Month: November 2021

Graduating into a world wrestling with a tyrannical virus isn’t easy, and even less so for Beverley, Harish and Fadzil, three young doctors from the Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine’s Class of 2020.

All three are Medical Officers and have been posted to different hospitals across Singapore. Beverley is with Tan Tock Seng Hospital in the department of renal medicine but is currently working in the National Centre for Infectious Diseases (NCID) to help see COVID-19 patients. Fadzil was posted to the cardiology department at Khoo Teck Puat Hospital and Harish is a month into his second posting at the Institute of Mental Health after spending four months at Changi General Hospital’s A&E department.

For Beverley and Fadzil, there’s no such thing as a fixed daily schedule. In the NCID, Beverley has to be ready for any sudden influx of COVID-19 patients or situations where her patients take a turn for the worse.

“The one thing I know for certain about my day is that I wake up at 5.45am every morning,” she laughs.

“Generally, mornings are the busiest as I need to look through patient case notes and find out if anything significant happened overnight. Then I do my rounds and act on any changes in treatment plans. On better days, we can go for a coffee break after that!”

Fadzil’s day similarly involves doing his rounds and writing up case reports, but in the cardiology department, an emergency could mean a life-or-death situation, where he could see his day’s plans change in a literal heartbeat.

“One of the most rewarding moments for me is seeing my patients get nursed back to the pink of health and leave the hospital better than when they first came in,” says Fadzil.

“I realised the importance of communicating in a manner where patients trust you. That was something I learnt in NTU through interacting with simulated patients. I can see now that it makes a big difference in whether your patients recover quickly or not,” he adds.

Beverley, too, credits the team-based learning system in NTU for helping her to adapt to the medical profession: “Solving class problems as a group closely mimics what doctors have to do daily. At work, we constantly interact with different teams and people depending on what is going on with our patients, so learning how to manage team relations as a student was invaluable.”

Over at the Institute of Mental Health, Harish’s day is a little more mellow. There, he works in the early psychosis intervention programme where he sees patients as young as 18 who are newly diagnosed with mental health issues. Together with other doctors, they evaluate and treat these patients as well as coordinate their long-term care.

“My time in NTU gave me a stable foundation on which to grow as a junior doctor. It gave me the flexibility to explore the areas of medicine I’m interested in, such as psychiatry, which I was already keen on during my fourth year at Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine,” says Harish.

This story was published in the Oct-Dec 2021 issue of HEY!. To read it and other stories from this issue in print, click here.

When Sangeetha graduated five years ago, it was with tears of joy. She had just spent one year fighting Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, juggling her studies with chemotherapy. Losing her hair was upsetting at first, she recalls. “But with the love and support of my family, I got over that quickly and was just excited to rock a new pixie cut in future.”

Not only did she beat second-stage cancer, she landed a plum role at Shell Singapore right after graduating as a member of the pioneer University Scholars Programme cohort. “Back then, I believed in working really hard and letting new opportunities find me. The plan still is to just be happy!” she says.

“My job as an inspection engineer was daunting fresh out of university, but over the years, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the balance of hands-on and analytical work that I’ve been given,” she says.

“I also realised that all my NTU experiences, such as hall life and being part of clubs, developed my soft skills such as adaptability, leadership and organisational ability. I gained the confidence to lead major work events at Shell over the years. Being able to take charge and make decisions has given me the chance to break the glass ceiling. I’m quite proud to call myself a young female engineer,” she says.

In 2016, Sangeetha drew on the love, care and support of her family members and friends when cancer threw her a curveball. Things have barely changed for the 28-year-old, who got married early this year and deeply values the ties that bind.

“It has been happy chaos planning for a wedding, new home and everything in between. Working from home means not having to commute so I can spend more time with my husband. We made a pact to try a new recipe every day for dinner,” she laughs.

“The one downside to moving out is that I’ve missed my family so much. They are so precious to me and I always end the day by facetiming them for hours!”

This story was published in the Oct-Dec 2021 issue of HEY!. To read it and other stories from this issue in print, click here.

She made our cover at the height of the Hallyu craze, starring in Living the Dream… Oppan NTU Style, a musical spoof of PSY’s international YouTube hit put together by about 100 NTU students from different clubs and societies.

Nine years later, HEY! cover girl Evangeline See, former NTU ACES cheerleader and Wee Kim Wee School of Communication & Information graduate, isn’t in South Korea but in New Zealand, where she settled down with her partner in 2018 and restarted her career in marketing.

