Edmund Wee

Preparing and Completing My Curriculum Vitae

 

Before we could kick-start our internship training, a well-planned preparation was of course needed to begin the search for an ideal company that could fulfil our expectation and criteria so that we can make the full use of this opportunity. I started off my preparation by looking at some of the basic requirements needed to apply for a job. Since this was my first time applying for an official job, a complete curriculum vitae (CV) was of course needed and that is something which I yet to have. This is after I realized that the previous CV that I prepared a few years back was incomplete and a tad informal. I decided to scrap the old CV and prepare a brand new one in order to increase my chances of acquiring a proper job.  

 

After I have my CV properly prepared, it was then time to hunt for a list of companies that would suit my requirement. I decided to conduct a brainstorming session to decide what are some of the experience that I would like to gain from my training. 

 

Goals & Expectations

 

From the brainstorm session, I have come to realize that, since the whole point of an internship is to gain experience from a working environment that cannot be learn from classrooms, I want to apply for jobs where I am exposed to the set-up of a company on a broad-basis and not jobs that are too narrowly-focused on a specific task kind. This means I have a shortlist of preferred jobs namely investment banks (in particular, private equity, corporate finance and research department), venture capitalist companies or corporate strategy departments as they are all pretty suitable with what I am looking for.

 

In addition, I have also come out a list of goals that I would love to achieve during my internship period.

 

                                    ✖ Develop interpersonal skills with colleagues.

                                    ✖ Involve in team discussion and projects.

                                    ✖ Improve presentation skills.

                                    ✖ Communicating with customers.

                                    ✖ Learning new software.

                                    ✖ Develop a clearer career path and future plans for myself. 

 

Conducting the Search for Companies

 

Moving on, with the assistance of my education institute, Taylor’s University, I was able to apply up to a list of 4 companies, where I sent in my CV along with a cover letter which I had specifically written for all 4 different companies. The 4 companies were RHB Investment Bank, OSK Holdings, TA Enterprise and UBS Securities.

 

Preperation for Interview

 

My university played a role in assisting us with our preperation for job interviews. They had invited big corporations such as Ernst & Youngs and BDO to held a talk on job recruitment and what would they usually expect from interviewees. Their Human Resource representative gave us advise on how we should tackle open-ended questions and what are some of the key characteristics thay recruiters normally look for. I have learnt that the ability to speak with confidence and good eye-contact is essential in an interview.

 

Back to my job application, OSK Holdings Bhd. was the first to get back to me and invited me for an interview. It was my first formal interview in which I had to attend and thus, it was pretty much of a challenge for me. I wasn’t too sure about what questions will the interviewer normally question us on. Hence, to prepare myself, I decided to look up some common interview questions on the internet and at the same time, did some brief research about the company and its job description. My key at that time, was to tell myself to keep calm and be myself during the interview. But of course, things are easier said than done so I decided to have a mock interview by talking in front of a mirror and from this, I realized that my expression was a little stiff and fake. I tried to calm myself down and did a few more rounds of practice on the night before the interview and things get better with time.

 

Post-Interview

 

Of course, from the title of this page, one would have guessed the outcome of the interview by now and hence, to cut a long story short, I just would like to express my feelings that I was very happy and satisfied that my job application was successful at first try! I got accepted to the company to conduct my internship training there under the company’s corporate strategy department specializing in business process.

 

However, my preparation for my internship did not end just there. It was also a challenging task when I am preparing for my first day of work. Now that I have clear idea of where I will be working at and which department I will be in, I would have to arrange my method of transportation there. Since I stay approximately 60 kilometers away from my workplace, it is rather far and hence, the planning on the choice of transportation and time management is pretty important to ensure that I have the right balance of cost and not being late for work. The few options that I have was either to take a train, drive my own vehicle or car-pool with a friend of mine who works nearby. I decided to take the last option as it is more convenient, less costly and less time consuming. Please visit my "Reflective Journals" section to know more about my internship training experience.