While the Manufacturing & Operations industry in Malaysia blooms with an abundance of career opportunities, employers have been increasingly discerning when it comes to hiring new staff. Talents could, therefore, stand to benefit by working on their personal branding to reap rewards, according to recruitment experts Hays.

Talents in the following functions within the Manufacturing & Operations industry are highly sought after:
    - Research engineers
    - Product design specialists
    - Quality control experts

“While the job market favours candidates within the Manufacturing & Operations industry, job seekers looking to advance in their careers should by no means remain complacent,” says Marcus Chin, Senior Consultant - Manufacturing & Operations at Hays Malaysia.

“Candidates who are on the lookout for a new role should consider enhancing their professional profiles on professional networking sites such as LinkedIn and increase their chances of being discovered by prospective employers by submitting their CVs to recruitment agencies. Because not many candidates in this area are casting their nets beyond simply responding to job advertisements, they are missing out on what could possibly be great opportunities to advance in their careers.”

Hays experts have also found that Manufacturing & Operations candidates with multilingual fluency are highly regarded by employers across the industry.

“This is especially so for international or foreign companies which have plants within Malaysia, where the majority of the ground staff (especially within the factories) are effectively monolingual in their mother tongues such as Bahasa Malay or Mandarin. Production and plant managers who are fluent in English, Malay and Bahasa make for the ideal candidates for mid-level or management roles,” adds Marcus.

Other trends in Malaysia’s Manufacturing & Operations industry can be viewed below:

• As Malaysia takes steps towards becoming a world class manufacturing hub, many businesses –– especially within FMCG, medical devices and pharmaceutical industries –– are placing a greater emphasis on R&D and product design.
• Many foreign MNCs with bases in Malaysia have been expanding their design centres to improve their product offerings.
• There has been a swell in demand for research engineers and specialists to improve existing products and production methods.
• In addition, product design engineers are also highly required to create new product offerings while taking into consideration product lifecycles and customer needs.
• The growing demand for wearable devices and smart home applications, alongside the strong automotive industry, is resulting in a heightened need for both production and quality control experts.

To view the full Inside Story report of Manufacturing & Operations, please click here.

Last updated on January 23rd, 2019