31 yo private uni grad. Is there any way to recover this position?

[xiaoyan]

I am a 31 yo private uni grad (RMIT-SIM). (ew YIKES)

I understand my situation is fairly hopeless.

I have been reading this forum for some time now, including this thread. It hurts, but I'm thankful for the brutality because I would have been too blind to notice or understand otherwise.

I felt prompted to create this thread because I saw this one and it's kind of scary how similar his situation was to mine now.

For context, here's a timeline of my "life".

Secondary School- L1r5 6 (2009)
Junior College- Dropped out (2011)
Polytechnic (Accountancy)- 2.8/4 (2015)
National Service- 2y (2017)
"""University""" (Marketing)- 2.8/4 (2019)
SME Marketing Exec- (2021)
Poster design and videography.
2.5k/mo no CPF
FnB- (2024)
Needed to survive (and badly needed to clear my head)
Picked up some programming skills because of the widely shilled courses during the Covid period

I fell off really, really hard. I know that. I suck.
I also know that I could not have done any better in JC given my mental/emotional state with respect to my family at the time, so I have no regrets.

What I've done:

Up until recently I was applying for SWE jobs, but no responses. This is my fault for chasing the 2022 bubble and I wholly accept this.

Applying for traineeships.

1) VTTP Passed assessments, went for interview.
I plan to reject because doing research showed me it's not worth it.
One source (I have other sources but I can't really link them).

2) AISG Considering as well.
Part of me doesn't know if I can make it due to the widely known difficulty of the assessment.
But aiyah, I will try anyway.
My real worry is if I can convert after participating, because all conversions I can see are from people with 4y STEM degrees from the big unis.

What I'm considering:

̶s̶u̶i̶c̶i̶d̶e̶
Applying for Local uni or masters to close the gap.
I was looking at Master of Science in Quantitative Finance (MQF) and BSC in SWE.
I understand that Civil Service (CS) or Multinational (MNC) mostly look at 4y degree and disregard masters, which is why I'm considering eliminating MQF altogether.

Intent:

My dad is 62 (retirement approaching). Mom is still estranged and up til a few months ago was still causing chaos for family. But nvm for now, it's ok for the time being

My dad has been working in MNC his entire life. He has never needed to hold a degree for this (but I guess our parents' generation was very different). I have asked him about his career a few times but he has never been able to communicate what made him valuable to his company.

I feel really bad because of my inability to close the gap (getting responses from MNC, CS) with people who have 4Y STEM degrees (FCH or not).

My 2019 jobseeking period was literally nothing but responses from Financial Advisories/FSC. I don't feel good leading that type of life, and I am literally getting no responses elsewhere.

I feel a desperate need to "become human" in a sense, even though I know I am currently unworthy of it. I don't really understand the emotional driver, but I think part of it means being eligible for responses from MNCs.

Tl;dr, I don't want to spend my entire life being trapped in this endless loop of being rejected by MNCs (and CS, to some extent). yes I know my life is already over so this is a pointless sentence hahah

Will getting a 4Y degree this late in life help me in this endeavor? Otherwise, what should I do?

If you have been in this position before, I need input. I don't want any false positivity. I can take the brutality. Please lay it down and tell me what I need to do.

[xiaoyan]

Sorry, can't edit the OP past 5 minutes; just wanted to update this section

What I'm considering:

̶s̶u̶i̶c̶i̶d̶e̶
Applying for Local uni or masters to close the gap.
I was looking at Master of Science in Quantitative Finance (MQF) and BSC in SWE.
I understand that Civil Service (CS) or Multinational (MNC) mostly look at 4y degree and disregard masters, which is why I'm considering eliminating MQF altogether.
I am considering Statistics degrees as well.
I have no proximity to engineering topics and I feel like Stats/SWE would complement my accountancy/business diploma (although idk that even matters at this point).
Feel free to point out why if I am mistaken.

Originally Posted by xiaoyan

Sorry, can't edit the OP past 5 minutes; just wanted to update this section

What I'm considering:

It’s kinda difficult to understand what you’re saying but just from an overall impression:-

The job market is competitive and tough, and it applies even to degree holders from full time courses.

What I think you could do with is a huge dose of positivity. It comes across that you are fixated on certain kinds of jobs and are beside yourself due to lack of success in that direction thus far. Your post gives off unpleasant vibes.

If your writing comes across as unclear and full of negativity, you might come across that way in real life (ie. during interviews) as well. People don’t want to engage with such people. Redefine your concept of success and try to be more flexible in your job search.

This is the worst place to ask for any help, trust me on this. You want some real help? Connect with people on linkedin, look for mentor, look for discord groups etc. Places where people are held accountable for what they say.

Otherwise all you'll get is a bunch of morons telling you useless generic info like the dumbass above me, "oh no ur post gives me unpleasant vibes", ????? what the f am I reading? is this guy an actual dumbass? why does the vibe matter LMAO typical gen-z tiktok brainrot delusional dumbass. Either help OP or stfu.

Also Visa traineeship isn't that bad, it's 4.5k, I got a friend in it, the only thing is that it's very hard, they expect you to learn OOP within a week or something, not sure why do you plan to reject, you made that judgement based off 1 troll post?

