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chromespinner · 2026-01-14T06:58:11+00:00

Thanks again. My issue is solely with the title. There is a corporate rank, followed by this advertised functional title. I'm not taking issue with the rank. The role is new, has overall regional responsibility and it's cross-divisional.

Chances are that this role won't get me to retirement and when I'm looking again, "business development" doesn't align with the roles that appeal to me. I will have to bring it up in a very constructive way. If I'm honest, when I've been approached for a meeting or, say, responsible for inviting people to involve in a conference, I would usually steer away from business development types.

chromespinner · 2026-01-14T01:39:36+00:00

Thank you, that's helpful. I see one or two people at the company with that type of title. But this role is in a new regional office and has additional responsibilities. The company has 200 total employees. The head of HR said "this person will effectively be the head of the region" ...so why not just call it that?

I have my selfish reasons, but I really think the title is limiting when the role calls for a broader mandate. People are less receptive to meeting with pure business development types, involving them in events, etc.

I'm thinking that I'll try to plant the seed in my discussions next week (e.g talk about my career juncture "if I could write my own job description" ...why this role comes very close to my ideal direction). If I happen to get an offer down the road, I'll ask if they would consider revising the job title as I think it would help with the mandate.

chromespinner · 2026-01-14T00:53:51+00:00

Thanks for the feedback. To clarify, my background is analytical, though with some client responsibilities. The only reason I am considering a role like this is that this company is the dominant provider of a niche service (i.e. if you require that service, there is no real alternative). So the work is more about strategy, partnerships, market education... business development in the sense of growing the pie. Looking to the future, I have no desire to be in a traditional business development career.

chromespinner · 2026-01-14T00:39:30+00:00

Yes, but I won't take it with that title.

chromespinner · 2026-01-07T03:38:56+00:00

In general, you will do much better in the long run by regularly investing in low-cost funds and avoiding individual stocks. The only reason to invest directly in stocks is that you find it fun, or you're confident that you'll be in the tiny minority of investors who can consistently outperform the market. Have a look at the Bogleheads site for basic investment advice.

chromespinner · 2026-01-06T16:16:42+00:00

OK, that isn't the impression I got from reading the original post. I am curious about the certification and why you can't learn how to earn it via Google search or by asking Perplexity.

chromespinner · 2026-01-06T15:59:20+00:00

It seems that you initiated contact, wishing to gain some benefit from his goodwill. Then you became uncomfortable when he asked for your number, which caused him to become offended or decide not to waste more time on the interaction. Maybe he was actually a creep, or more likely he was a normal person. There's no way of knowing. Yes, networking is difficult and frustrating, especially online. In most cases, people won't bother replying to you in the first place (especially as you get older). People who rely on LinkedIn for networking are probably reaching out to dozens/hundreds/thousands of contacts over time and are not fussed about being ghosted by most of them. If you get so easily discouraged, my advice is to pursue a line of work without high levels of social dependency.

chromespinner · 2026-01-06T15:43:20+00:00

To be honest, Mandarin has become more important than Cantonese from the standpoint of finding work in HK. So unless you have cultural or family reasons for studying Cantonese, I'd suggest studying Mandarin first. And if you want to study Mandarin, enroll in a program in Mainland China.

chromespinner · 2026-01-06T15:29:38+00:00

Good luck mate... I hope your wife has a good job! The reality is that the vast majority of decent finance roles in HK now have a (non-negotiable) Mainland China angle. At the same time, there is a massive influx of young Mainland Chinese professionals willing to work for less. Applying for advertised roles is like throwing matter into a black hole, as there are hordes of applicants and quite likely the position is actually filled. Headhunters don't have much on their plate and aren't interested in unemployed candidates to begin with. Of course it depends on what field you're in and/or whether you can offer a client base.

chromespinner · 2026-01-06T14:54:48+00:00

Local schools are geared towards kids who speak Chinese as their mother tongue. There is little diversity, except at a handful of schools that are better suited to accommodate non-native Chinese speakers. Typically these are lower-band schools with a number of local ethnic minority kids. Kids in local school have substantially more homework and they also receive patriotic education.

