The low take-up rate in the recruitment of graduates from local universities has prompted Setia Haruman to ensure the sustainability and pre-eminence of Cyberjaya through its own internship programme by up-skilling young graduates for the kind of work demanded by the MNCs.
Tan Sri Mustapha Kamal, founder and chairman of EMKAY Group, who is also the Chairman of Setia Haruman, said he has spent RM1.8 million on an industry-academia collaboration programme to train and improve the marketability of graduates from five local universities by improving their skill sets and language skills.
He said Setia Haruman aims to compile a report detailing the findings of the pilot project and offer recommendations to overcome the mismatch between future graduates and the industry.
"We are spending RM1.8 million from our own budget. This is to ensure that we find out the root cause relating to the mismatch (of skills). We decided to proceed with the internship and up-skilling programme to ensure that the immediate requirements needed by the industries in Cyberjaya are met by the students from these five universities -- Universiti Malaya, Universiti Teknologi Mara (UiTM), Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM), Universiti Utara Malaysia and Taylors College University," he told BERNAMA TV recently.
Mustapha expressed surprise over the poor recruitment rate from the MNCs in the internship and up-skilling programme but stressed that he was undaunted by this and would carry out the internship and up-skilling programme up to December this year as he wanted to find out what had caused or led to this poor state of affairs.
"From the figures that I have just received, only seven out of the 300 graduates that indicated their interest were directly employed by the industry. And one of the major reasons is they are unable to communicate in English and the level of their command in English is low. I believe we have to do something concrete to overcome this problem."
Some of the other drawbacks uncovered were their critical thinking, cross-cultural, problem-solving and analytical skills. There are 74 graduates from these five universities currently undergoing Setia Haruman's internship and up-skilling programme.
Launched in 1997 by the country's fourth Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, Cyberjaya was developed to help push the country towards a knowledge-based economy. Its aspiration to be one of the global ICT hubs has turned Cyberjaya into one of the top destinations for ICT Shared Services and Outsourcing (SSO) businesses. Over the next 10-15 years, businesses are expected to provide jobs for about 120,000 employees and the higher educational institutions here providing places for up to 30,000 students.
Today, Cyberjaya is home to many multinational companies such as Shell, HP, Ericsson, IBM, Dell, BMW, HSBC and DHL. It is also a choice location for educational establishments such as the Multimedia University, Limkokwing University College of Creative technology (LUCT), Cyberjaya University College of Medical Sciences (CUCMS) and University Malaysia of Computer Science and Engineering (UniMY).
In the last few years, many have also decided to stay in Cyberjaya in top-end residential developments such as Perdana Lakeview West, Perdana Lakeview East, The Serinity Garden Homes, Neo Cyber of EMKAY, Garden Residences and D'Melor Condominiums.
Mustapha, a property developer who has won many accolades for his property projects, does not see Cyberjaya as a property play but as the nucleus for the country's aspiration to have a high-income workforce.
"By December we hope that the 74 graduates in the internship and up-skilling programme, God willing, will be fully employed. We will be able to take up from there with the authorities on our findings in this pilot project and offer solutions on overcoming this mismatch," said Mustapha.
He said he was taking this initiative personally because of his concern about the sustainability of Cyberjaya if there was a lack local manpower to fulfil the requirements of multinationals operating there in the immediate and medium term.
"If these companies cannot find people of the right calibre, they would then be forced to look for foreign talents, which may raise their cost of doing business here in Cyberjaya," he said, stressing that the bleaker outlook over the medium term if the skills mismatch was not addressed would be that these companies might be encouraged to re-locate outside Malaysia if local talents were hard to come by.
"It all boils down to the cost of doing business in Cyberjaya and having the right skills required by the multinational companies," he stressed, adding that since he has been entrusted with the development of Cyberjaya, he would like to ensure its significance as the leading hub for the country's high-income economy as planned by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak and its catalytic role in the Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC) as envisaged by Dr Mahathir.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Wan Nor Azura Mior Abdul Aziz
Quelle/Source: BERNAMA, 21.09.2013
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