Tips cari kerja untuk para graduan

2 years back, I wrote this email to my junior to serve as tips for their job hunting.

Hasil pengalaman saya menemuduga lebih seratus calon, dan membaca lebih 400 CV, inilah hasilnya:-

Resume

1. Kurang formal

Contoh:-

A. Gambar kat tepi pantai la, kat Mc Donalds la.. Ambil la gambar kat kedai gambar.. Professional photo shot

B. Email id yg tak sesuai. Nama penuh Ramli Ramlan, emailnya jadi jejakasunyi84@yahoo.com. Ada indikasi yg anda ni kaki chat.

2. Pengalaman bekerja atau praktikal atau kertas kerja yg tidak kena dgn jawatan yg diminta.

Contoh:-

Kursus Business Study mintak kerja bidang IT. Boleh dipertimbangkan kalau ada pengalaman bekerja, tapi kalau setakat baca buku "yada yada for dummies" pastu claim skill dah sampai level 8, lupakan la..

3. Butir2 terlalu am.

Contoh:-

knowledge in Linux <-- kena huraikan apa yg dah buat, tahu buat DNS server, tahu setup firewall, mail server, atau web server

4. Tak de surat permohonan

Personalised. Setiap permohonan tolong jgn letak standard application letter, dan ayat ni "to whom it may concern". Letak nama company kau korang apply, find out pasal department yg korang kena hantar CV tu.. Pastu letak dalam application letter. Cerita sikit pasal kompeni tu, puji sikit pasal kompeni, tulis dalam tu apa yg korang tahu pasal kompeni tu. Rayu mintak interview (Kalau tak panggil interview boleh dapat kerja ke?) antara ayat power "I appreciate if you could grant me an interview to further explore my experience and potential"

Pre-Interview

1. datang lambat atau on-time

Kalau kompeni panggil interview pukul 10am, derang expect 10am dah start interview, tapi korang mesti ingat yg korang MESTI kena isi application letter yg receptionist tu bagi. Tak kira la berapa cantik CV yg korang dah prepare sebelum ni. Kalau alamat kompeni tak familiar, pegi survey. Buat planning kalau dapat kerja tu kat mana nak stay kalau jauh sgt, transport dan sebagainya.

2. Pakaian tak presentable

Pakai la yg pakaian yg paling cantik, yang paling formal. Lagi bagus kalau korang pegi survey kat kompeni tu tgk cara staff derang dressing. Blend in. Kalau derang pakai T-Shirt, jgn le ikut. Untuk lelaki, Neck Tie penting. Jangan lupa minyak wangi yg secukup rasa.

3. Kurang hormat

Hormatilah receptionist dan juga cleaners. Dia orang manusia, mesti ada rasa hormat kat orang lain walaupun pencuci tandas. Kalau tandas tak cuci seminggu, agak2 sanggup tak korang gunakan?

Apa yg anda perlu buat:-

Interview

1. Off handphone

2. berterima kasih

Walaupun baru dipanggil interview, berterima kasih pada panel pasal dipanggil interview (Kalau tak panggil interview boleh dapat kerja ke?)

3. Berkenalan

Perkenalkan diri. Salam yg mana patut dgn firm grip bukan lemah longlai macam org tak de confident. Dapatkan nama orang2nya, dan email (email ni akan digunakan sebentar lagi). Bertanya pasal recent news pasal kompeni tu.

4. Duduk tegak

5. Gunakan pergerakan tangan tetapi bersederhana.

6. jgn silang kaki

7. jawap soalan dgn confident

elakkan ayat "i am willing to learn". sekarang masa untuk kerja, masa belajar korang dah berlalu.

8. soal balas

Tanya pasal kompeni tu:-

a. Direction of the company

b. Dimana anda di carta organisasi

c. Benefit (cuba elakkan sekiranya anda fresh grads)

d. Bila korang boleh dapat tahu result interview.

Post-Interview

1. Berterima kasih

Sebelum keluar, berterima kasih lagi.

2. hantar nota terima kasih

Gunakan email yg anda minta tadi untuk ucapkan terima kasih, & looking forward for your immediate feedback

Statistik

Secara purata:-

Dari 5 CV, 1 dipilih untuk interview.