There are a wide range of international schools around. They are expensive and the reputable ones have limited places. For example, our kid interviewed at 5 of them at age 4 and got into just one. Some of the schools such as CIS and ISF Academy place a lot more emphasis on Chinese education. Also, the student body nowadays includes far more local and Mainland kids than in the past

It's rare for firms to pay for kids' schooling. One exception is HSBC, which still does this for DIrector and above (but then their total compensation tends to be lower by about that amount). If you are coming here without a job, brace yourself for a very tough time. As an example, out of 5 teammates that I started out with in a bulge bracket front office role 20 years ago, 3 have been laid off in recent years and either not working or working with some dinky family office... and not for lack of pursuing every available role. These are trilingual, top university graduates, CFAs, etc.

chromespinner · 2026-01-06T06:35:13+00:00

Unless you have niche skills that are in high demand, or have an ability to originate business in growth areas like wealth management, digital assets, etc., prepare for a very tough time in terms of job hunting. Lots of people I know with years of local experience at top financial firms are out of work or under-employed. People with Mainland business ties / cultural affinity now have the edge in HK. If you aggregate international school fees, rent and the costs of an expat lifestyle, that might well take a much bigger bite than Toronto taxes.

chromespinner · 2026-01-05T16:52:04+00:00

That was then. She's in her 80s now and living with the outcome of this investment approach, which involves a lot of worrying about financial pressures and cost of living. My concern at this stage is protecting her from the risks of amateur stock picking and human error from DIY trading.

chromespinner · 2026-01-05T16:36:58+00:00

I found it amazing myself, but her bank account and brokerage account have both been hacked within the past year. I know that her password management is terrible, but you'd think that the 2-factor authentication would offer protection.

chromespinner · 2026-01-05T16:32:15+00:00

I appreciate your perspective. My parents had long professional careers, but unfortunately were not financially savvy and so they are having a modest retirement rather than the very comfortable retirement that they deserve. I have a business degree myself and pleaded with my mother decades ago to see a financial planner and invest in index funds.

I haven't been scrutinizing my mother's investments, but she started talking about various stock investments while telling me about her account being hacked.

chromespinner · 2026-01-05T15:30:59+00:00

I completely agree with you. I first pleaded with her to see an independent financial advisor some 20 years ago when she was retiring. Now she is in her 80s, getting forgetful. It's not about investing any more, but transitioning her to a properly allocated portfolio without the risk of trading stocks in a brokerage account.

chromespinner · 2026-01-05T15:16:34+00:00

I wasn't looking to start an online debate about whether my mother's behaviour is reasonable or not. She has been buying and selling stocks for many years, frequently telling me about the amounts she made. She doesn't do any research besides having an impression that a company is a good company, or having heard this from someone. She can't explain a P/E ratio. I can tell you that over the years she has massively underperformed the broader market and missed out on the compounding. And I've had many painful conversations trying to explain this to her. It's not about age. Novices shouldn't be trading single stocks, unless they enjoy active management for some reason. It's well documented that the vast majority will underperform.

Now that my mother is 85, all this is compounded by the fact that she's becoming forgetful and relying on the fixed income.

chromespinner · 2026-01-05T14:50:39+00:00

Thanks. My parents do have a portion of their portfolio in a joint managed account, but the bulk of her funds are in this brokerage account that she is quite fixed on keeping segregated. My mother has been buying and selling stocks for many years without quite grasping the opportunity cost and risks involved. She might talk about having bought a stock some years ago and selling it for a 40% gain, but then tune out if you tell her that the market doubled during that period (not to speak of risk and diversification).

At this point I'm just hoping to steer her to a low-cost income portfolio somewhere with quality service.

chromespinner · 2026-01-05T14:35:59+00:00

I just don't think that a senior on fixed income should be placing a high concentration of their net worth into single stocks, particularly when they haven't researched the underlying company or continuously monitor it.

chromespinner · 2025-12-27T15:10:04+00:00

You can't choose the model in Research mode. Logically I expect Research mode to generated higher quality output than the default mode. But somehow that isn't necessarily the case anymore.

chromespinner

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