I Got A Job! ...In 2.5 months! As A Fresh Grad! Tips On Getting That First Job

Just as the title indicates -- I got a job!

In complete honesty, it took me 2.5 months total to find one, beginning from the very first week I begun applying for jobs... till now. I finished uni in November, went on vacations until mid-December, and so only started applying mid-December. I spam applied job applications like crazy from December to January, only stopping because I had quite a number of interviews in February to go for (some were several rounds for the same company).

I didn't keep a tally of the number of applications I sent out, but I mostly sent them through job postings on LinkedIn, and got myself 1 interview in December, 3 psychometric assessments and 1 interview to be done in January, and 1 phone call screening and 4 interviews in February. In total, I had about 5 serious companies that gave me face-to-face interviews... and I was beginning to lose hope and was growing jaded up till the very last company, which coincidentally turned out to be the best one that I liked, as well as the one that liked me the most!

I know all these details seem pretty mundane to talk about, but since my blog is like my little diary that I can read and look back on after a while, I think it'd be helpful to remember what my job-hunting process was like.

I won't name the company that I got a job at out of privacy and fear of doxxing (lol), but I will say that it is an MNC and was the only company that offered me a role that was Corporate Communications-related -- which was the exact job scope that I was actively looking out for. I had like 3 Marketing interviews and 1 Strategic Communication interview, and not going to lie I was completely disinterested in the Marketing ones, and only liked the Strategic Comms one because it would have been a government job. Nevertheless, my preference was working in Corporate Comms, and I'm so happy that I got my preferred job scope.

For this job, my hiring timeline was as follows...

(0 week) 21 Jan: Job Application

(+2 Weeks) 3 Feb: HR Phone Screening (a very long one, lol, ALL generic interview questions were asked)
(+10 Days) 11 Feb: Email from HR for Interview

(+12 Days) 13 Feb: First interview with Direct Boss, contacted on evening itself by HR for 2nd round

(+6 Days) 19 Feb: Second interview with Chief Marketing Officer, Third Interview with rest of team

(+5 Days) 24 Feb: Call from HR that I was preferred candidate, but had to wait for interviews to finish

(+4 Days) 28 Feb: Offered expected pay via call from HR
(+3 Days) 2 Mar: Offer letter given, and signed. Background check in progress

(+2 Weeks) 16 Mar: Start of Job

I won't say I'm very experienced in hiring timelines since I'm a fresh graduate, but this was certainly pretty fast! I'll be starting work in 2 weeks too, and I think they liked that I was pretty much available immediately :) I'm really happy about securing this job offer, I got really good vibes from all of the interviews I attended for this company (it was pretty much 3-4 rounds, but since I was so distracted by other interviews on the side it didn't feel like much!) and the team that I'll be working with seems so lovely and aah everything truly excites me! I was very surprised to hear that my fellow teammates (expats) had been working in the company as fresh grads till now (~9 years)... It really instilled in me confidence that there is growth and progression opportunities in the organisation. Here's crossing fingers I have the same positive experience in the company as well!

Pretty proud of myself for getting employed relatively fast in this economy and climate... Especially with the coronavirus going on, and what with the government announcing a likely oncoming recession. I also got the job at a very reasonable (and to some fresh grads, perhaps even above-average) pay which is even more motivational when it comes to wanting to do well in this job, haha. Plus, I was already quickly losing stamina when it came to preparing for and going to job interviews, even though I may have only went to 5... So I was very lucky this job offer came at an opportune time!

Here's hoping for the best :)

Anyway, I just wanted to write out a couple of tips that I believe can aid fellow job-seekers as well... or fresh grads looking for jobs in general!