Dari 5 interview, 1 dipilih untuk 2nd interview
Dari 2 2nd interview, 1 dipilih.

Secara peratusan, anda hanya ada 2% untuk mendapat kerja disatu2 tempat. Segala2nya bermula dari CV yg bagus. Kesimpulannya, pegi tgk balik CV tu dan dptkan nasihat pakar.

Sekian.

Probably this may benefits other fresh graduates too..

Taking newbie to bike hash

20080727: Kemensah's first ever bike hash by KLMBH

Jazlany, my cycling mentor adviced me to take scenic ride (as oppose to long ride) for my first bike hash at Pangsun. The main reason, the scenic term can be totally misleading depending on your fitness level.

For this particular bike hash, I took Pak Sham & wife for their first time ever bike hash. For the record, Pak Sham just pickup cycling about 2 months back. They were overwhelmed by the huge turn-up as they reached the RV (Kemensah is consider as backyard trail for most cyclist within the vicinity).

Bike Hash
The extensive explanation is here. In short, it's a trail ride where you follow square paper (if you are taking scenic ride) or rectangular paper (long ride). While scenic last for approximately 12-15km, long ride is can be anywhere around 25km.

Newbies taking break

The scenic ride from newbie's perspective
Puan Roziah (Pak Sham's wife) was saying, "I was imagining that the scenic ride will has some nice view but all I had was totally the opposite". On which Kelolo's reply was "well, this part of the trail we call the beach" (referring the place further up the hill where it is covered with sandy flat land). I can't denied it was a tough ride for a newbie, at least that's how I felt during my first hash.

10 year old boy navigating single track

Bottom line
In cycling particularly bike hash, we are not competing against other cyclist. It is a competition against your own capability, a challenge against your own capability and continuously pushing the envelope (another cycling mentor elaborate this in his blog on Pushing the Envelope). Despite feeling tired and wanted to gave up during the ride, both Pak Sham and wife set their mind to finished the ride and they did it! After the sign-off, their comment was they enjoyed the ride and wanted to do more of this next time. On which my reply was, "we can do FRIM or RRI next week".

Even though I missed to enjoy this my-own-backyard hash by taking the scenic ride, the excitement of getting not just 1, but a pair of newbie to enjoy MTB as much as I do, is a different kind of achievement that I found satisfying. After all, I can just do the loop some other time by getting the GPS tracklog from the hares.

Album/s
Yours truly

Cycling medication (part 1)

Left to right, top to bottom: hard plastic case, Panadol Extend, Voren Plus, Duzen, Menzza, Hydrocortisone

Hard plastic case
To keep the medication protected against accidental pressure

Panadol Extend
A fix to muscle pain after fall (read: endo or anything less than that)

Voren Plus
Apply to body part that sore due to what I suspect as ligament injury

Duzen
Apply to open wound (general)

Menzza
Apply directly to muscle soreness due to cramp.

Hydrocortisone
Apply to wound due to pacat(leech) bites or other insect bites that show sign of irritation.

Disclaimer: All information above are provided on the basis of sharing my personal experience. You shall you use common sense and/or consult doctor prior taking medication of the above.

Favorit bicycle

After a short ride with Pak Sham last night, I offered him to take a look on issues that bugging him on his road bike. To my surprise it was a 1975 Favorit road bike made in Czechoslovakia. I myself getting excited on restoring the condition of the bike.


Pics from Karavshin's Flickr

The following are what I had in mind and yet to share it with Pak Sham: -
1. remove the spokes (later replace it with a new one)
2. polish the wheel
3. clean up the hubs, cassette, chain
4. replace hub bearing and relube
5. replace headset bearing and relube
6. check the bottom bracket
7. restore the other parts and repaint if necessary

Knowing him as an avid antique collector, he would want it all in original form :D

Cadence is the key

A summary quoted from the original article at Spin Cycle - Bicycle Victoria

Maintaining a high cadence is part of good cycling technique. A few of the basics to remember are:

• Try to maintain a constant cadence. A cadence of 90–100 is best for riding on the flat
• Learn to use your gears. Small or low gears refer to gears that are easier to ride in (small ring at the front and large ring at the back). Big or high gears are the reverse (big at the front and small at the rear) and are harder to push
• Be aware of when you are starting to slow down or speed up and change gears accordingly
• Smooth gear changes decrease the chance of your losing speed
• Avoid 'grinding' away in high gears as this generates muscular fatigue in your legs and can cause you to lose efficiency
• Change down a gear coming into corners or at the start of hills and try to keep your cadence up.

