervous. But compare that to my dentist, nobody can fix my teeth remotely. I have to find a local dentist who can deal with my teeth in person. So my dentist's job is safe as there's always gonna be a demand for dentists but Ricky's former job was in IT and his job was probably outsourced to India or China.
DeleteI have changed industries so many times - I have done more as an actor than many who have tried for a very long time to make it in the industry. But I still hold down a respectable job in banking. I also volunteer as a coach at my gymnastics club and the gymnasts there just assume that I coach full time given the kind of expertise and knowledge I have when it comes to gymnastics. That's three very different industries, none of which had anything to do with my degree. What has acting, gymnastics or banking got to do with a degree in geography? The problem with a lot of people is that they think, "I'm a working adult now, I'm done with education", so they never learn anything new as an adult. But I picked up the most useful skills for my career as an adult, not as a student and the learning never stops (such as with my languages). So I am wondering if Ricky is guilty of being one of those adults who stopped learning new things and that was ultimately his downfall?
Do you think oil running out will have an impact on Scotland's economy? I'm not sure what else they do aside from oil. People say the North of England is poor, but I wonder what is the case just further North of that into Scotland. Y'know the US is so protectionist about jobs only going to locals I'm surprised more international outsourcing doesn't happen. I guess it's just more convenient to hire locally even if it costs more. But IT is not necessarily the same as computer science. The former doesn't see a lot of innovation, while the latter requires one to come up with new algorithms everyday. And skillsets that don't have a lot of innovation are easily copied in 3rd world countries, so supply and demand...
DeleteWhile I think you have the advantage of having no dependents which gives you more time to learn, unlike working parents like Robert's dad or Ricky, my cousin has 3 kids but recently changed divisions in Meta. And he told me "you have to constantly be hungry and learn or become outdated." But he's a very ambitious person that is an innovator who tries to improve the technology everyday. That's not a skill that can be taught because it's brand new knowledge he developed himself. So I agree with you yeah, I think Ricky was guilty of resting on his laurels thinking the good times will last forever without any maintenance required. My cousin is a lot older than me and I used to find it annoying at Chinese New Year how much he'd criticize my school activities and push me harder to succeed, but now as a working adult, I get it, that's how he maintains job security. Meta conducted a lot of layoffs recently, but he survived, and his department is even expanding and hiring.
I refer you to the case study of Nauru - they were once one of the world's richest countries with a lot of phosphate reserves. But being a small island in the Pacific, that resource was finite and they ran out eventually. Without having invested that wealth wisely, that plunged the country into poverty. It was like a rich kid with a trust fund who squandered that wealth and ended up living in poverty once that money eventually ran out. So in so many words, of course Scotland is fucked. Okay, they're not as bad as Nauru of course, they have a more diverse economy and are not reliant entirely on oil - but oil & gas has played a huge part in boosting its economy in the last four decades and losing that pillar of the economy is going to be a massive blow. So in so many words, yeah of course they're fucked. It's like losing a limb, you won't die but life will never be the same again and the quality of your life is going to be a lot worse. There's a bit of everything else in Scotland, but here's a tip for you since you're preparing for job interviews, NEVER admit your ignorance on a topic when you have Google at your fingertips. You wrote that you don't know what else they do aside from oil, hello? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Scotland It's called Googling the answer. Do I expect you to know what goes on in Scotland's economy? No. Do I expect you to Google the answer to avoid exposing your ignorance and losing face in an interview situation? Yes. You're going in for all of these interviews and you must NEVER EVER admit to not knowing the answer like that because it just makes you look bad.
DeleteI have heard of Nauru. At one point, due to their small population, their GDP was #2 in the world just behind Saudi Arabia. That was how rich their country used to be!!!
DeleteWow that really sucks for Scotland, I hope they have a plan for that. It makes me wonder what the Scottish national party were gonna do if the referendum made them left the UK. It would be like a mini-brexit having to negotiate more trade deals with the UK and EU, especially to trade their oil to those countries. I've heard of the "resource trap" where a country stays poor because the money from the resources just funds corruption at the top, but at least Scotland isn't a dictatorship and has a functioning government and education system. I've also read articles in the UK about how its economy is too centralized around London, and that they should create an "MIT of the North" to spur innovation, but nothing has really happened along that vein. In America we also have poor states like Alabama, or poor cities like Detroit, but it's not talked about as much as the North of England being poor. People are just told to move for work if they can.