Things I Learned as a Fresh Graduate Job-Hunter

#1: Apply for Government Jobs Waaay Ahead!
Everyone says this, but I paid no heed lol. I couldn't, anyway, since writing my honours thesis during the months of Aug-Oct was so hectic and drained me completely. Either way, since I managed to go for at least 1 government interview, I can at least say I did try for it but it was not meant to be at this time. The main point here is that the civil service can take ages to respond to your application, and by the time they schedule an interview with you, you may have already gotten offered by an MNC. I actually have two government job interviews coming up, but I'll be cancelling them since I prefer the MNC offer more. I believe these stat boards only contacted me once their applications closed (which they leave up the job posting for at least a month for those interested to apply), so... yep, definitely a really long waiting time to even be shortlisted in the first place. Side-note, all government jobs require written tests, and boy they are draining...

#2: Be Clear and Consistent in Your Internship Experiences
I have a little inkling that I didn't manage to clinch the marketing roles I interviewed for, despite delivering a good interview (as relayed to me by my interviewers, lol), was because I lacked in marketing experience. My internships varied across advertising, design and corporate comms, but I didn't have much marketing experiences. Fortunately my corporate comms role saw need for a combination of all my various experiences, and that was why they hired me. But I believe for marketing roles it's more concentrated, and they really want to have someone with actual marketing experience. Anyway, I was still consistent in performing in comms-related roles. For myself, I did not realise I was interested in corporate comms until my very last internship stint where I was exposed to such work, so it worked in my favour still, I guess. So it's still wise to decide on a certain industry/expertise from the start and stick to it all throughout your uni life as you do internships. In other words, try to have a goal!

#3: If Negotiating For Higher Pay, Make Sure You Have Internships to Back It Up
Luckily for me, I did not have to negotiate for my pay, since they agreed to it on the spot. But I have a feeling that if I did not have my three internships to back me up, they would not have agreed to it as readily. During one's university education, often students make the mistake of paying too much attention to their academics and not embellishing their CV with actual internship experiences. All my summer vacations in NUS were spent doing something of note: FASS summer school, or internships. I never wasted any particular vacation doing nothing, haha. I think this foresight really helped me when clinching my first job :) So current undergraduates, please re-think doing nothing during uni vacations and go get an internship instead!

#4: Take Advantage of University Resources/Career Counselling/Resume Reviews
Since I was rather free in the month of December, my boyfriend actually pushed me to pay a visit to NUS' career services to get my resume checked out so I could improve it to get shortlisted for interviews. At first I was kind of disgruntled and reluctant to do it (out of pure laziness lol), but since I was rotting at home anyways, I scheduled an appointment with a FASS career advisor (they have designated ones for different majors) and sent her my resume in advance so she could make the necessary/edits and comments. To my surprise, the session was actually very productive! She gave very good advice and criticism, and I heeded all of her feedback and changed my resume accordingly. Not sure if it's related (or more timing-related), but I actually got a lot more interviews afterwards. Instead of copying and pasting job descriptions of the jobs that I had done into my resume, I manually wrote down all my achievements and described them in numerical terms. My resume definitely looked way more attractive afterwards, and several interviews actually commented on how strong my resume was!

I Graduated!: Mini Reviews of All The Modules I Have Ever Taken

Just as written in the title: I graduated! From NUS!

To top it all off, I did it with First Class Honours. I'm still unbelievably excited and overwhelmed by this feat. I'd never imagined I would be able to do so -- in fact, I never even set a target to graduate with FCH in any capacity throughout my entire university life. I never wanted that pressure, and so I told myself Second Upper would be enough. But then I ended up maintaining my FCH from the very first semester through the last semester... and while I did not like that added stress of "oh, but I technically *could* maintain it...", being able to successfully graduate with it is just so incredibly satisfying. It's really funny how the most amazing things happen to me by chance, though I'd like to think maybe, just maybe, some little hard work went into it as well. I worked so hard for my Honours Thesis, and I'm so glad to see it paid off.

If any stranger is reading this off the Internet, and wondering why I'm graduating in December/January, here's a short recap: I came from a polytechnic, so I get credit exemptions that are worth 1 semester. Hence I only needed to do 3.5 years to get my honours :)

Since I never finished doing reviews for my modules (I only bothered doing reviews for the first year, lol) I thought this might be helpful for those who are still debating/will debate in the future what modules to take in NUS. :)

These will only be mini-reviews though, I don't have the time or energy to go into detail too much!

