With high ambitions, NUS graduates power towards career success

Navigating the ever-evolving landscape of professional opportunities can be both exhilarating and daunting. Yet, recent NUS graduates, most of them from the Class of 2023, have secured exciting careers, armed with a diverse skill set honed through a rigorous interdisciplinary and experiential NUS education, and future-ready life skills.

Interdisciplinary education opens doors to many career pathways

The strong foundation that Estelle Ho Jia Hui, NUS Business School graduate and Valedictorian for the Class of 2023, acquired during her course of study opened doors to a variety of career options upon graduation. Armed with a Real Estate degree, she is now an Associate Product Specialist in the Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance (ESG) team at Mastercard.

In her current role, Estelle develops go-to-market strategies for customers in Asia Pacific to accelerate their corporate sustainability goals through Mastercard’s ESG products. She also works on product enhancements to drive product adoption, collaborating with diverse functional teams to enhance the value proposition of the products.

“The foundation of skills I acquired in my time at NUS opened doors to a variety of career options upon graduation. For instance, I learned project management skills for land development and building lifecycles in Real Estate studies, which I now apply to managing product roadmaps and formulating go-to market strategies at Mastercard,” said Estelle.

During her undergraduate years, Estelle completed multiple internships at Shopee, Changi Airport Group, Enterprise Singapore and Inland Revenue Authority of Singapore. She also actively engaged in discussions with her career advisors and sought to upskill herself through workshops conducted by BIZCareers, the NUS Business School’s careers centre.

“I acquired stakeholder management and communication skills from internships, mentors, and BIZCareers workshops that help me to navigate challenges and drive impactful change with our customers at Mastercard,” she added.

Internships reaffirm choice to pursue a green career

An Economics major at the NUS Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Ashruff Ng Wei Sheng Ibrahim was able to hone his interest in social and environmental issues through courses such as developmental and environmental economics. Being a student under the former University Scholars Programme (now known as NUS College) also exposed him to an interdisciplinary learning environment.

Through the advice of NUS career advisors and his peers, Ashruff went on to complete three sustainability-focused internships at the Singapore Business Federation, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Ramboll during his undergraduate years which helped reaffirm his decision to work in the sustainability space upon graduation.

In his current position as a Sustainability Specialist at WS Audiology (WSA), a privately-owned manufacturer of hearing aids headquartered in Denmark and Singapore, Ashruff manages the carbon accounting of WSA’s operations and its value chains. This includes measuring carbon emissions produced in WSA's sites, upstream processes such as procurement and logistics, and downstream processes such as the use and disposal of the hearing aids that are sold to the end users.

A unique study opportunity leads to a career in New York

Working as a finance associate in the New York office of global law firm Latham & Watkins and a member of the Banking Practice in the firm, NUS Law graduate Lee Kay Han represents investment and commercial banks, private debt funds, and corporate borrowers in a range of domestic and cross-border finance transactions.

Kay Han, who was Valedictorian for the Class of 2022^[1], was fortunate to have landed the coveted opportunity to study in New York through the NYU-NUS LLB-LLM Exchange Plus Programme with New York University (NYU) and eventually pursued his career there. Using the networking skills he picked up from the career guidance departments at both NUS and NYU, he approached several firms in New York during his job search and later aced the interview with his current employer Latham & Watkins.

“At NUS, I developed a strong foundation both in terms of substance and legal skills, with credit to the many resources that NUS provided. Having worked for a while now, this has definitely helped me in analysing legal issues, drafting documents and much more,” said Kay Han.

Beyond that, Kay Han also appreciates the NUS Law community’s sense of camaraderie and the general willingness to help each other in sharing advice, notes, and life tips to get through law school, internships, job applications and more.

A strong foundation for the corporate world

As a Regional Study Coordinator at clinical research organisation Labcorp, Jeannie Su Ching Ting manages clinical trial projects for pharmaceutical clients in the Asia Pacific region. She works with multiple stakeholders across time zones and oversees the entire project management spectrum which includes managing logistics, lab test results, study monitoring, and patient sample management.

Jeannie, who graduated with a Pharmaceutical Science degree from NUS Faculty of Science, shared that she had a smooth job search thanks to her education. “My foundation in Pharmaceutical Science helps me understand how clinical trials fit into the whole life cycle of drug development. There were a few Pharmaceutical Science courses on the drug development lifecycle, and regulatory guidelines in the pharmaceutical industry which are relevant to my role today,” said Jeannie.

Jeannie added that her internship through the NUS Undergraduate Professional Internship Programme, was particularly helpful in imbuing her with transferable skills for the workplace and complemented her academic credentials when applying for jobs.

Holistic education paves the way for career success

For NUS Computing graduate Yoong Yi En, her all-rounded experience at NUS has prepared her well for her career as an IT Security Specialist at the Housing and Development Board (HDB).

An HDB scholarship recipient, Yi En completed her six-month internship under NUS Computing’s Advanced Technology Attachment Programme at HDB. During her internship, she was given the opportunity to learn and develop a web application that conducts source code analysis and identifies potential application vulnerabilities.

A semester-long student exchange at the University of Gothenburg in Sweden added to Yi En’s personal growth. “The exposure gained away from home enabled me to enhance my global perspective and grow as an individual,” she recounted. While in university, Yi En also took courses from the NUS Centre for Future-ready Graduates to equip herself with important soft skills, such as workplace etiquette and effective communication.

Seven months since joining HDB, Yi En finds fulfilment in a role that aligns with her interests in cybersecurity, software engineering and community engagement. But mostly, she is excited to be part of an organisation that contributes significantly to shaping Singapore’s communities.

Strong employment prospects and higher starting salaries for NUS graduates

NUS graduates continued to command high employment rates and earned higher starting salaries in 2023, according to the Joint Autonomous Universities Graduate Employment Survey 2023. Please click here for the press release.

5,582 out of a total of 7,629 fresh NUS graduates from the Class of 2023, and 436 out of 819 follow-up NUS graduates, participated in the joint survey.

[1] Law graduates complete a one-year practical law course/pupilage prior to joining the workforce.