I earn 55K a year currently working in customer services. Have Masters in Business Administration. Already have 2 year experience now in a Big Health insurance organization. Not sure how to increase my income. It seems to increase like a snail. Need advise people. The only draw back i see is that I ve been in Australia for 6 years now and only local experience matters. Open to all advises. Think about business but not sure or any skill. HELP
How Do I Increase My Income ! Help Needed
Lzhk89 on 05/12/2019 - 17:22
Comments
That shouldn't impact on your job hunting abilities too significantly, but it's something to perhaps recognise.
What? Someone who cannot write fluent, top-level English should not be working in a professional services role. The standard is very high for a very good reason. It leads to poor communication, missed deadlines, confused customers, and even potential lawsuits when customers think they were told something which isn't true. There is no "good enough" when it comes to speaking English. Your written and verbal skills should be 100% fluent. Having a strong accent is fine, but you should still be able to use the right words and convey the right meaning. No exceptions.
Then it must be your attitude :)
No, it is not.
You came here for advises and you're getting advice and ignoring it completely. My personal advice is that this is why you can't get a better job. You ignore others or think you're better. Employers are looking for effective and humble team players. This isn't you right now.
earn more money
/thread
Did you complete your education in Australia? Did you work before your MBA?
Yes masters in Australia and the rest overseas. Had little experience before MBA not much.
If you have an oversea bachelor and an Australian Master, that is practically the same as having no degree in most employer book. A lot of oversea bachelor is not recognised in Australia. Having a master in your resume doesn't really help at all. A Master degree only helps you in the executive and management positions but no one will hire a person with no experiences for these positions.
To get experiences, you need a junior position, but I can see it will be hard for you to even get one. Since employer will mostly consider Australian citizen with Australian education first, then international with Australian bachelor. You are dead last ladder and you have to be exceptional to stand out.
Your field is also highly competitive and not in very high demand as opposed to Engineering, Computer Science, Nursing and Healthcare.
It also depend if you are really passionate about business management or if you are just in it for the money?
If you are just after the money, there are a whole host of blue-collar jobs that are widely available and pay extremely well. You are taking $70k-$100k a year with just a few weeks to a few months training
Tbh you can get Master qualification in Business/Accounting/Finance really easy in Australia from grade B universities where I bet OP did his study from.
what have you tried in the last 6 years to increase your income?
I tried Hospitality work / Sales / UBER and ended up on Customer Services and I am stuck. Thanks for asking some concerned questions about the post.
Maybe continue with sales if you can pull it off.
Earning potential can be uncapped if you get really good at it
Other jobs you mentioned will always be low income earning
https://www.seek.com.au/business-administration-jobs
Apply for everything, continuously. It may take a while, it's a competitive market out there.
Appreciate your concern :) Will do.
You may need to have a pay cut and start at the bottom. Stay a maximum of two years at the bottom, and move on. The 'bottom' places won't pay much for your experience, but the next job will.
Come back in 2 years and thank me.
pay cut as in something like 40-45K but related work?
@zhk89: Yep, take a junior job in the field you want to get the experience. The experience in this sense, is field experience, not knowledge.
Once you're in, stay there while looking for a better role.
So in this sense, you may feel you're taking a step back, but you'll soon be two steps ahead. Rinse and repeat until you've reached your destination.
Just remember though, money isn't everything. Mental health is worth more.
@rompastompa: Thanks for taking your time to advice something sensible :) I will look for this option.
@dcep: No man, haven't you been reading the thread? The OP's English is perfect and we are the ones who are all incorrect!
Employers and recruiters can see if you are spamming seek job ads. Be mindful. Go for quality over quantity.
Also sharpens your application if you tailor it meaningfully. The more you do with full attention to get the perfect application, the better your get at seeing the patterns in job ads and nailing the covering letter and cv
If you have excellent written English skills it should be easy to write in excellent English all of the time.
I think some people are getting annoyed and doubting your abilities because you aren't displaying excellent English in your posts.The assumption being made is that either you dont have excellent written English at all and have no insight to that, or that you are generally lazy or you dont have enough respect for anyone on here to make an effort to communicate effectively.
All of those things relate to a bad attitude, people are wondering if this is a problem for you and is actually the real reason you cant move forward in your career.
If you wrote your posts in the excellent English you claim to have, it would help people clearly understand you and motivate them to help you.
