Corporate Survivor with Mei Phing : Career Growth In The Corporate World - Ep160: Why I quit my high-paying job.

Episode Date: January 6, 2023

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Welcome to the Corporate Survivor Podcast, where we talk about how to grow your career confidence, build your skills and value, increase your salary, and the many lessons we learn in the corporate world. For more career support, click on over to www.mayping.com. This is Mayping, your corporate leader turned career coach. I hope you enjoy, like and subscribe. Welcome back to a brand new season of the Corporate Survivor Podcast, the best place for you to learn everything that you need to know about the corporate world. Today, if you're watching live right now or listening live right now,

today is the 6th of January and it's a very special day for me. And therefore, in today's episode, I want to share with you the story of how I ended up becoming a career coach. So even up to today, having been a career coach for a few years now, I still call myself an accidental career coach. Now you might find it quite curious or interested or really wondering as to, hey Mei Ping, why do you still consider yourself an accidental career coach? And I thought that you have worked in the corporate world for such

a long time. So what motivated you or inspired you to make that career transition from an ex-corporate leader as someone who has achieved leadership positions, career success, climbed up the career ladder, worked in global multinational companies to making that big career success, climb up the career ladder, worked in global multinational companies to making that big career change, transitioning into a career coach, career mentor and career trainer nowadays. So in this episode, it's going to be a little bit of a story time. I'll walk you through a little bit of my career journey and the key event that really allowed me or rather, you know, pushed me to transition. And I'll also share a little bit about the plans that I have for the future

now that I am a career coach and a very committed one at that. So let's dive in. A little bit about myself. I graduated in 2008 and 2009 during the financial crisis. And I started my career in a very small company in an audit firm actually as an auditor, accountant and doing all sorts in the professional world. So throughout my entire career since 2008, I have always worked in the corporate world. That's really how I was trained, I was educated and really the path that I thought I had for myself until I retired.

So started my career in a very small company, as I said, wasn't paid the best. But during that, I learned a lot of very important soft skills and also connected with some people have truly helped me in my career. Then after that, I moved on to join Ernst & Young, a global accounting firm where I was in the audit assurance department. I was also involved in compliance, financial services, AML, and so forth. So that was where I got a bit of a taster as to what it really takes to transition from a small company to a big company, the culture, the structure, the people, and how to have a different mindset on that. So I also learned a lot in that second role.

Then after that, I thought that, hey, you know, I've been in advisory consulting assurance for a long time, then why not, you know, make the leap out into joining the commercial world? I mean, still the corporate world is, you know, a commercial company right now. And I had the amazing opportunity to join Visa. So Visa is one of the world's largest global payments company and in that I was in a role that allowed me to travel to more than 20 countries. So with Visa I've been to the US, I've been to Australia, Japan, many parts of Asia, you know China because in that role what I really enjoyed was the coverage was huge. So my coverage or rather my team's coverage at that time was Asia Pacific, Central Europe, Middle East and Africa. So with

that, you know, I got a lot of business travel. I also managed to work with many, many people from different countries, many colleagues. So I learned a lot as well. You know, as you can see up to this point, right, I've always been in the corporate world, just moving different types of companies. Then in 2015, I was on LinkedIn and I've been on LinkedIn since 2012. So it's been a long time. So in 2015, I was headhunted to join Standard Chartered Bank. So this was a completely new team, due diligence, risk management, compliance, you know, financial crime compliance and all the very, it's a very niche industry. So I was headhunted to join Standard Chartered Bank because I had a very strong LinkedIn profile.

I succeeded to get the job offer within days from those interviews, and I made the transition. So now I've moved from a commercial company, now joining financial services, joining banking, in a very niche industry that I know is extremely valuable. From that, my journey in Standard Chartered, I would say that it's about four to five years, but it's a very, very rewarding one, very busy one, but very rewarding one because I was promoted every single year. So I started as a senior executive in due diligence. Then within

three months, I was promoted to a manager. I got a salary increment. I was now handling a bigger portfolio, right? I had team members working for me. I was talking to the business leaders, the compliance leaders in multiple different countries. And at the peak of my career at Standard Chartered, I was the head of governance and control for the global banks, broker dealers and fintech portfolio covering 43 countries and over $1.5 billion under management. So as you can see, you know, my career in the corporate world, I'd say that, you know, it's going really well, to be honest. Like, you know, I was making six figures. I was in a very senior position. I was the youngest in my team. I was a senior director. I was working with C-suite CEOs, basically business leaders, you know, who had huge portfolios to run.