Fuel Consumption of my new car

I bought my version of SLK (Small Little Kancil) few weeks back. It's 850cc and manual transmission. After a few much-needed fix, I start clocking the FC just for the record. Roughly I gained about 15km per liter for town driving (15% of the time with aircon).

Last weekend, I took the whole family to wife's kampung (180km away from KL). With full load of human, aircon all the way, maintaining 3000rpm (merely over 80km/h on PLUS highway!).

Result (as oppose to our mini MPV)
Pros
1. Better FC (18km/liter as oppose to 11km/liter)

Cons
1. Travelling time (30 minutes more)
2. Wife suffers backpain (seat has no lumbar support)
3. Kids wrestle for the right of their butt space
4. Being treated like a 3rd class citizen by those luxury cars & evo/impreza wannabe zooming left (on emergency lane) and right

God gave you lemon, you make lemonade?

My initial intention buying that Spesh frame from Mac was to setup a bike out of my parts surplus. It wasn't much of a surplus but I believe that it can turn up to be quadruple S, SSSS, or Specialized S-Works Single Speed. Soon after the frame resides on his new home, parts hunting begun. When begging doesn't work, I intimidated, harassed and threaten friends into selling me their parts surplus rather than sitting there collecting dust under their bed.

Spesh undergoing transplant to become SS

Once the SSSS project completed. I taken the Spesh for a ride and both of us survived. Soon enough, I harassed my wife into cycling, and succeeded. As the human greed will never stop, I starts dumping money to improve the Spesh, changing parts with Scott until the Spesh ready for its first trail outing.

Spesh at Lubuk Tedung/Kem Sleh junction, Kemensah

What I thought as "I need 17" frame that match my size" turned out to be that it takes more than that. I learned that apart the size, frame geometry is another important element that separate different regime of mountain biking.

Spesh, fitted with suspended fork given it a taller ride on front wheel thus lessen the degree of the headtube and seatpost angle. These introduced some difficulties for me on my overall reach as a result putting me on very awkward position taking decent where in most cases, taking the butt behind the saddle.

Scott vs Spesh. Take note on the headtube & seatpost angle

Finally, decided that Spesh has to stay on road with rigid fork on which turning the "flaw" into advantage. And Scott who benefited with new Shimano LX shifter, Avid Speed Dial 7 brake lever, and Avid Ball Bearing 7 mechanical disc brake enjoys his time outdoor in the wild.

I guess when God gave us lemon, we may spoilt some lemon before we can make that tasty lemonade.

The final specs as of 14th of July 2008

Raising a daughter

This morning, when I woke up, my eldest was in our room. I asked her to come closer and we had a talk, a session that I had missed for quite some time. Watching her grows beyond my pair of eyes and now she's almost as 5 feet at age of 10!

Raising a daughter at this new era where it wasn't safe enough to let them play outside, predator just wait for the right moment and next thing we know, it become the headline. I am torn between letting her socialize and being safe at the same time. Let alone the challenges of the bad influences she may has pick up from peers.

Apart telling her how to take care of herself physically whenever she's out there for school or Al-Quran class after Maghrib, telling her the right thing to do and to avoid picking up the bad influences from peers somehow has a very thin line separation.

From now onwards, I should lessen my cycling outing and spend more time with the love one.

Pak Sham

He was my management lecturer during my time at ITM (I insist in calling my college just like the way we left it, the original way despite the new UiTM). Funny enough, we met at Rodalink in Bangsar despite the fact that both of us live in Gombak.

His lesson on Maslow's hierarchy of needs really useful that in most occassion it helps me runs my daily life. Now that he just took up cycling, we hanged out quite often after our cycling exercise, more or less like me resuming my management lesson.

Pak Sham,

I believe that Allah brought us together for a reason.

Allah maha besar, Allah maha mengetahui.