M’sian Fresh Grad Ridiculed For Asking RM2,000 Salary in 2013, But Has The Situation Improved Now?

Going for interviews is an integral step before you get a job. Whether it’s conducted online or face to face, you’re focused on making a good first impression but it’s no surprise that these interviews don’t usually go your way.

Overcoming your fears and low self-esteem is one issue but what if the interviewer and to a bigger extent the job itself, simply isn’t conducive?

Facebook user Kiyomi Denise Lim shared her horrendous experience during an interview back in 2013 where she was ridiculed and only offered RM1,800 as a starting salary for a fresh grad!

Reading about what she went through during her interview will definitely anger you.

Despite only asking for a salary of RM2,000, she was ridiculed and told that she should be grateful she’s getting paid at all.  Despite this, they chose to hire her and offered her a salary of RM1,800.

When she ignored the offer, she got hit with a rude message that she didn’t even deserve the job because of HER “horrible attitude’.

Now, there are two aspects to her story that we need to analyse, the hiring process in a Malaysian company and the minimum salary a fresh graduate is supposed to earn.

Hiring process

Not only was Kiyomi treated rudely in her interview, but she was also discriminated for being a fresh graduate. Besides being judged for their experience level, some interviewees have also been judged for their gender, appearance, race and religion.

Kiyomi shared with WORLD OF BUZZ her experience of being an interviewer this time where she had to follow instructions from her superiors.

The screening criteria were gender and results. She had to filter out male applicants vs female applicants and then split them out by results above second upper class. After filtering and binning quite a number of resumes, her boss picked out five of the best male candidates based on their results and only one female candidate (out of the four that was left).

“Hm she’s cute let’s invite her for a chat.”

This was what she was told when she asked for a reason for selecting only one female candidate, to which her boss also added, “How do you think you got in?”

A survey in 2018 shows that for every rm100 of salaries and wage men earn, women earn rm93. 20. Picture for illustration purposes only.

How do we curb this? Well, for starters, let’s normalise NOT having pictures in our resumes as to be really frank, it doesn’t really serve a purpose. 

In a survey carried out in 2019 by  The Centre for Governance and Political Studies (Cent-GPS), it was found that Malaysians of Malay and Indian ethnicities faced more challenges to secure job interviews compared to Mandarin-speaking ethnic Chinese candidates in the private sector.

How much should a fresh graduate earn?

You might think, oh, this is 2013, is it still relevant now but I’m sure many fresh graduates could relate to Kiyomi’s situation here. Despite, the rightful starting salary for a fresh graduate is a minimum of RM2,500, it’s sad to note this isn’t case.

Fresh graduates are still earning below the expected pay and are supposed to be fine with it and are even told to be grateful that they even have a job.

According to Vulcan Post, only jobs relating to IT, sales, finance and e-commerce provide the employee with a chance to earn a good salary while the other professions STILL offer a salary below RM2,500.

However, according to Jobstore‘s survey, it was noted that the salary for fresh graduates at 2019 averages at RM2,635 which is an increase from 2018’s RM2,482. The company obtained this figure by compiling data from salaries in their database. Based on this statistic, Jobstore urges employers to pay fresh graduates their desired figure or benefit to retain talents.

Disclaimer: We realise that being in a pandemic, jobs are hard to come by and we need to grab whatever opportunity we get. However, always remember that as a future employee, you have your rights and don’t let anyone EVER revoke them!

Also read: 36yo Collapses & Dies During Job Interview As He Always Work OT in Previous Office