I had a lot of face time with C-suite as well. And everything was going well. It never crossed my mind at any point in time that, hey, you know, I'm just going to leave it all behind and quit. Honestly, never crossed my mind because, like I said, there was never the plan, right? However, in 2019, I, you know, got the news that my mom has, you know, again, you know, fell terminally ill. So basically it was a cancer relapse. So when she, you know, dropped me that text message, I read it. Very emotional, of course, but I made a very immediate decision that I was going to quit this job and return home to spend time with her as a caregiver and spend her last days with her. Because based on what the doctor said, we knew that she was not going to be alive for a much longer time. And I knew that, you know, if I give up this time, right,

it's not time that I'm going to get back. So this was really the event that I say changed the course of my career because it was then and then I decided that, hey, you know, I'm just going to quit and be a caregiver. And I'll think about my own career later because time is more important than money. Family is more important than money. And I've always talked about why it's so important to always remember why you are working so hard for, for yourself, for your family. Why are you working so hard for? Because, you know, you know, the corporate world, yeah, I mean, you know, you can see as a job, you can see as a passion, you can see as a long-term career, but, you know, at the end of it, you know, why are you working so hard for? And that was something that, you know, at the end of it, you know, why are you working so hard for it? And that was something that, you know, I'm really thankful that's not lost.

So I've always remembered why I work so hard for it. And that's why even when I was working overseas, regardless of which company I was working at, no matter how busy I was, I made sure that at least once a month, I will always travel home from overseas to visit my parents. So that's something that I have been doing for years already. So when I got the news, I thought it was a pretty easy decision for me to make at the time. So then I quit. But I will say that, you know, my bosses at Standard Chartered, specifically Heidi and Richard, I think they have been extremely supportive and they really spoke to me and, you know, gave me options on what I would like to do.

And they were also being very open to offer me sabbaticals or, you know, to work part-time or to work from home and, you know, to reduce responsibilities. There are a lot of discussions that were made, but at the end of the day, I decided that if I want to do something, I want to do it 100%. You know, I'm not the kind of person that like, if you want to do something, you know, if I were to do something 50-50, I wouldn't feel good about it. And I would still push myself because I feel like I want to be responsible to do everything properly and to do everything right and to do everything well. So knowing my own personality type, I think that if I were to take on

the part-time work and, you know, 50-5050 sort of thing I don't think it would work out and like I said you know overall it's a very big emotional time for my family and I just wanted like a really clean break so that was what happened in the middle of 2019 and this is probably something that you don't hear me talk about a lot because of course you know it's a very emotional time you know grief is very difficult so I don't talk about it a lot and that's why I understand that even up to today some people in my community my subscribers or my followers they frequently have this question as to you know what made me transition. And yeah, that's it. You know, it's the personal reason that I talk about a lot, but basically it's a family reason

or rather just choosing your loved one over your job. Maybe that's the best way I can say it. So, you know, continuing on from the time that I left. So I left Standard Chartered in 2019, in June 2019, actually. And I returned home to Penang, Malaysia to spend time with my mom. Now, the time when I left the corporate world, I knew it was the right decision. But there was one part of me that felt like, oh, if I'm leaving everything that I know behind, then like, what's next? And the second question, I guess the second thing I also thought of was, you know, if I want to still get involved

in the corporate world, what are some of the options? So these are just things that were at the back of my mind at that time. I wouldn't say like it's the most important thing, but it was just something at the back of my mind. So as I said, you know, I've been educated, I've been trained and I've been working in the corporate world for about more than 10 years at that time. So, you know, moving away from something that, you know, it's kind of scary to be honest, even though, you know, I knew that the reason was, yeah, I was just going to do it, right? So anyway, back to the second half of 2019, I really took a break, really spent time with my mom. I didn't spend that much time online, social media or connecting with a lot of my colleagues. Then come 2020, so back to the

end of 2019 to the early 2020, to be honest, I didn't really do much online. I didn't really start anything to be honest because that one year was a very, very important time for me to spend with my mom. And unfortunately, she passed away in July of 2020. And it actually took me quite some time to be able to talk about it. And only in last year, episode 100 of the podcast, where I actually shared a little bit more on what exactly happened. So like I said, you know, grief is something that is emotional. Grief is something that is difficult, and we all say that time heals, and I guess it does make it a little bit more comfortable to share, like I'm doing it in this episode right now, but I think overall, you know, time, space, it's things that will take time because it's emotional.