DeleteI had a phone call about an interview the day before yesterday where they asked me if I knew about X and I didn't, but I did talk my way out of it and immediately started googling before the official interview the next day. It wasn't for finance, it was engineering for a defense contractor. I'm probably gonna be asked about market making and options trading in the video interview for the quant job. The company even sent me a course they made themselves and put online for free about options trading when they first asked me to do the math test. If I don't study their course, they'll know. Also, a quant recruiter told me some hedge funds passed on me because a) I didn't have a PhD and they only want PhDs, or b) I didn't show enough interest in financial markets while pursuing a STEM degree. I can't do anything about a) in the immediate future, but I can certainly do something about b). I'm glad she told me the truth they were passing on me and why instead of just ghosting, it's very valuable feedback.
By the way, I just opened the trading firm's options trading course. I was expecting a wikipedia article's worth of information, but instead there's 6 hours of video lectures with some very complicated math. Now there's no excuse if I can't understand finance terms during the interview like "rho" or "gamma", I can't just say "oh I come from STEM, I'll learn that later." My god, this is the longest most involved interview process I've ever had, it's even longer than Big Tech's interviews. I guess these companies can afford to invest so much time and money into recruiting, because the base salary is very high and they expect a quant to make them huge returns in the long run. I heard they invest even more time and money into training afterwards. A friend of mine has a friend from undergrad who became a quant after finishing his bachelor's degree, and he said the training process was over 1-2 years, and they learn how to play poker with each other as part of the training. Also, every few months the lowest performing people in the cohort are fired until they only keep only the best of the best. Also, it makes me wonder how Sang-woo in squid game lost so much money, there should've been a quant in risk management keeping an eye on his numbers.
DeleteHonestly, during undergrad my engineering peers would complain that people in finance were lazy and got paid way too much relative to what they contribute. But seeing how cutthroat it is first-hand and all the hoops you have to jump just to get in, I have a lot more respect for people who work in finance.
@Amanda, I am making a career switch to financial services too. But at this point I don't want to disclose too much since everything is not finalized. It is only quants that have such an involved interview and training process. But if you have the time read the book: The Man Who Solved the Market: How Jim Simons Launched the Quant Revolution.
DeleteHey Choaniki, thanks for the book recommendation. I googled Jim Simons, MIT undergrad, Berkeley PhD, in math too. That explains all the academic requirements for quants, because the OG quant grinded through the system himself.
DeleteLet me provide some more context to Ricky's story:
ReplyDeleteFirstly he is not strictly working in an IT company as that company is very niche. It could be considered a financial industry solutions provider. And Ricky's job in such a niche company is doing cash verification template customisation for money handling machines, some sort of firmware engineer. So his skills and experience in that company were totally not transferrable. That company also happens to be the global leader in terms of market share.
Now he has made several life choices (missteps) which led him to his current state.
Firstly he had already left the company once and when I joined the company, he had just returned back to the company at the behest of the outgoing managing director (MD). There is a Chinese adage, "好马不吃回头草". And the person who came up with it was correct, Ricky should have never returned to the company as the new MD totally didn't have anything planned for him and just threw him to do this completely stagnant engineering role (a back office cost centre job, totally no negotiation power).
His second misstep was staying so long with the current company (more than 13 years if I remembered correctly). If he had job hopped like me (4 companies in past 12 months) then he would have had transferrable skills and an adaptable mindset. In fact when I talked to him previously he told me he had previously applied for a career switch programme to study artificial intelligence and was accepted but chose not to proceed with the switch (again unlike me).
His final nail and misstep was getting married to a foreign wife and asking her not to work. His wife was a highly paid IT manager in her home country and when she moved to Singapore she became a dependant. But this was both their choices and I can't tell him if it was the right or wrong thing to do. But it is something I am not prepared to do personally.
Well there's nothing wrong with working for a niche company, every company is unique and you will have to learn a lot of product specific details for your job - but then there are transferable skills like adapting to a new environment, learning to negotiate with clients, dealing with clients when things go wrong, building relationships with existing cleints, doing research etc. But I agree you should not go back to an old company that you have left - like if they give you a good offer, fine but if things don't work out be prepared to walk away again with your head held high and say, "I deserve better." As for staying with a company for too long, well it depends on how well or badly they are treating you. And the whole domestic situation with his wife is messed up to say the least.
