WHEN it comes to internships, many people are divided between compensating interns for their time working and believing that interns should value receiving their knowledge first hand and not expect much payment since they are basically learning for free.
A Malaysian proved that one can get paid and gain the necessary knowledge firsthand in their specified field, after sharing their experience interning in Hong Kong as an actuarial intern, earning HKD12,000 (RM7,034.95).
The student shared on the Instagram page, @malaysianpaygap , that they took up the offer to work in Hong Kong as it was the better one despite being under a Public Service Department (JPA) scholarship.
They then explained that they have been interning at the “world’s largest life insurer by market cap” for seven months as part of their course’s graduation requirements.
“Interning in the Group office has been quite challenging (these) past seven months. I (was) required to compile reports on a very short deadline and the Excel sheets must look presentable too.
“In short, everything in Hong Kong is urgent and must be done instantly,” the intern said in their submission.
They also stressed on the importance of being fluent in Mandarin as most of the workforce in Hong Kong requires employees’ literacy in Mandarin.
The young intern noted as well that while working in Hong Kong, one will get to experience interesting cultural backgrounds.
“For example, 1/3 of my classmates are from China. You can notice the difference in the accents from different prefectures,” they explained.
They then went on to say that while the intellect is higher in students studying in China, Malaysians’ strengths lie in their “ability to speak multiple languages.”
They also suggested that the Malaysian education system needed to be revamped especially in regards to topics mainly leaning to the sciences and mathematics, even proposing the idea of introducing quantum physics in SPM textbooks.
“There are some improvements that we can make to our syllabus if we want to move into high-tech manufacturing” they added.
To conclude, the 22-year-old believes that one should work hard in order to get the chance to work or study abroad in order to “broaden our horizons”.