Year 2 Modules

SC2212 Sociology of Deviance: [Grade: A] I did this during FASS summer school (June/July), and I would highly recommend doing so if you have the chance. As far as I know, this module is *always* offered for summer school. You'll get to hang out with mostly foreign exchange students who come here for summer school, make international friends, and also take advantage of the bell curve because students on exchange don't really care about getting As :P The module itself was very interesting, Prof Gana is always lovely and super engaging as always, and there was even a field trip to a halfway house. I deeply enjoyed it. The workload was considerably light considering it was only an 8 week program. There was a test and group project assignment. I'm sure there is more but I forgot the exact details lol.

GEH1014 Samurai, Geisha, Yakuza As Self Or Other: [Grade: A-] I enjoyed this module because of the very interesting subject matter, and it was relatively easy to do well in. You could bring one sheet of notes into the exam hall. Also, make sure you get good group mates for the group project!

GEQ1000 Asking Questions: [Grade: CS] Not much comments for this one. Very easy and chill module. Compulsory and only CS or CU grade. Can't go very wrong here.

LAJ2201 Japanese 2: [Grade: B+, but I S/Ued] Took this in preparation for my student exchange in Tokyo. The senseis are all so lovely but I cannot stand the environment of learning Japanese in NUS. I experienced being talked down on by a classmate who thought he was much better than me. Turned me off so much I didn't want to enter such an environment again. Also, the workload was incredibly heavy. All language mods will have this kind of workload so I didn't want to have to juggle this with higher-level mods as I grew into Y3 and Y4. In my experience, language mods are very hard to score in unless you are extra vocal and put in a lot of work into the module.

SC2210 Sociology of Popular Culture: [Grade: A+] I very much enjoyed this mod. Very manageable workload. Theories are very straightforward and easy to understand. I was taught by Prof Josh(ua Kurz), and it was his first time teaching this mod. I almost chose him as my HT supervisor in Y4 because I wrote my HT on popular culture, but I ended up choosing Prof Ivan (Kwek) instead.

SC3101 Social Thought & Social Theory: [Grade: B-] My grade for this module absolutely devastated me lol. I don't think I did that badly for the exam, but I believe everyone scored more or less the same marks (going by our assignment grades) and so 1-2 marks difference would cause a huge change in grade. The prof provided an opportunity to get some extra credit for attending a book talk, but I personally couldn't make it because I was having another lecture at the time. I feel like that put me at a major disadvantage :( Just be diligent for this, guys. Not my favourite module, but it was compulsory for Soci majors.

Rest of the modules: Done at my overseas student exchange at TUFS. I cleared three 3000-level Soci modules, one 2000-level Soci module, and two 2000-level Japanese Studies modules. Very pleased with being able to overload during my exchange!

Year 3 Modules

JS2225 Marketing and Consumer Culture in Japan: [Grade: B+, but I S/Ued] Very do-able module, thought I would get an A coz I got consistent As in my individual assignments but I guess my group project or exam must have pulled me down :/ I really like Prof Hendrik as a JS professor though. He's this cute jovial German dude that makes me want to put in effort into the module because he's so passionate about what he teaches. I liked him so much I ended up choosing to take another class by him next semester (a level 3000 module).

SC2214 Media and Culture: [Grade: A-] I thought I would get a B+ for this considering how much I didn't like the module lol. Nothing personal. I genuinely like the professor (Prof Kiven) he's very friendly and recognises me when I'm in school and always says hi, but I just do not enjoy the way he teaches this module... It's very abstract, very theoretical, too "out there" for me. To me the content he teaches for this module can be taught as a level 3000, not 2000 lol. I came from a mass comm background in NP so maybe I'm critical/too used to learning other types of media-centric schools of thought. Just was not my thing at all. Module was easy to score in though, I guess... I really did my best in doing all the readings and making my own notes and trying to understand them through their "abstract"-ness lol.