It was difficult at first, Evangeline said, having to job-hunt in a country where she had no connections or knowledge of the work culture.

“After a temporary contract job, I landed a permanent marketing role in Philip Morris, a Swiss-American multinational. In Singapore, we don’t rely as much on recruitment agencies to find a job, but it is a huge thing here, so I had to learn about that,” she says.

“At work, I had to start from scratch and navigate the work norms and cultures, much of which was new to me. For example, there is less emphasis on hierarchy and more importance on visibility. It’s the norm to challenge your superiors or speak your mind if you don’t believe things are right. This was something I had to get comfortable with.”

Tough as it was, she is thankful that her four years of hall life, team sports and cheerleading in NTU taught her resilience and independence, helping her integrate into the new environment quickly.

“Living in New Zealand turned out to be perfect for a homebody like me. I enjoy the quieter life so I go on plenty of walks in nature with my dog. The breathtaking scenery is just the cherry on top,” she says.

“And when I don’t have to work, I can head to one of New Zealand’s many national parks, which are just a 45-minute drive away, or fly down to the South Island for a road trip. There are still many places to explore even though I’ve been here for three years.”

This story was published in the Oct-Dec 2021 issue of HEY!. To read it and other stories from this issue in print, click here.

Back in 2012, we marvelled at Nur Shabnam’s ease at switching worlds. At school, she was a chemistry major. After class, she would shrug off her lab coat and swap them for sky-high heels as a fashion model.

Her transformation did not stop there. In the nine years since she graduated from NTU, armed also with a technopreneurship minor, she has worked in two companies in two vastly different fields, completed another degree in business management, attained a postgraduate certificate in data science and business analytics, and is now even the co-founder of a data analytics consulting firm, which she runs alongside her day job as a technical analyst for Mastercard.

The jump from alchemy to analytics was propitious, spurred on by her first full-time job where she was exposed to data for the first time at Agilent Technologies.

“I was intrigued by the stories data could tell if handled well. I noticed that my team’s performance could improve drastically if I used our performance data to highlight our strengths and weaknesses,” says Shabnam.

“It is exciting to me because what the data displays may dictate the direction an organisation takes. My global exposure when I was an undergraduate, which included an exchange in France, has made such a huge difference. Today, I’m comfortable working with clients, partners and teammates from all over the world,” she adds.

This story was published in the Oct-Dec 2021 issue of HEY!. To read it and other stories from this issue in print, click here.

Work never stops for Lim Chuan Kai, not in 2014 when he was managing locals in Turkey’s most populous city, and not now in 2021, still working for Singapore Airlines (SIA). It is work of a different kind though for the father of one, who moved from Istanbul to Paris and back to Singapore in 2020.

“I spent a very enriching eight years abroad living and working in some of the biggest cities in the world. We started our international journey as two and ended with three! My wife and I had our daughter, Kaeley, in 2016,” says the 37-year-old.

The decision to end his globetrotting adventures came as a natural step when Chuan Kai realised he needed to do his part to take care of his ageing parents and grandmother – a duty which had rested solely on his younger brother’s shoulders for eight years.

As Head of Customer Contact Services at Krisflyer in SIA, Chuan Kai’s days are just as fulfilling as the time when he was a Station Manager in Istanbul managing the operational efficiency of the airline’s flights. These days, he works with his team to ensure that customers’ expectations are properly managed, especially with COVID-19 halting travel. One of the most challenging moments in this new role was having to formulate a strategy to deal with the 20,000 calls the call centre received at the height of the pandemic.

“I face different work challenges and exciting moments daily but now I also have my family to care for after work ends. I go to bed feeling accomplished knowing that I’ve done everything I possibly can for my loved ones and my company,” he adds.

Looking back on his life since NTU, where he represented Hall 6 in six sports, acted in plays, competed in dance competitions and chaired camps, Chuan Kai says that a particularly impactful moment in university – and which still serves him well today – was discovering the power of autonomy and making the most of this privilege.

“It hit me in university that it was entirely up to me to decide what I wanted to do, which sports I wanted to play, when I wanted to play them and how to juggle my time between studying and playing. I was free to devote my entire time to playing, but that also meant bearing any consequences on my own. I learnt how to take ownership of the decisions I make,” he says.

This story was published in the Oct-Dec 2021 issue of HEY!. To read it and other stories from this issue in print, click here.