Are you known to be late for meetings or appointments? Do you feel stressed because you can’t seem to find time to have dinner with family members, go for your spa session or finish your work on time?

Are you always rushing your children from one place to another, taking them to ballet, French lessons, violin practice and other dreadful “enrichment” activities, and feeling more exhausted than they?

If you answer YES, heaven has mercy on your soul for you’re being condemned to a lifetime of penal servitude, no different from a convict doing hard labour.

With an aging population, there is an increasing need for more professional healthcare providers. Ms Theresa Cheong, Head of Allied Health Sciences, EASB tells JobsCentral more about jobs in the healthcare industry.

1) How many allied health professionals are in shortage in Singapore at the moment? What is the estimated figure to be like in the next few years?

We have about 800 physiotherapists and this figure on a per population basis is way behind that of HK and Australia. The HK standard is 1 per 30,000 population, and Australia 1 to 10000 to 12000 population.

The comparative ratio for Singapore is 1 per 50,000 persons based on a population of four million. We will need another 500 physiotherapists to bring the comparative ratio down to 1 in 30,770.

Singaporean women in the accounting and finance sector want better work-life balance, says a survey conducted last May on more than 700 female professionals in the public and private sectors in Singapore.

Almost 60 percent cited work-life balance as their top priority, over other concerns such as opportunities for advancement, job security and skills upgrading. And more than 50 percent of those polled said they would leave their current job for one that offered a better work-life balance, even if it means less money.

It’s probably not just women, but men too, who need to find the right balance between work and their personal life.

Are you married to your work?
It can be tempting to rack up the hours at work — especially if you're trying to earn a promotion or extra money to send your child to university or for a dream vacation to the Caribbean. For others, it is simply necessary because of the heavy workload.

But if you're spending most of your time at work, what suffers is likely to be your home life and personal relationships. If you are perpetually working overtime and on weekends, you may miss out on important events such as your child's first bike ride, your father's 60th birthday or a reunion with your old friends. Missing out on important milestones may harm relationships with your loved ones.

So you aspire to be a chef? Do you have the patience to spend 15 hours in a hot, stuffy and greasy kitchen cooking up a storm for your customers? Are you able to create innovative and tasty dishes? Do you understand food ingredients well enough?

Will you remain passionate enough to go on, even after receiving criticism from demanding customers? Do you value your food?

If your answer is a resounding Yes!, you may have what it takes to be a chef.

Being a chef is not just about cooking. It’s a job that requires hard work, creativity and passion. Chef Jonathan Koh, head chef at Miss Clarity Café says, “A good chef has to love and respect food. Proper treatment of food is important to ensure that the end result is good. Food has to be packed and stored properly to maintain its freshness. Timing is also vital. The time spent on preparing and cooking the food will affect its taste.”

Whether you are struggling to write your résumé or attempting to answer questions like ‘Where do you expect to be in three years from now career-wise?’ at a job interview, a well written career plan is a helpful tool in addressing these ‘challenges’. Writing your career plan forces you to think tactically and strategically. It also helps you to identify your strengths and weaknesses besides your natural talents. Writing a career plan also provides an opportunity to examine your personal attributes critically. Career planning provides a chance to explore episodes and experiences in your life that impacted your attitudes, beliefs and may even have been turning points in your career.

A well thought through and effectively written career plan is an exercise no one can afford to miss in the 21st century working world. With the disappearance of job security, an annual review of your career plan can provide the much needed impetus to propel you forward and even upward in your career. In writing the career plan you will assess the past year’s events in your career. If it has been a ‘monotonous’ past year with no new or exciting opportunities, you will inevitably think of something to do to break the monotony. If you have made career gains, you will think of ways to consolidate the gain.

Whether you are driving a forklift, making fengshui divination or lecturing in economics, you must stand out and be recognised by everyone as the expert in your trade.

Not too long ago, to be an expert meant that you had to have an advanced degree and be doing a specialised job for years. Today, people will pay attention to you if you can deliver what they need, regardless of your professional experience or academic qualification.

