(From L to R: Prof Aaron Thean, Provost of NUS, Mr Daryl Chee, Infrastructure Engineer, GovTech Singapore, Ms Janet Ang, Chairman of NUS-ISS, Mr Sydney Gunady, Software Engineer, NCS Group, Ms Linda Lee, Software Developer, DBS Bank, Minister Tan See Leng, Ms Jane Lee, Associate Application Consultant, NTT Data, Mr Andrew Kwan, Associate Software Test Engineer, VISA)
As part of the NUS-ISS Annual Luncheon 2023, we were pleased to uncover the stories of five graduates from all walks of life. These five graduates had the chance to speak with Dr Tan See Leng, Minister for Manpower and Second Minister for Trade and Industry prior to the event to share how their careers have been empowered and their lives turbocharged for professional growth.
Two of whom had a media background, Andrew and Linda.
From Media to STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) Industry
The VISA Technology Traineeship Programme (VTTP) had been a 360 degree transformation for Andrew. After graduating from university, he worked as a freelance actor, animator, and writer before working at a small start-up doing game design and producing audio fiction. At the time he contributed to basically everything that was “non-tech” related such as narrative design, art, script writing and project management.
The VTTP programme in collaboration with NUS-ISS became the bridge for him to gain hard skills such as programming languages, understanding industry standards and frameworks, and soft skills such as communication and leadership, where he now works as an Associate Software Test Engineer at VISA.
For Linda, her career had also transformed radically as her current role is completely different from my previous one. She came from the media industry at Walt Disney where she was a video editor for a long time; doing censorship, handling different languages for mixing and delivering TV programs according to broadcast specifications. She is now a software developer and part of a team at DBS Bank that builds and maintains features in NavPlanner on the Digibank mobile application as well as the DBS internet banking site.
Her motivation? Having watched a video about an 81 year old Japanese lady who learnt how to make a game on a mobile application. This inspired her to learn how to code from watching YouTube videos, and piqued her interest to make a career switch. When Linda learnt about The Institute of Banking & Finance Technology in Finance Immersion Programme (TFIP), she made not one but two applications, with much determination after being unsuccessful the first time round.
To this, Minister Tan gave his heartiest congratulations and mentioned them in his speech as role models.
Watch the rest of their stories here in the full Partners Video.
Once again, we would like thank all our graduates and partner organisations - Accenture, GovTech, IBF, NCS and Visa who have made this possible!