After starting his career in the semiconductor industry, Mr Jacob Ong switched to becoming a secondary school teacher in 2012.

He had then just completed a part-time degree in electrical engineering at the National University of Singapore.

But after five years of teaching design and technology and computer applications, Mr Ong, 36, decided to return to the electronics cluster and left his teaching job at the end of 2017.

In April last year, after over a year of job hunting and taking on a temporary role as a tutor, he landed a position at his former employer GlobalFoundries through Workforce Singapore's six-month professional conversion programme for electronics engineers.

Mr Ong, a senior engineer, picked up skills in areas such as radio frequency testing and instrumentation, as well as electromagnetic simulators and software, which helped him readjust to working in the electronics sector.

"While the fundamental skills required are the same (today), the kind of (work I do has changed)," he said.

His role involves more responsibilities beyond operational functions such as taking measurements, which he was doing in his first stint at the semiconductor firm.

His time as an educator taught him some valuable soft skills, Mr Ong said.

"To do your job well (as a teacher), you have to be very mindful of how you (work with) other stakeholders, like other teachers and parents... and teaching helped me build up those (skills)," he said, adding that these interpersonal skills and multi-tasking abilities have been serving him well in his new role.