And in fact, this is the reason why I wanted to release this particular episode today. So if you're watching live or listening live to this podcast episode during the release, today is the 6th of January and today is actually my mom's birthday. If she were to live up till, yeah, if she would live today, then today would have been her 68th birthday. So this is a bit of a tribute and I think, you know, I felt a little bit more comfortable to, yeah, share a little bit more today. So anyway, back to July 2020 was actually the time that my mom passed away. So, you know, from there, you know, I took it really, really slow.

Now, that's basically the key event. Maybe event is not the best word, but the catalyst for my forced career change. And that's why, you know, like I said, up to today, I still call myself an accidental career coach. So back to the career coach part of it. So in 2020, as I said, you know, I was not really doing much online. However, in late 2019, early 2020, I had some friends and ex-colleagues who reached out to me asking me what I've been doing right now. And if I'm not keen to get back to the corporate world with the opportunities that they had for me, then would I be open to help them out with some career advice and some job search advice and just some tips on how to better handle people problems,

productivity problems, and some management experience as well. So basically, they wanted to learn from me and they thought that, okay, you know, if I am not going to go back to the corporate world, that means that maybe I might be open to helping them out a bit, which I thought was an interesting opportunity. And that's why even up to today, I still say that career coaching found me. I didn't found it. There were people who reached out to me, my acquaintances, my connection, my community reached out to me asking for help. And that was when I started doing little bit,

little bit, little bit. So in the middle of 2020, I took on a few clients at, you know, up to the end of 20 year 2020, right? when it's been six months since my mom had passed on and I was at that juncture where I asked myself at the end of 2020 am I ready to get back to the corporate world or do I feel like I want more time with my family and with myself to heal and at the end of 2020 I made that, okay, I want another one year to continue to spend more time with my family, to continue to heal. And maybe in the middle of it, I would get more involved in career coaching because at the time I was sharing career tips on LinkedIn and those were pretty well received. I had a lot of people reaching out to me asking for help. So I thought that, okay,

this arrangement is something that I think will work for me for the next 12 months. And, you know, at the end of 2021, I would then make that decision on what, you know, how that's going to look like. So 2021 was the time that I was healing. By the same time, I didn't want to fall into my own black hole. And therefore, I spent a lot of time experimenting with new content, new tips, new videos. And if you've been following me since 2020, 2021, you would have noticed that during that time, I tried so many different things. And I also took on a lot of new clients as a result of that. So more people discovered me on LinkedIn, Instagram, and YouTube, Spotify. More people discovered me, discovered the podcast, discovered the blog. And gradually, I started working with a lot a lot of clients now 2021

turns out turned out to be a very busy year for me and you know at the end of 2021 I really looked at all the clients that I worked with the hundreds of clients that I worked with and really asked myself like what are some of the common themes that of the problems and the challenges and goals that my private one-on-one clients are experiencing and how can I make this learning process more efficient because at some point right I was having so many and frequent one-on-one coaching calls and I started noticing that I'm giving the same advice or rather kind of like going through the same review process with many many clients and that kind of tells me that, okay, the problems are

similar, right? Maybe, you know, they are different people, slightly different situations, but your problems are not unique, right? Your problems may feel unique to you and special to you, but in the scheme of things, right? After working with hundreds of people and also layering my understanding of, you know, me as a manager and a leader in the corporate world, I realized that, okay, right? People out there, everyone that I know, or my clients manager and a leader in the corporate world, I realized that, okay, right, people out there, everyone that I know or my clients are facing the same problem. So how can I make the training or the learning or the coaching more efficient? Because, you know, it's not really like the most cost-efficient thing

and best value to have one-on-one calls all the time, right? So that was when at the end of 2021, I decided that, okay, I'm going to tie in everything together. All the knowledge that I've had from my corporate years, my corporate world experiences, leadership experiences and also experiences managing staff and climbing the career ladder within a short period of time. So in Senate Chartered, I was promoted every year and I also got 20 to 30 percent salary increments every year so I think you know these are really good lessons that I would like to infuse in the course and make it a self-study course an online course that my clients and students can access every time and for those of the for those of them who are more committed then they can join the group mentoring calls or they can then book a private session which I think honestly is way more efficient. And probably if I was a working professional at that time, I would have appreciated something like that.

