We are all born to do some work. Even if you are born with a golden spoon, you have to do some work to while away your time otherwise you will find your life too boring.
To choose a profession is a constant puzzle to all students, career guidance teachers and even parents. Career guidance teachers and parents generally believe that the students themselves should make the choice because they have to do the work they have chosen throughout their lives. This view seems logical because they are afraid that the students would blame them if they do not eventually like their recommended professions.
Does a student know enough at this young age to make such an important choice for a life time?
Many a student thinks he knows but often wind up choosing a career that is not completely satisfactory. Some frustrated ones eventually make a change after having wasted several years. I have seen many, including my only son who did a civil engineering degree course, changed to do accountancy. He is now happily making money from his investment.
Does it make sense when a student says that he likes science and mathematics so he must be a doctor or an engineer? If a subject called ‘How to make money?’ is taught in school, I believe almost all the students would like to study this subject and finally choose the profession of making money.
Happiness is every one’s ultimate aim in life. How can you be happy if you do not have enough money? Just look at your parents, in all their lives they have been working hard for money, spending prudently and trying to save some money for their children’s education and for their retirement when they are old. So, the most important consideration is money.
Which profession pays the best salary?
According to statistics, people in the banking and financial institutions enjoy the highest income on average. There are so many banks in every town or city and invariably the top 1 or 2 jobs in every bank are accountants. Accountants can easily find employment.
There are more than 1,000 public listed companies in Malaysia and invariably the top 2 or 3 jobs in every company are people involved in accountancy or finance. Top accountants usually become Chief Financial Officers and eventually become Chief Executive Officers of listed corporations. The CEOs of public listed companies enjoy the highest salary among all professionals. Even small companies pay their CEOs a few hundred thousand ringgit per year. The larger ones pay their CEO much more.
From the internet, I saw this report from The Malaysian Business Magazine Edition August 16th, 2011:
Here is the TOP 10 Highest Paid Directors for 2010 :
Rank Name of Director Company Amount Earned (RM) Million
01 Tan Sri Lim Kok Tay Genting 106,700,000
02 Tan Sri Lee Shin Cheng IOI Corp 53,100,000
03 Tan Sri Lim Kok Tay Genting Malaysia 42,150,000
04 Datuk Sri Mohamed Nazir Abdul Razak CIMB Group Holdings 12,000,000
05 Tan Sri Vincent Tan Chee Yioun Berjaya Corp 11,750,000
06 Sandip Das Maxis 10,350,000
07 Tan Sri Teh Hong Piow Public Bank 9,302,000
08 Tan Sri Liew Kee Sin SP Setia 9,113,000
09 Tan Sri Yeoh Tiong Lay YTL Corp 8,500,000
10 Datuk Sri Edmund Santhara Kumar Ramanaidu Masterskill Education Group 8,500,000
The above salaries were for 2010. Can you imagine how much they are paid now?
Many of a student would say that he does not like accountancy because it is a boring profession. What is so enjoyable for an engineer in surveying or supervising construction work in the hot sun? You must bear in mind that it is likely the employer, a contractor or developer, is a businessman without tertiary education.
Fortunately we still have people who are really interested in engineering, otherwise we will not have so many buildings, highways and other infrastructures. Among the several branches of engineering, civil engineers have less difficulty in finding employment.
In most cases, if the job pays well, anybody will not mind if the work is not too enjoyable. So, it all boils down to money, the most important consideration. The average income for accountants is more than the average income for doctors or any other profession.
Many of my scholarship applicants are not sure what they want to study. To save my time and effort, I have prepared this article for them. I have given scholarships to about 300 poor students whose family income is less than Rm 3,000 per month to help them complete their tertiary education. Some of my scholarship recipients have already graduated.
When they graduate, they do not need to work for me nor they need to pay me back the amount I spent on them. They only have to promise me that when they are financially solvent, they must remember that I help them when they were poor and they should help other poor students. I hope many of the graduates will continue to do charity when I die.
I am 82 years old. I have already written in my will that all my remaining assets will be for charity after I die. At the meantime, I am trying to make more money from the stock market.
I hope this article is helpful to you, as students, career guidance teachers or parents.
