SINGAPORE: A National University of Singapore (NUS) graduate who admitted feeling like a failure after five months of unsuccessful job hunting was met with an unexpected response online, as many Singaporeans urged him to “toughen up” and accept that landing a job has become far more difficult.
Posting in the Threads community “Singapore jobs,” user papayat95 said months of rejections had taken a heavy toll on his confidence.
Having been unfairly laid off from his previous role, he said he could not understand why he had been unable to secure another job despite graduating from NUS with an Honours degree with distinction and tailoring his résumé for every application.
“It is frankly demoralising as hell to be applying for jobs for 5 months straight only to not get a single interview even after tailoring your resume to each application.”
“I just need someone out there to give me a chance as a qualitative researcher or even as a banking operations analyst again.”
“It is a worldwide issue”
Usually, stories like this end with commenters rallying around the jobseeker and blaming the dreadful hiring market. Not this time. The mood was noticeably less sympathetic, with many arguing that he needed to be tougher, less picky, and prepared to take a detour before landing the job he actually wanted.
One individual told him, “Ehh, I graduated from NUS in 2001 and spent 9 months selling clothes at a department store. Toughen up, please.”
Another urged him not to get too hung up on finding the perfect role straight away.
“I know it’s humiliating, but you just got to take jobs you don’t like as much. While you chase and wait for your chances.”
A third shared, “Jiayou! The job market is honestly really tough now. I have a colleague who graduated from NTU in Banking & Finance but couldn’t land a role in that field for almost 3 years. He eventually decided to explore a different industry instead, and things started moving from there. Sometimes changing direction isn’t giving up, it’s just taking a different route to the same destination. Wishing you the best of luck!”
Others pointed out that five months, while undoubtedly frustrating, is no longer considered unusually long in today’s hiring market.
One parent shared that her son submitted more than 300 job applications over the course of a year.
“My son took 1 year, over 300+ applications with a 95% no-reply rate, and got played out 3 times before landing a job related to his academic discipline. He is into his 5th month now and grateful for the job. So, don’t give up. Know that it is NOT your issue. It is a worldwide issue.”
Another simply wrote, “I’m an NUS grad, and I haven’t been able to get a job for 1.5 years.”
In other news, a Vietnamese woman sought the opinions of Singaporeans after her husband repeatedly insisted that the habits she finds suspicious are perfectly normal because, according to him, “everyone in Singapore lives like this.”
After hearing that line one too many times during their arguments, she decided to fact-check it with Singaporeans themselves.
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