COVID-19 restrictions in Malaysia are slowly easing up since the Movement Control Order (MCO) was put in place in March. The economic slowdown that resulted was expected to cause over 2 million Malaysians to lose their jobs due to the coronavirus pandemic, according to the Malaysian Employers Federation in April.
JobStreet conducted a survey among 5,000 Malaysians the following month, revealing 44 percent of candidates claiming unhappiness towards their quality of life. In pre-COVID times, 77 percent of the workforce surveyed said they were happy with their quality of life. This number has decreased to only 35 percent after MCO, and more distinctly among those who were permanently retrenched and those temporarily not working.
To aid those impacted by COVID-19, the government introduced a RM2 billion (US$467.3 million) PENJANA initiative for skills development programmes for youths and the unemployed. This aims to provide new skills for Malaysians and enable them to meet the demands of job markets and industries.
JobStreet has also stepped up to help the retrenched and the unemployed get back on their feet—and ultimately improve their quality of life — with #TogetherAhead. #TogetherAhead provides support and inspiration to candidates and hirers as they navigate the challenges of COVID-19.
It includes the COVID-19 Jobs and Resources Hub, which provides helpful insights and reliable data to support them and get their businesses and careers back on track.
Candidates will be able to search for jobs that require little experience but still provide additional income. They may also be able to do industry-specific, in-demand job searches, target companies that are still hiring despite the pandemic, and gain relevant information on job trends and advice on career development.
Hirers, on the other hand, will be able to access up-to-date information and insights from JobStreet’s extensive collection of studies and surveys conducted across the Southeast Asian region, as well as learn new ways to improve hiring strategies amid COVID-19.
JobStreet also introduced the #WorkNow feature, which helps employers zero in on candidates who are immediately ready for hiring. In order to activate this feature, jobseekers simply need to update their Jobstreet profiles, and add the hashtag #WorkNow.
“With many Malaysians reversely affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, our goal is to jumpstart their stalled careers with tools that may assist them in landing more and better opportunities,” says Gan Bock Herm, country manager of JobStreet Malaysia. “We hope that these will eventually help them raise their outlooks and improve their quality of life.”