Denying that you have a problem writing in English with responses littered with mistakes gives people the impression that you are unable to accept feedback and have no self awareness both of which are undesirable qualities in an employee.Having an MBA as an overseas graduate is not unique, its a very common study pathway and there are thousands of people like you out there who studied an MBA as an overseas student, to the point an MBA no longer holds the prestige it may have once had. Unless you have senior management or executive experience its probably not going to help you at all.
Your most recent work experience is what potential employers are going to consider.
Two 2 years as a customer service agent is very unlikely to help you obtain a management role backed by your MBA, especially if you have not progressed and gained promotion within your company.
If you work for a big health insurer and earn $55K, presumably you are still in an entry level role.People advance their careers by either being ambitious or being acknowledged for excelling and promoted.
Its not always about chasing a higher salary either because sometimes in the long run it can pay off gaining experience.
It might be easier for you to look at the hierarchy structure in your workplace and find out what you need as a skill set and qualifications to take the next step up, presumably you could be a team leader, then a manager.
You can ask for a performance appraisal from your manager and let them know you want to climb the ladder and expand your skills and find out what you need to do that.
Once you gain some management experience, then changing to a different field becomes easier.
A persons attitude is everything in finding success.
*… an MBA no longer holds the prestige it may once have had.
*a person's attitude
Your first correction is overly prescriptive. The original - "an MBA no longer holds the prestige it may have once had" - reads fine to me, and has a long history in literature.
Great advice for the OP, especially the last line about attitude. Having started my career again from the bottom and watched others since, it's attitude that brings opportunities.
One of the best ways to advance in the workplace can be by getting to know your colleagues, attending after work activities, building friendships outside your core area.
One of the best ways to advance in the workplace can be by getting to know your colleagues, attending after work activities, building friendships outside your core area.
Haha…username checks out!
“ ..an MBA no longer holds the prestige it may have once had. Unless you have senior management or executive experience its probably not going to help you at all.”
Have a few contacts who have done an mba with 0 experience (straight through unis) and expect it to be a golden ticket to senior mgmt, always makes me chuckle
Have a few contacts who have done an mba with 0 experience (straight through unis) and expect it to be a golden ticket to senior mgmt
Worked for Ryan Howard, although I think he lied about going to Thailand.
MBA is a great pathway to working in a bowling alley
I agree. I came over as an International student and pursued a Masters degree. I still had to start from the bottom despite have a few years experience working in my country of birth. It took 8 years to get the role I really wanted to grow into a career. 8 years of having to swallow my pride and taking on roles that were probably more junior than I would have liked but it's paid off for me now.
Unfortunately, you're sold a dream as an International student. That all you need is your master's degree and you can pick up right where you left off which is unlikely unless you go back to your country of origin.
The only advice that I can give is that don’t stick to one job for more than two years if there is no promotion at the end of the second year. Start making plans to jump to a different company 12 to18 months in.
If you really want some help let us know what type of jobs you are applying for.
Give us a sample of your Resume, you can blank out personal details.Until we have this information, we won't really be able to help you as people are jumping to conclusions.
Show us a cover letter and a resume tailored to a job you would consider is within your skill set.
It seems Master's are the new Bachelor's.
OP; what sets you apart from all the other job applicants? If I'm an employer why should I give you a job?
Op is an ozb. We take care of our own.
OP only joined up to post this.
Crime pays pretty well I hear.
And if you're particularly bad at it you can still end up getting free accommodation and food for life!
And gym facilities and a library of books to choose from.
Cleaning up crime scenes before the police get there , could be lucrative
i heard you get 1 coin per reservation
There are enough politicians out there… I don't think OP qualifies with his degrees anyway!
There is only one answer to this, chance. You're doing pretty damn well already, if I were making that much I would consider myself on easy street.
I dont want to stir the pot here but 55k salary while living in greater sydney area isnt easy street.
You can get by with proper budgeting but need to hold back on lifestyle spending like yearly holidays.
Not everyone can be on $125K, like Whirlpool.
Whirlpool is >$220k
Talk to your employer about opportunities.if you dont tell them you want to grow, they wont know
+1
@zhk89, talk to your leader about your ambitions and ask them for help.
Talk to them about your development plan and where you want to be in one, three or five years' time. Don't ask them "How Do I Increase My Income !"
With 2 years in customer service you should know the business well by now. Look for internal job opportunities (even secondments) either within the business or IT department. Something like a junior business analyst could be a good start.
