The Human Advantage: Shub Faujdar

In conversation with Shub Faujdar – Chief Career Coach and Managing Director of JobS-ME Singapore

Shub Faujdar is a career strategist, executive coach and the founder of JobS-ME, a career coaching firm based in Singapore. With over two decades of experience in recruitment and talent development, she has advised and supported professionals at every career stage—from fresh graduates to C-suite leaders—across global companies including Facebook, Apple, and Standard Chartered.

Careers are evolving rapidly, and artificial intelligence is reshaping the job market, that’s why the human side of work—identity, connection, purpose—is an imperative. Shub demonstrates what it means to stay human in a technology-saturated talent market. Her journey is a guiding light for job seekers, professionals, and business leaders navigating career intricacies and managing their personal branding.

From Engineer to Career Architect: The Genesis of JobS-ME

Shub’s career began in tech, but she found her calling in people. After studying computer engineering, she realized there was deeper fulfillment in helping people unlock their potential rather than writing code. A turning point came when a long-time client—an experienced executive who had been jobless for two years—walked into her office seeking assistance. Through personalized strategy and targeted outreach, Shub helped him land a role in just two months. That experience laid the foundation for JobS-ME, a venture that has since supported countless professionals through job transitions, branding efforts, and strategic pivots—long before career coaching became mainstream in Singapore.

Her journey was also enabled by generous mentors and open-minded employers who gave her space and time to grow. Today, her business thrives not through aggressive marketing but through trust, word-of-mouth, and repeat clients. She counts her greatest accomplishments by impact—helping those who thought they were “unemployable” find renewed purpose and success.

Personal Branding: Reputation Matters

From professionals to business leaders, including Principals of UHNW family offices and Next-Generation changemakers, personal branding is everything. In the pre-social media world, it was reputation. Today, it’s amplified and borderless. Shub cautions against blending personal branding with influencer culture—it isn’t about followers or filters, it is about thought leadership, trust, and clarity of purpose. Attention is now the most valuable currency, those who can articulate and project their value will be effective leaders. As she puts it, “We’re no longer in an information economy, we’re in an attention economy.”

Looking Ahead: Building the Career Growth Circle

With job markets tightening and career paths becoming more fragmented, Shub is expanding her scope. Beyond one-on-one coaching and workshops, she is launching the Career Growth Circle—a peer community designed to foster accountability, inspiration, and authentic connection. She’s also investing in innovative digital courses to extend her reach. At the core of this expansion are two timeless principles: branding and networking. Together, they provide a solid platform for lasting success in both corporate careers and entrepreneurial ventures.

What Truly Matters for Careers Today

Today’s job market is a “jungle gym.” So, to be successful, you need more than planning, you need enhanced preparedness. From working with top talent hired by major global banks and technology companies, Shub has learned that one-size-fits-all strategies no longer apply. The key is self-awareness. She urges job seekers to search within before they search externally. Knowing your strengths, motivations, and hidden superpowers can set you apart. It’s not the resume that wins—it’s the narrative, the ability to forge genuine career conversations, and an understanding that every journey is unique and personal.

Exposing the Myths of Personal Branding

Shub has run enough branding workshops to know where people get stuck:

• “I don’t like to talk about myself”
• “I don’t have anything interesting to say”
• “My work should speak for itself”
• “What will people think?”
• “I don’t have the time for this”

These are the five most common mental blocks she sees. She tackles each one head-on, encouraging people to reframe visibility not as self-promotion, but as a value creator and differentiator. “Your market value,” she explains, “is your visibility multiplied by your performance.” Visibility comes first, and then performance. Your personal brand helps to ensure you are noticed, make strong first impressions, and improve your chances of employment with more successful interview outcomes.

An Essential Skill: Communicating Value

From resumes to interviews, Shub believes the skill most job seekers lack is the ability to communicate their value. It’s not enough to do the work—you must articulate its worth. Even those with modest personal branding need to be fluent in conveying how they can contribute. Confidence in your value drives the entire job search cycle. Shub points out, “A company won’t hire you to do the bare minimum. When you’re contributing, you need to make a meaningful difference—and own it.”

Coaching in the AI Era: Beyond just Templates

As AI becomes more widely adopted, Shub argues the role of career coaches must evolve. Standard templates won’t suffice. What machines can’t do yet is hold space for human hesitation, self-doubt, and emotional complexity. Great coaching isn’t about scripts—it’s about insight. Community will also be a competitive advantage. “AI may give you answers,” she affirms, “but it can’t give you belonging.” Her strategy is therefore to integrate personalized coaching with digital scale and a well-built professional community.

Talent Crunch in Family Offices

With over 2,000 single family offices in Singapore and with more being established each month, Shub sees a growing challenge: how to attract, retain and motivate the right talent without compromising discretion. Her solution is to encourage decision-makers to become “key persons of influence” to foster alignment from prospective employees and collaboration from ecosystem partners. People don’t just work for compensation—they work for culture, for mission and for meaning. Beyond candidates searching for suitable roles, branding is about the right candidates being findable by employing organizations. And in a talent-starved market, that’s invaluable.

A Pillar of Support

Whether you’re a professional at a crossroads, a business leader, working for a family office or just insecure and unsure of the future as the role of AI grows across industries, Shub’s message is clear: the most powerful career strategy is found in the clarity of purpose, self-confidence and strong connections – Networking.

As industries transform, what’ll always matter is how well we understand ourselves—and how courageously we demonstrate our presence, our personal Brand and our value. If you need help, don’t hesitate to reach out, support is available.

Shub regularly shares insightful content on LinkedIn, where she is a Top voice in Careers, as well as on YouTube and Instagram. She also publishes a weekly newsletter.

Here’s how Shub can help:

• 1-on-1 coaching – Helping professionals and leaders to secure their next job quickly
• Workshops – Personal Branding, job search and career growth workshops for MNCs and organizations to encourage their employees to take ownership of their careers
• The Career Growth Circle Mastermind – A group working for 12 months to enhance visibility, corporate influence, career growth and job search success. The group unlocks peer accountability, facilitates powerful networking, and provides opportunities to be coached and mentored by leading experts and collaborating partners.

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