SINGAPORE: Yet another Singaporean job seeker is starting to lose hope after 18 months of job hunting.
The job seeker took to r/askSingapore, a Reddit forum, on Thursday (Dec 5), explaining that despite reaching out directly to talent acquisition specialists on LinkedIn, contacting managers from various companies, constantly checking for openings and even following up with hiring managers from past interviews, he has found little success.
“This cycle has been ongoing for at least 18 months already with some breaks every few weeks. And I am losing hope and feeling drained/helpless,” he lamented.
“At this stage, I feel like I can only lower down my expectations in terms of coms package & location if I really need a change of environment.”
The job seeker, who is looking for roles related to medtech or biopharma, then asked the Reddit community, “What are the things you have done to increase chances of landing new jobs?
“What can I do better? I also have been gathering industry related knowledge and ready to use it whenever there’s an opportunity.”
“Get yourself a good recruiter”
In the discussion thread, one Redditor suggested that the job seeker consider finding a skilled recruiter with strong connections.
He wrote, “Get yourself a good recruiter, someone who has connections and can sell you. A good, experienced/trusted recruiter will have lobang for jobs that aren’t necessarily advertised.”
Another Redditor advised the job seeker to focus on developing his problem-solving skills.
He said, “Bosses/ companies want to hire you to help solve their problems. If you’re working in a small company, try to see the business from the POV of your boss while going through day to day operations.
“You will soon realise there are a lot of problems or areas of improvement in terms of efficiency or effectiveness. Ask yourself then, what can you do to help fix this. If you can do it, you instantly increase your value at work.”
A third recommended that the job seeker lower his expectations next time, “Employees simply have no bargaining chip when there is a global pool of jobseekers, forever an employers’ market from here.”
In related news, a 27-year-old Singaporean man opened up on social media about how discouraged he feels after a year of constant job rejections.
“I’ve been to interview after interview for a year now, and yet, I’m unable to land anything,” he wrote on r/askSingapore. “Interviews, if they happen, generally go well, but after that, nothing. Or if they’re nice enough, they’ll send a rejection email.”
The man shared that he studied engineering but ended up working in the healthcare sector during the COVID-19 pandemic because it was the only industry that was willing to hire him at the time.
Over the past year, however, he has been actively seeking engineering-related roles in hopes of getting back on track in his field of study.
Featured image by Depositphotos (for illustration purposes only)
