Hi,

just to share my 2cents.

I started working in Wyeth Pharmaceuticals in Feb 2002 as a Management trainee after graduating overseas. Working hours are pretty standard from 8.30am - 5.30pm but work life as management trainee sucks big time as I need to attend 3 management meetings per week and minutes taking is really time consuming and tedious.

After 5 months, I throw in the towel and moved on to a hands-on engineer role in A*STAR Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology. The pay increment in A*STAR is pathetic at the time of post-911 and SARS. Bonuses are generally not that fantastic, typically with the good performers getting the most 1.75 months bonus. You will receive your usual 13th month AWS. After staying for 3 years and 2 months, I move on to teach in a polytechnic and my pay jump as public service tends to tag your pay according to years of experience + NS.

Since then, I have made my tours in govt agencies and govt linked company and after 10 years, i decide to move out into the private sector. My monthly basic salary has went up as much as 35% (based on last drawn salary in govt) after 2.5 years of private sector work life.

My advise to you is to take on the A*STAR role and used that Research officer role as a stepping stone to move out to something different after 3 years or so.