DeleteBut I suppose my question is more a question of why he didn't ask his friends for help to get a better job or if his friends even automatically volunteered to help him when they heard of his predicament? I am starting a new job contract soon and part of the reason why I was offered this work (without me asking for it, it was handed to me on a silver platter) was because I had always gone out of my way to help others and thus have a good reputation of being a nice guy in an industry full of quite cut-throat dishonest people who will stab you in the back for a quick profit. So why didn't Ricky ask for help or receive any help then? Why was he hung out to dry like that and ended up as a taxi driver?
When I spoke to him the other da y he told me that he was doing a very valuable operation centric job and was waiting for the company to discover his value and reward him with more money and or responsibility (it is a cost centre job so I disagreed with him on that point). He should have watched this video: https://youtu.be/j0Gix4nmF8U
DeleteRicky also survived the tenure of not just 1, 2, but 3 MDs and if they didn't increase his pay and/or prestige in the meanwhile then either A) he really sucks at his job or B) he really sucks in selling his value to his bosses.
Why didn't Ricky ask from help from anyone? Your guess is as good as mine. Ego perhaps? I have a thick skin and no ego so will always ask and accept help from anyone. But you probably already know this by now. I only heard he was leaving after he had handed in his resignation so was no in a position to help him.
My current role is a profit-centre one and I can even calculate down to the exact cent how much revenue I bring in to my company. Even still I don't believe in the hubris that any role is indispensable (and my low pay only demonstrates that I am right).
Face palm, you can't wait for people to discover how valuable you are - either they already know it or they take you for granted. Thus either be prepared to claim credit or move somewhere else (or even strike it out on your own) to get the credit you think you really deserve. That's awfully foolish of him and it's probably got a lot to do with his Singaporean mindset where the vast majority of kids at school just study hard and hope that the teachers notice how well they're doing by putting a lot of effort into their homework when in reality, the teachers really don't give a damn - the teachers instead notice the students who are bold enough to speak up and get their attention. That's the problem with the culture of Singapore and it took moving to the West for me to break out of it. Ricky clearly sucks at selling his value to his former bosses and I think that's a cultural thing associated with a certain kind of Singaporean. If that's how his character is (too late for him to change), he probably is a good worker ant who will go to work at the same time everyday, doing the same boring routine over and over again without once using his brain - put him in a more challenging position (like the one you're going for Choaniki) and I swear he will sink like a rock to the bottom of the sea. You have a certain feistiness and a desire to succeed whilst Singaporeans like Ricky don't - there are many more Singaporeans like him out there and he is actually quite typical.
DeleteThere are many reason why I am atypical.
Delete1) I left home while in NS so sink or swim. My parent wouldn't give 2 hoots if I died.
2) After being scammed my whole life I am very skeptical and don't trust people easily. In fact I no longer give out my real name online or offline to strangers. Good luck trying to dox me.
3) I am an avid reader from young and still read, listen, and watch material from various sources out of intellectual curiosity. I believe knowledge is power so would never miss the opportunity to learn more from experts, regardless of the topic.
At this point of my life, I have been hustling for so long it has become second nature to me. While some Singaporean would have been content to settle, I am always chasing the next target and destination.
Ironically, being forced to hustle has taught you more than whatever you could have learnt in a classroom. Too many Singaporeans view education as "memorize the textbook, ace the exam" and that's never a process replicated in the real world and that's why they become trained to be worker ants who simply memorize how to do a process, repeat over and over and over again and follow orders but they will never thrive when it comes to the real business world when it comes to hustling. They have the mindset of a factory production line worker.
DeleteBtw I did a quick calculation for my current job and here it goes: 4 + 3 + 0 + 0 = 7/40 which is why I'm leaving this job next week.
ReplyDeleteFingers crossed, everything will work out well for you in this next career move!
DeleteIt definitely will and that is because I am already asking for help from an Ang mo regional sales guy who has some 20+ years of experience selling all sorts of products. I am also stubborn by nature and don't give up easily.
DeleteHey Alex, I just passed the first round math test of the quant trader interview I got. Next round is a video interview, where I have to answer a lot of probability and statistics questions within an hour. I have 5 days to study, contemplating learning how to play poker or blackjack to get good at probability and statistics. There's even more rounds after this, one more coding test, a technical phone interview, then an in-person all-expenses paid trip to Chicago to HQ. Each round I could be eliminated. Also, I found out the company laid off 11% of their headcount in Dec 2022, which surprises me they're hiring right now. What happened in the finance industry in Dec 2022? Crypto collapsing? US fed raising rates? I feel like I had way more interviews while needing to send out fewer applications in August 2022 than now.