And that was how in early 2022, the Corporate Survivor, which is my current career training and mentoring course, is launched. So 2022 was really all about the Corporate Survivor because I finally found my interest, my passion of wanting to continue to become a career coach. So when I launched the corporate survivor in January of 2022, it was the core curriculum, the three-step framework on how to get clear in the corporate world, get confident with corporate skills and get visible personal branding so these are the three steps you know what helped me to climb the career ladder and also infused by a lot of conversations that I had in private coaching session it also comes with a lifetime access for a job search bonus so this is a step-by-step from identifying career options career clarity then to resume writing then the

next one is how did I use LinkedIn to attract opportunities. So I've been headhunter on LinkedIn multiple times, on Google, you know, for Google, PayPal, Alipay, Visa, Stan Chartered, you know, multiple different banks as well. Then the next one is on interview skills. So I would say the first iteration at the beginning of 2022 for the Corporate Survivor was the three-step framework that helped me survive and thrive in the corporate world, the job search bonus I felt could really help the experience a little bit more and that was you know how can I get everyone in the same room at least once a month and that was where I introduced group mentoring because I know that you know career development can be a bit boring so at least you know you may not feel as motivated to do that so that's why in July, August 2022, I introduced group mentoring. And that's basically a month by month session where students can ask their questions and

also learn from fellow corporate professionals in the program on the challenges and how to overcome it. And that's where I also infuse a lot of my stories as well. So that was the middle of 2022. And towards the end of 2022, I had hundreds of students in the program. And that's why I still want to continue with the Corporate Survivor program in the next years, because I've seen the results and the strategies, the action plans that I have been using in my career. But right now, instead of training team members internally, I am helping my clients on an external basis. like having this huge structure and like teaching and working on the career development of the staff that worked with me, I am doing that for clients and students in the program. And I think in a way,

it kind of allows me to still be part of the corporate world because as I said, you know, I've been trained and educated to be in the corporate world, right? I mean, I am a chartered accountant. I started in accounting, audit, internal controls, you know, risk management, financial crime compliance, you know, business management, business portfolio, and ultimately nowadays as a career coach. So it's been a journey. And the program is something that I'm really proud of.

So, you know, if you are part of my online community, I'm sure that you have heard me talk about the corporate survivor a lot. And that's because it came out from a lot of reflection and a lot of like thought process

had gone into it as to how can I combine my corporate world insights, experiences, climbing up the career ladder, being confident from an introvert, being competent while starting out like super

blah, and ultimately learning how to increase my income and increase my value. And also including all the conversations I've had with my one-on-one clients over the years and how to really add better value in the course itself versus doing like hundreds and hundreds of one-on-one sessions. So all in all, you know, this was really the event or catalyst that, you know, helped me transition to a career coach, which I'm really, really happy about right now. And I say that, you know, there can be good things that come up from sad events. And I no longer want to tell myself that it is the end of the road

because it never is the end of the road. And like I said, grief takes time to heal personally, to heal with your family. And it's okay to make a decision that is right for you. So there are no best decisions. There are only decisions that are right for you. And I hope that my story for you. So there are no best decisions. There are only decisions that are right for you. And I hope that my story inspires you. And even if you ended up like me

and in an accidental career change, just know that you can always make the best out of any situation that are handed to you. And you do not have to get beaten by any circumstances at the end of the day. If you are valuable, you are hardworking, you are ambitious, you know that you have something to offer, then you will always be in demand. So that's just something to remind you of. And I hope that this story inspires you. And

if you have learned something from today's story time, personal story time sharing, then drop me a message on LinkedIn and Instagram and let me know. So thank you so much for being a loyal listener, a loyal watcher and a loyal subscriber let me know. So thank you so much for being a loyal listener, a loyal watcher, and a loyal subscriber of the podcast. And if you'd like more free career resources in terms of newsletter, training webinars, masterclass,

or interested in my paid program, The Corporate Survivor, you can find all the links in the description box below. Till then, I'll see you next time and all the best in the new year. Cheers!