Is it worth moving to Singapore from the US for ~2 years for life/career experience
I am currently ~2 years in to IB M&A at a good group in a major west coast city. I grew up here but my family spends time in Asia & US for business purposes (we have residences in both). I have the opportunity to connect with some folks on the corporate side thru my family and live in Singapore for the next ~2 years before I might go pursue an MBA.
Because of my family situation I am ok with the tradeoff of pure career growth that I might get via chasing PE in the US or something like that, I instead think working corporate for some time with a connection of ours for a public co, pursuing B-School at a M7 program, and then pivoting to MBB or a more senior corporate role could be a great path while also getting to see more of the world in my early/mid-20's.
I have spent time in Singapore (maybe ~2 months total), and I do think outside of EU/American financial hubs it is one of the few places that really competes/would still be compelling from a career POV (Also I don't want to be in financial services/investing for my long term career choice).
Would love to hear how you all would consider approaching a situation like this. Just thinking about spending my whole life in NYC/SF and never immersing myself in another culture, have been thinking more about life experience since I've been chained to my desk for almost 2 years now, though it has been a great experience in terms of learning I will say.
The work authorization stuff can likely be alleviated just because we have a base/connections there as well.
Yes its worth it, better food lower tax cheaper COL and u get to explore beautiful SEA countries as well.
I moved to London after a couple years in New York and I absolutely loved it. Definetly encourage you to move around so you don't get stuck
Did you manage to transfer internally at the company you were working for or did you pick up a new gig? Also how was integrating in to London in terms of meeting people, or did you already have a good group? I think I've gotten pretty good at making high quality friends but I know cultures can vary a lot.
What’s the process here for a move like this? Was it difficult to obtain a work permit?
Also, are these opportunities typically networking heavy or typically through internal company transfers?
Candidly it is different for me since we have connections out there, but based on research internal company rotations tend to be the easiest path
Thanks!
Hey, Singaporean here — while I can’t comment on work in particular since I’m not in ib, I’m happy to help with any lifestyle questions you may have.
Perks are: the country is really safe, seamless to navigate as long as you know English, relatively international, food is cheap and good(!), good “home base” if you’re looking to explore other SEA countries (like what another user mentioned) or Asia in general. Downsides are: corporate culture is typically sweatier (longer hours, more face time) and people sometimes complain that the country gets boring after a while.
But imo it never hurts to try living overseas, no matter how long or short — it really widens your perspective.
Thank you - a couple of questions:
- I know people contrast Dubai and Singapore pretty often, but it seems like Singapore is much more advanced in terms of education and less classist and even racist /more diverse and merit based. Curious to see your POV on this
- What is the social life / dating scene like for people in their 20's
- How 'lively' is it - know it's friend group dependent but are people inside and outside work easy to meet / happy and willing to socialize (NYC and SF are very different in this way)
- Career wise do you think work experience in Singapore would translate well to other geographies / North America; know this is not the case if you work in others parts of Asia and then move to the US. I know a lot of Asia leans more in to nepotism but feels like this might be less of the case in SG
Not OP but
- SG elite merit based education (Raffles/Hwa Chong) produce way smarter and nerdier and less charming type comparing to the elites in the US like Andover/Exeter/Lawrenceville/Nueva.
- You need to know local SG to get into their circles else you'd be just hanging out with expats. There are also a ton of young Chinese national so dating is pretty good as a male with high salary, not much for female.
- I would say HK at its prime is definitely better than SG in terms of liveliness and and overall social scene. Local SG also settle down relatively early to get government housing support. And SG is way boring than HK and Shanghai on all levels and food is not as good as people claim.
- Career wise nope, I've only had friends who worked in Hong Kong IB before transferring back to NYC (have to do 1-2 more years extra before promotion though), and only people who's made it to US PE before moving back to SG for tax and family.
Thanks for adding on!
- Class and racism: Our educational indicators may be high, but people are more book-smart and good at following instructions rather than being inquisitive or thinking critically. IMHO Racism is one of those things that exists in sg but people feel uncomfortable with talking about it. The most you'll get are some judgemental glances, but it's unlikely for you to be assaulted. The country as a whole is pretty diverse because you have folks from different nationalities and backgrounds, but I would say that this doesn't really apply to the local population.