You may not get an initial pay rise, but it should be a stepping stone in the right direction.
great reply guys. Thanks for great suggestion :) Actively doing it and waiting for the right move.
Good advice. Companies want good workers so they're always willing to support their development.
You go on seek or any other job listing and start sending your CV.
You ask your mates for any openings at their jobs.
You start a business of your own.You sure you graduated uni?
I heard that picking fruits in farms earns 6-figure salary.
Now you have had lots of advises will you do the needful?
And kindly revert back to us with your findings
"do the needful" - oh boy
i think the advises he gots now should help him gets lots
I wouldn’t recommend you become an English teacher
I mean why post these unhelpful comments unless you're trying to be mean.
Wow thanks legend
Fair: English teaching is garbage money.
Unfair: you're just being a jerk.
We can only give advice based on the information we have before us. So, first thing is to work on your written and verbal communication skills. Second, you’ll need to adjust the attitude a bit. It appears you don’t appreciate constructive feedback.
Employers can tell when going through applications and in interviews which candidates think they pretty much know it all. These candidates rarely get the job.
I believe ozbargain is not a right platform to post career related queries, however I would suggest you to spend time of your CV and make a goal to apply for max 2-3 jobs per month with proper research; and yes as lot of people will suggest you try networking, use LinkedIn to find people and try connecting to them through facebook :)
Bikies
We need more information from you.
You're in customer service. This is a low skill job which means all you have to offer is your time, so your pay will always be limited. It doesn't matter what qualifications you have.
In saying that, you say you do have some education and perhaps experience in other fields. So then I ask you, what do you actually want to be doing?
What have you done to get a job in that field / profession? Have you applied for openings? When you did that, what happened?
If you provide us with this information, I think people will be able to give you better advice.
Some thoughts on how to get a better paying job.
- Give up feeling entitled.
- Give up being defensive about your English. Your English appears good, but not great.
- Start business relationships by creating a feeling of relatedness with the person you're talking to.
- Leave thoughts of your old country behind. What you used to be & where you used to live - nobody cares, except on a personal level.
- Write down your goals and start living into who you want to be.
Get your rll dump truck license apply for every dump truck job WA is where you will most likely be moving to its hot but it will make you 100k+
Thanks :)
Gotta take the move to WA. Gotta put up with up to a year trying to get your foot in the door on a minesite, when people with mates are getting picked before you. Gotta put with zero job security once you're in, cause you should just be grateful to even have gotten in. And then try not to become a suicidal alcoholic like the rest of them on the site.
Did u expect tha jus because u have masters degree you are automatically entitled to a big income??Sheesh….
Self entitled much? Unfortunately for u, employers are interested in yeas of experience in the right fields.. U have years of experience as a student.All right folks morning troll feeding is over go about your daily business now
At work:
Its all about right place, right time and right attitude. The main one that you can influence is the right attitude. Say yes to things. Take on as much responsibility as you can. Learn the hard things. Do the boring things that no one wants to do and do it with a smile. Anticipate what your manager wants. Make your mamagers job easier. Don't complain unless it is absolutely warranted and even then consider whether complaining is worth it. Go to work events when they occur (even if they are family events and you don't have a family). Talk to the managers. Ask them about their lives. How are their family? Are they going on any holidays any time soon? And when it comes to opportunities, don't be afraid to leave and go somewhere else for a small incremental move. Your company doesn't owe you a career progression and you don't owe them anything past your last paycheck.
At home:
A dollar saved is a dollar earned. Prioritise needs over wants. Don't borrow for any depreciating assets except for a car if you need one to get to work. Don't try to keep up with the Joneses.
But also balance frugalness with enjoyment of life. Money is only part of the equation. Happiness is the end goal and that involves balancing money, lifestyle, relationships, friends and family.
Good one thanks :)
And try upskilling to a hardskill that you enjoy alot. For eg. Forensic Accounting, Risk Assessment, DevOps, Business Analysis, Information Security, Education Advisory, etc. It's all about finding your niche.
THIS
OP, ozbargain doesnt have a messaging system so I can't send you a personal message. But if you use reddit, let me know and I can send you a PM. I was once in your situation and I know what you're going through. I can waste time writing a comment here but its not going to connect, and people generally just frown about the truth and reality that exists in australia for immigrants. Aussies might look like they are ok and accepting of immigrants but inside they really aren't. Anyway let me know.
OP, ozbargain doesnt have a messaging system so I can't send you a personal message
o really!!!!!
