In one of my entries recently I talked about what I thought would present it self as Malaysia's greatest challenge in the coming years. I said that that challenge would be how to close the gap between the available talent pool in Malaysia with the demands of the new economy in the coming years.
On July 27 and 28, the Customer Relationship Management & Contact Centre Association Malaysia (CCAM)had a CEO round table in conjunction with its national conference with the theme " Empowering the Industry to be the Next Global Catalyst".
The Edge reported on the conference on 20th August with a write-up on the discussion. Sam Haggag, the president of Contact Centre Association of Singapore put it bluntly when he said "...The technology is in Malaysia. The infrastructure is here too. The challenge is talent".
It is amazing how at any given time, a government policy maker can go on for 2 hours talking about the efforts needed to make Malaysia a competitive global economy without once mentioning the word talent! What do they think will make Malaysia a 'competitive global economy'? More buildings and infrastructure? Why is the Multimedia Supercorridor is no longer in our popular lexicon? The reason is simple.We simply don't have enough talent in these critical areas to sustain our grand plans. Despite our farsightedness to piggy back on the bandwagon of the ICT based economy we failed to see that this new economy is based entirely on talent. We don' even have to have the financial resources or infrastructure. Others with these resources will line up at our door knocking feverishly to come in. That is, if we have the talent. Ask the Indians and the Filipinos!
For example, the petrochemical industry in Malaysia is already facing a talent shortage so acute that drastic measures are needed to stem the outflow of our precious talent to newer players in the industry.
The way to develop talent is dependent on developing a performance based culture. One that is unforgiving of poor performance and reluctance for continuous change and willing to make 3 times more investments on people development.
As we celebrate our 50th Independence Day, let it be made clear that the road ahead is tougher than what our forefathers would have seen way back in 1957. Happy Merdeka!
May God bless our nation and our people.