- Social life: Alcohol is really expensive and the local clubbing scene is dying, so people usually spend their evenings shopping, eating out or going for short getaways on weekends. If you're into bars/bar hopping, I personally feel that the country has a really good concentration of bars -- quite a few of them place within Asia's best 50 bars, including one that's ranked #5 in the world.
- Liveliness: Agree with what xyzdonttell said. However there are other ways to meet people, e.g. via run clubs, timeleft, etc. I've also had friends who used features like the BFF(?) function on bumble to find friends. The younger generation are usually pretty happy to socialise, but our culture is less open to small talk as compared to the us.
- Career mobility: afaik nepotism isn't as common in sg. From what i've seen, people usually move from other countries to sg instead of vice versa. The most I think that working in sg helps you with is maybe moving to other sea countries or china/hk, but even then it's most likely that those countries will require local language fluency.
Thought I would weigh in here. I'm an expat who grew up in Singapore for most of my life, my father worked in banking / PE / fund management in SG/HK for 25+ years, so I have some tangential knowledge about the landscape there (from his rants). Also seriously considered starting my career there so did a bit of research as well. Anyway, take what I say with a grain of salt as I'm in a different industry now.
I won't touch too much on the pros as other people have done that already and they are all very correct (cheap food, nice place, clean, safe, etc.)
Now for the cons. IB is not easy in SEA, each country has its own set of regulations and laws regarding M&A activity, meaning it takes a while to do deals, certainly a lot longer than the US or Australia. The only, I guess, positive aspect of IB in SG/HK is that the move to the buyside can happen a lot later. From my understanding in the US its normal to move at the analyst / associate level while in Asia it can be quite normal for VPs and MDs to transition. Anyway, I digress.
By extension this means that PE deals are hard to push through (for reasons above) in addition to the rampant corruption that exists in places like indo, phillipines, vietnam, etc. This is getting better and certainly there exist opportunities for growth (esp healthcare, energy, etc.) but these are systemic issues that will need to be addressed before it becomes a 'good' place to get deals done.
Now you mention you don't want to do investing as a long term career choice and this might be a good move from my perspective above, but there are still other things to consider.
The expat community is fairly small and consists of mostly brits and Aussies, you will also be interacting with lots of Asians and the culture is not always the best fit for everyone. I'm okay with it because I grew up around it, but my father is basically screaming now to get back to the US as he just feels that he wants to be around other Americans again. Keep this in mind. It is much harder to move from Asia back to the states than from the states to Asia, easy to get stuck.
Also its small country, you will have seen most of it by 1-2 years in. and (fairly importantly) Singapore will not change for you, if you don't like how people do their work or approach it, tough. Despite common misconception they will not worship the ground you walk on just because you're a foreigner, in fact if you work for anything other than a foreign MNC, you will not make it past upper middle management. This is one of the reasons I chose not to start my career there, I just wouldn't be promoted and certainly not as fast as my Singaporean colleagues.
THAT BEING SAID. I love Singapore, I consider it my home, and whenever I go back to visit my family, I feel very comfortable and 'at peace.' I have a nice routine there and I never need to worry about things going wrong or being mugged or the son setting at 4pm or freezing to death (it is fucking hot though so be prepared). We also don't really have the woke shit here, not sure what your thoughts on it are but in my opinion the lack of it means that it's just easier to live without the fear of offending everyone.
Anyway always happy to message privately if you want to reach out and ask for more clarification. People can get bogged down in the 'good' of Singapore as there are immediate benefits with the tax and cost, but the 'bad' stuff usually manifests after a few years so its harder to see.
Omnis necessitatibus animi qui. Veritatis aliquam debitis et eos totam. Consequatur id est est ducimus et. Asperiores consequatur earum veritatis neque.
Modi ea voluptatem et ut enim molestiae numquam ut. Corrupti non quia ea et nostrum officia. Et vel rerum eveniet aperiam sint iure tempora quo.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...