It does, but he is a 20 hour old member
I mean I think its simpler then that. Hiring somebody is pretty much like any other transaction. Immigrants with bad communication skills, and without the grasp of the local customs are worth less to the business then those without such disadvantages. Obviously this depends on what field you're in. Write code in a basement all day and only communicate through commit messages and memes and your language skills will come far secondary to your technical skills and I have worked with plenty of immigrant devs who succeed just fine. 'Business' is very reliant on soft skills, so much so that even with a MBA, OP is probably deemed unqualified by his language skills alone. You cant expect people who are hiring to hire a 'worse' candidate anymore then you or I would knowingly pay the same for an inferior product. Something that should offend all of us, this being OzBargain after all.
Honestly…just based on your question and some of your responses, you've got to work on your written English.
This isn't a personal dig at you…it's super critical to employers, especially with people where English isn't their first language.
I've been on panels and witnessed candidates bring instantly struck off because their CVs and written responses had all the signs of English as a second language.
Bring this up to speed and you'll be fine.
Welcome to the hidden reality of modern slavery where you are indebted to paying back your HEX and exorbitant rent/mortgage, realising your career choice is not what it seemed and unable now to re-train or basically do anything except be stuck in the chaste system of being a slave to debt.
HEX is a choice.
Welfare system is adequate to significantly offset rental in outer suburbs.
Career choice is a… well… choice.
Unable to retrain… It's actually unwillingness… unless mentally impaired.
Modern "slavery" isn't remotely close to slavery. Stop conflating an atrocity with inconvenience.
What is HEX?
It's like a spell, but more expensive I think.
Higher Education Contribution Scheme
That would be HECS
@John Kimble: Yes, which is exactly why everyone here saying "HEX" is incorrect. HECS might be a curse, but it's still not a HEX.
Op chose to do a master's degree in a field already saturated with potential employees. No one forced him to. He could have chosen a field with much higher chances of getting a position, but he didn't.
Why is it you "slave to the government, slave to debt" people always want to shirk personal responsibility?
Uber may be your only option.
the amount of patronising comments in this thread…
Ironically, you're going to have to clarify the meaning of patronising.
For boosting your confidence and appeal to employers, become an excellent public speaker.
Attend toastmasters - it's cheap, held everywhere and easy to find online.
I'd also write in shorter sentences. Crisper, shorter sentences convey a better understanding of business English.
I'd also wake up every morning and try to spend 10-15 minutes willing yourself to be grateful for the opportunities you have, thinking that no job is too small or no job is too hard. Then spend 10 minutes at the end of the day meditating and reflecting on the positive things that happened and how you could have better reacted when you felt criticized.
If you genuinely work on having a positive attitude - which requires daily reflection - everything just becomes so much easier and people recognise that you are the type of person they want to work with.
Good luck
Thanks for you suggestion. Will definitely look for it
I thought toastmasters was for MCs and the like, may look into it.
Never limit yourself.
Being a good MC means you have to be good at public speaking. Being a good public speaker means you communicate well.
There are many more low cost hands on practical courses and experiences out there.
The challenge is to grab them, learn from them, evolve…
Toastmasters International is a not for profit training organisation that focuses on communication and leadership development.
Move to a more regional area where lower pay is offset by lower cost of living (eg: Mortgage). You might also find that there are less people with your qualifications willing to move regional so you can get a better role, say with local governments, regional businesses. A 4 bedroom brand new house on 766m2 block where I live costs $415000. Close to the beach, 30 minutes from a city. You might not get the capital gain of the city but you can live for the now and enjoy your life while you can.
as a college computer teacher, I once had 3 overseas-born guys come to me saying they had Masters of Computer Science (from some upstairs university I’d never heard of) - seeking exemption for my spreadsheet subject.
OK - I started with my standard first question - 'how do you create a formula in Excel?'
Immediately the leader looked anxious and exclaimed 'sorry sir - we never touched a computer!'
ah - so - that would be a - no.
Experience beats dubious certificates.
Ahh the typical MBA candidate with poor English skills. This is why MBA is a joke now. Any man and his dog can get one if you have the cash.
@SydStrand: If OP was an engineer, in IT, had a trade, in medicine, or basically (kinda) anything else tbh, his language would probably be much less of a deal breaker. Everybody I know in 'business' spends 90% of their work life in meetings, writing reports, or in meetings about writing reports. Seriously.. Listen to the now very wide range of people and work on your english skills.