If it was such a bad program, no one would join. Fact is that people join and convert to perm, same thing about the DBS SEED, people like to cry about how garbage it is yet do you know that their associate converted SEEDers make 6-7k after 2 years? pretty good amount imo, especially when you can't land anything else.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

This is the worst place to ask for any help, trust me on this. You want some real help? Connect with people on linkedin, look for mentor, look for discord groups etc. Places where people are held accountable for what they say.

Otherwise all you'll get is a bunch of morons telling you useless generic info like the dumbass above me, "oh no ur post gives me unpleasant vibes", ????? what the f am I reading? is this guy an actual dumbass? why does the vibe matter LMAO typical gen-z tiktok brainrot delusional dumbass. Either help OP or stfu.

Also Visa traineeship isn't that bad, it's 4.5k, I got a friend in it, the only thing is that it's very hard, they expect you to learn OOP within a week or something, not sure why do you plan to reject, you made that judgement based off 1 troll post?

If it was such a bad program, no one would join. Fact is that people join and convert to perm, same thing about the DBS SEED, people like to cry about how garbage it is yet do you know that their associate converted SEEDers make 6-7k after 2 years? pretty good amount imo, especially when you can't land anything else.

Even wonder why he does not want to post on Linkedin? It is likely he want to be anonymous. There is also nothing wrong with what the other post mentioned about been positive. It is a cruel world out there, people dont like to engage with negative vibe, and if you are giving out negative vibe, the interview likely can sense it too. So need to manage your mindset before even make the next big decision in your life.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Even wonder why he does not want to post on Linkedin? It is likely he want to be anonymous. There is also nothing wrong with what the other post mentioned about been positive. It is a cruel world out there, people dont like to engage with negative vibe, and if you are giving out negative vibe, the interview likely can sense it too. So need to manage your mindset before even make the next big decision in your life.

Agree. What really turn me off is the “ew yikes” at the beginning of the post and and the next line determining that it is a “hopeless” situation. How do you sell yourself at interview if you don’t really believe in yourself?

I am also doubtful if SEED is a useful suggestion. The person don’t seem to meet eligibility criteria.

To the OP - suggest you have some focus and think what are your skill sets and what you enjoy doing based on your work experiences so far. You seem to be jumping from accountancy and marketing to SWE, quantitative finance, STEM, stats etc all in a single post. There are a lot of people with private degree who have done well with themselves. All the best.

[xiaoyan]

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Also Visa traineeship isn't that bad, it's 4.5k, I got a friend in it, the only thing is that it's very hard, they expect you to learn OOP within a week or something, not sure why do you plan to reject, you made that judgement based off 1 troll post?

If it was such a bad program, no one would join. Fact is that people join and convert to perm, same thing about the DBS SEED, people like to cry about how garbage it is yet do you know that their associate converted SEEDers make 6-7k after 2 years? pretty good amount imo, especially when you can't land anything else.

VTTP is a dead end role upon conversion (and an exceedingly low chance of conversion at that). It's not a troll post, he is right.

Besides, OOP is not difficult to learn, there are a million tutorials out there. Most actual devs (also ironic because VTTP doesn't convert to dev) are expected to learn tougher concepts than that.

I haven't checked out DBS seed yet but I'll take a look.

[xiaoyan]

Originally Posted by Unregistered

To the OP - suggest you have some focus and think what are your skill sets and what you enjoy doing based on your work experiences so far. You seem to be jumping from accountancy and marketing to SWE, quantitative finance, STEM, stats etc all in a single post. There are a lot of people with private degree who have done well with themselves. All the best.

Yeah, I am all over the place. I was looking at quant because it is a business-related and SWE adjacent role. To be honest I am lost and grasping at straws.

Could you give me some examples of people with private degrees who have done well with themselves? I have difficulty envisioning that after my own lackluster application process in 2019 and the dominant opinion of this forum.

At least the people viciously attacking private degree holders gives me some clue as to where my lack of worth comes from.

Originally Posted by xiaoyan

Yeah, I am all over the place. I was looking at quant because it is a business-related and SWE adjacent role. To be honest I am lost and grasping at straws.

Could you give me some examples of people with private degrees who have done well with themselves? I have difficulty envisioning that after my own lackluster application process in 2019 and the dominant opinion of this forum.

At least the people viciously attacking private degree holders gives me some clue as to where my lack of worth comes from.

Well some of them are in self-employed industries like those finance roles you despise. Some start off as low ranking role in bank then work their way up. Obviously also depend on your performance. Performance includes things like having the confidence in your opinions which you present to your boss so your boss job is made easier.

But really, please start with such new day by speaking only positive words to yourself.

When you look in the mirror, try to like what you see. When you craft your job application, try to bring out good points. These may sound like general advise but the truth is the bigger the company, the more competition, however good your cv is, it all boils down to the shortlisting and interview process.

Your posts are full of negative words, as a reader no one even wants to cast a second glance at what you write.

Pls eliminate these words that put down yourself, frankly I haven’t seen other posters who seem to dislike themselves so much. As for those who criticise private degree, you really don’t have to bother about them. People who criticise others are usually insecure themselves. If you work on your own confidence over time it won’t affect you.

[xiaoyan]

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Well some of them are in self-employed industries like those finance roles you despise.

Apologies for the difference in opinion but I don't see anything to be positive about this.

Originally Posted by Unregistered

Some start off as low ranking role in bank then work their way up. Obviously also depend on your performance. Performance includes things like having the confidence in your opinions which you present to your boss so your boss job is made easier.

What's the progression like? I have heard about back office but what are the the tasking and positions in this scenario?