Career Advice Career counselling, advice and guidance

Kelvin Lau

Kelvin Lau is manager of the Walters People Division — Technology at Robert Walters Hong Kong

To advance to a management role or technical role

I am terrible with clients. This problem is really holding my career back. I work in IT and have made rapid progress up the ranks over the last six years. Now I am second in command of a team. But I just can’t see myself taking my manager’s role because I can’t handle clients well. Many times at meetings I’d feel like I’d said something wrong and back in the office I’d find it difficult to hide my frustrations in the face of their constantly changing demands. I really want to be a manager in the future. What can I do to improve? ...

How do I engineer a move into project management?

I am a process engineer with more than a decade’s experience, seven years of which working in Hong Kong. I have been looking for a change of direction in recent months and I read an article that said project management is a sector that is expected to grow in the coming years, and that there is a severe shortage of talent.I am naturally very interested in this sector, but I am unsure how to move into it. Will retraining be needed? Is the transition from my field of work a relatively straightforward one or are there obstacles? ...