SC4221 Comparative Analysis of Human Rights: [Grade: B] Did not enjoy this module because of the professor for this sem (to my understanding, he is no longer teaching it... for now?). He's very biased towards the more vocal ones in class. He also marked my test down because I provided my own understanding of a [political] news piece in Singapore (where I supported a government initiative) and he wrote comments on my paper indirectly insinuating I could not critically think about politics because of my support... He was very vocal about being pro-opposition in class, so... He also did not make an effort to provide clear instructions on how to write the final term paper, which pissed a lot of students off. I don't find the way he marks fair at all, because of his incredible bias-ness.

SC4227 Gender, Sex and Power: [Grade: A] I LOVED this module. I love Professor Eric as well. Highly recommend for those interested in Gender studies. And no, you don't have to take the level 2000 Gender Studies mod before doing this module. In fact, a friend of mine took the level 2000 mod AFTER she took this level 4000 one. The level 2000 one is taught by Prof Adelyn and my friend does not have positive comments about her as a lecturer...

JS3222 Japanese Business Management: [Grade: B+] OK, I did expect this B+. I didn't really put too much of an effort into this module for god knows what reason, but I still enjoyed it because of Prof Hendrik. He really loves what he teaches! That inspires me.

SC3213 Visual Ethnography: [Grade: B+] A lot of hands-on work every week, and group discussions. But this is just Prof Ivan's teaching style. He rather have students group together to formulate discussions and then present at the end of every lecture/tutorial. I don't think he gives out bad grades but I have a feeling because everyone gets good grades that's why the bell curve might be quite tight and I didn't get my expected A lol.

SC4205 Sociology of Language & Communication: [Grade: A+] I chalk my A+ up to a ton of hard work for this mod, ok. This module is HEAVY on the theoretical parts. Good if you have a background in Linguistics, but most people don't. Even my friend who minored in Linguistics had a bit of trouble digesting all of it. I was also quite shameless ah and frequently emailed Prof Elliott with all of my questions, to which he always answered promptly and lengthily. I really did my best for this module and so I went from understanding nothing to understanding... most of it?

SC4226 Cultural Production: [Grade: A-] Highly recommended and hands-on. Very fun because I had the best group mates. We performed a skit as part of a group project, and then later got to write feminist poetry to submit as part of a group assignment. I also got to write about the fandom of my favourite Japanese-rock band, The GazettE, for a term paper. Prof Ivan marked it, wrote comments on it that would forever change my life, and then returned it to me. Basically he changed the way I (sociologically) thought about the fandom, opened up greater perspectives, and from that moment on I knew he was going to be my HT supervisor. Lol. Poor Prof Ivan... Hahaha

Year 4 Modules

SC4101 Practising Anthropology and Sociology: [Grade: A-] This module is mandatory. The advice for this mod is always to: GET GOOD GROUP MATES. It's a very chill module, honestly. Choose a topic that is EASY and do not be overly ambitious. Choose an easy topic and do it well. My group did Healthy Eating Initiatives in NUS. LOL.

SC4401 Honours Thesis: [Grade: A-] I slogged my guts out for my HT so I think if I did badly for it I would cry. Very thankful I got an A-. I cooped myself up in the NUS library from 9am-8pm daily and met Prof Ivan once a week to talk about my thesis. It was hell, and a nightmare, but it was the greatest ordeal and academic rigour I'd ever gone through in my measly twenty-three years of living and it was glorious.

I hope all of these mini reviews were semi-helpful to anyone on the Internet, in some way or another.

And so...

Ta-daa! I graduated. In 3.5 years. Majoring in Sociology and minoring in Japanese Studies. Went on 1 overseas student exchange to Tokyo, tried out FASS summer school, did 2 internships throughout the years, even accomplished writing out a 12,000 word Honours Thesis at the end of it all.

I did it!