ReplyDeleteI'm starting to feel like the entire finance industry is just professional gambling. I'm supposed to gamble using maths, while in your case you use common sense. Technically when you choose to take on a freelance project you have to gamble on whether it's a good project and whether the deal will go through. It also makes me think all those ads on youtube or instagram promoting day trading for ordinary people are a scam, because no way do they have all the information and tools to analyze all that data to make a good decision. They're at an information disadvantage compared to the professionals. Proprietary trading firms/hedge funds even pay data brokers for specific data they need for their algorithms, which the ordinary investor wouldn't have the capital to do or even think to do.
@Amanda those YouTube ads are a scam, period. But don't take it from me, here is a former investment banker telling you more
Deletehttps://youtu.be/C3FyIev_f8s
Good luck and all the best for your video interview!
DeleteThanks Alex! Yeah @Choaniki, I mean the things I have to be tested on just to check I'm qualified to be trusted to trade is ridiculous, no way would the average person study all these things or be taught all these things.
DeleteBtw regarding the Singaporean mentality and being worker ants, would you say the Singaporean workplace is not cutthroat enough? Because jobs where it is cutthroat you need to use creativity rather than just work long hours. I can't imagine surviving as a quant or A.I expert in America with the Singaporean mindset. It doesn't matter if you work long hours, if your solution isn't new or creative, you're done.
@Amand I mean there is an accredited investor (AI) scheme in SG. Basically these are a category of people who have like 1M AUM with any financial institution and earn an average of 300k income the past 12 months.
DeleteOnce these rich people have AI status basically banks and other financially institutes are allowed to sell them risker instruments. MAS is basically treating AIs as rich ignorant investors. They are either rich and know how to invest their money or rich enough to not need protection against losing all their money.
Ok I have some not so happy news from Ricky. He just completed his first 2 weeks of taxi driving and works up to 10 hrs per day but only makes 17/hr. I can make more than double that with less work but even I find my earnings low compared to what some professionals make (lawyers and doctors).
ReplyDeleteWell the worst part about driving a taxi is that there's no career progression - the only way to earn more money is to drive more hours and he is already working 10 hours a day, very long hours and he has no control over whether or not he's gonna pick up loads of customers or spend ages waiting around doing nothing. As mentioned before, I always refer you back to the Big Mac Index, it's how long you have to work to earn the equivalent of a Big Mac locally. So Choaniki, with your new career, you can drastically improve your Big Mac Index by becoming really good at your new job - Ricky can be the best taxi driver in Singapore but it still cannot help him earn more by being good at his job.
DeleteYou can *dramatically* improve - that's a better word.
DeleteHmm, that's a very interesting story. I met someone who was working in marketing/communications a few years back, and was ghosted soon after. When I met him, he had a very successful career with one of the biggest tech companies in Singapore, with a proven track record of working in marketing agencies, both big and small. He definitely knew how to climb up the career ladder quickly.
ReplyDeleteI put him on a pedestal because I thought I would never be as successful nor would I ever earn as much as him. Anyway, lo and behold, after his stint with one of the biggest tech companies ended, he seemed to be unemployed for quite a long time (>6 months).
And I can keep speculating but I may never know why. It could be ageism, or being overqualified for certain roles, or not wanting to take a pay cut.
There has been retrenchment exercises happening across many major tech companies and I feel that a lot of employees who previously had illustrious careers may end up becoming displaced in the process.
Hi Bella, you talk about ageism - how old is this guy?! I'm 47 and instead of trying to get another full time job, I set up my own company (it's a one-man band) and thus I am now my own boss with several different clients; I'm still essentially doing what I do but instead, as a contractor, I get to offer that same service to many different companies instead of expecting just one company to pay me a good salary to do it exclusively for them. I can't sit around at home and be unemployed, I get restless and wanna make money knowing I have a lot to offer.
Delete@bella, let me give you a hint. I am not much younger than @LIFT. I have worked for close to 22 years and have never been retrenched or fired. Just within the past 12 months i have changed jobs 4x with the shortest stint being only 3 months. Boomers will call me a job hopper. But enlightened people will see me as being highly desirable to get so many offers in such a short period of time.
Delete