Experts are sought after. They get cushy job offers and business opportunities, and command high fees. Even expert forklift drivers are in high demand as trainers and to display fancy moves in industrial competitions.

Reporters interview them whenever an issue or situation crops up in their area of expertise. They get invited to speak at conferences. And if they own a business, their firm gains more market share than their competitors. They are not anonymous because people recognise that they know more.

By Mr Tim Hird, Managing Director of Robert Half Singapore

(15 Dec) 2009 - The Ministry of Manpower today issued its labour market report for the third quarter of 2009 (3Q2009). Amid the recovering economy, employment grew 14,000 in Q3 09, offsetting losses in the preceding two quarters. Services employment rose 12,700, significantly higher than the gains of 7,500 in Q1 09 and 3,800 in Q2 09. In particular, services industries with external exposure (e.g. in terms of international trade and visitor arrivals) such as hotels & restaurants (400), wholesale & retail trade (1,300) and financial services (2,100) added jobs, after shedding workers in the first two quarters of 2009.

Over the last 12 months, many organisations have undergone varying degrees of corporate and manpower changes. With businesses now gearing up for growth amid improving overall economic prospects, they face the challenge of attracting the best people from a limited talent pool and retaining them, or risk missing the recovery bandwagon due to a lack of suitable ‘business ready’ resources.

Being out of work for an extended period can get you down. Even worse, whenever you apply for a vacancy, you know there will be many others applying for the same post, and – what the heck – many of these people are still employed!

You feel you can’t compete with them because prospective employers are more likely to favour such people when looking at applicants. (Employers don’t like idle people, you suspect.)

Thankfully, this is not true.

Saying nothing
A resume-writing adviser from ExpertResumes.com says if you are unemployed for less than a year, your best strategy may be to say nothing about it in your resume.

“Shorter time frames of up to a year or so aren’t absolute necessities to explain on a resume,” says Teena Rose. If you are still jobless after more than a year, a possible strategy is to fill the time with useful but unpaid activities such as community work, special projects or a study programme.

From its home base in Singapore, SingTel has, through its strategic investments, transformed into Asia’s leading communications company. With more than 249 million regional mobile customers, it is also the largest multi-market mobile operator outside of China. Today, it is listed on the Singapore Stock Exchange as the largest company by market capitalisation. On the global front, it is aiming to be the top info-communications technology (ICT) solutions provider in the industry.

For SingTel to lead and shape the markets it competes and operates in, it has to continually invest in both its infrastructure as well as capabilities. This includes building its human capital with a strong commitment to talent management and development.

A key feature of SingTel’s corporate strategy is thus to be an Employer of Choice.

The University Scholars Programme (USP) is an interdisciplinary academic programme for National University of Singapore (NUS) undergraduates. Admitting 180 students each year, USP offers the freedom to explore across disciplines, a wide range of extracurricular and overseas opportunities, and a community of exceptionally motivated and talented students.

My Major + USP
USP is an honours programme, not a monetary scholarship. Students admitted to USP are concurrently enrolled in one of six NUS faculties or schools – Arts and Social Sciences, Business, Computing, Design and Environment, Engineering, and Science. They earn 30% of their academic credits in USP, and 70% in their home faculty or school. Upon their successful completion of USP requirements and an honours programme, students will graduate with an honours degree from their faculty or school, and a certificate that recognises them as University Scholars.

USP Interdisciplinary Curriculum
At USP, students can choose from a wide range of interdisciplinary modules, on topics as diverse as The Mind, Human Relations, Evolution, Simplicity, and Sonic Arts. USP students take a writing module in year one, which provides a foundation in writing and thinking critically. These modules are taught seminar-style, with class sizes ranging from 12 to a maximum of 35 students. This facilitates interaction amongst professor and students. Beyond year one, additional for-credit options available to USP students include individual research with a faculty mentor, overseas academic exchanges, and entrepreneurial internships.