I'm back in Penang, once again. SDP was fine. But I got to admit that second day into the program, I was starting to feel that this was your typical, generic motivation camp you used to attend during your high school years. Up to a point it felt a little bit redundant because you already knew and at least familiar with the modules. This year, they kinda reshuffled the SDP program. There's no more outdoor activity, no more mock interview, no more movie night and no more CSR program. Just plain in-the-classroom-training.
Of course there's pros and cons to it. For example we get to finish our program earlier at night but the classroom based training has taken it's toll on me. I understand that YSD and SDLC were prepping us for the corporate world, but I find it a little bit boring. For example we were asked to sit through a business communication class sedangkan there's already a subject dedicated to it alone in my university that I had taken. So it was like a revision class. Nevertheless, I paid the instructors their due respect and listened to them with an open mind.
Of course to make it interesting, they conduct their lessons in several ways. Ada games, ada presentations, ada sketches etc. But I dunno. That classroom 'feel' is still there, while I was expecting more of a corporate 'feel'. I mean yes, they taught us a lot of things. But it was more like a theory rather than the reality I was expecting. For example, they talked about trust and responsibilities and said that if your boss trust you, he or she will give you more responsibilities. Well, benda tu macam logik ja. Apa kata kalau hang explain kat aku, 'where do you draw the lines between having accepted a responsibility because the boss trusted you or is it he/she simply was riding you and bullying you?'
That was the kind of questions that I needed answers to. If you see the itinerary above, the green colored ones were conducted by SD while the blue-colored ones were carried out by a training consultant hired by SD. We were well informed that SD invested a lot of money hiring them. But if the training consultant are just there to teach us superficial stuff, I think a lot of my Uni's clubs and societies could do the exact job with minimal payment. The only thing that can justify their selection was they have Roshan Thiran, who used to be a key right hand man to General Electric, a big company in US. So yeah, he managed to share with us his experience working with GE, under the leadership of Jack Welch, one of the most influential CEO in the USA.
Well, having Roshan Thiran with us was exactly what I was looking for. He taught us things that you can't learn in a classroom. So I guess it pretty much justify why SD paid great money to this training consultant. There's a lot of business or entrepreneurial seminar out there where famous CEOs was invited to give a talk and I know for a fact that the fees wasn't cheap. Well anyway, you could google him up to read about some of his interesting experiences. All in all it was a good program for me. Even though it didnt rise up to my expectation, at least it managed to show me a career path with SD. At least I have an idea on what's waiting for me this coming new year.
And of course, they managed to show us a glimpse of their snazzy reputation. At SDLC, they invited both the ex CEO and the newly appointed CEO , Tun Musa Hitam and Dato Ghani Othman. They gave us access card for the building. Nak pi toilet pun kena ada access card. Food toksah cakap la. Sedap2 dan best2. And free flow of water from the vending machine. All you need is press the button. I even managed to visit the staff gym. With crazy and buff up equipments in it. And their zen garden is totally breathtaking. Sempoi baq hang.
But to me, the best of them all, is the people behind it. I am so thankful to have so many people taking care and nurturing us. People from YSD and SDLC. And also fellow scholars from Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia (under Minamas Plantation, a subsidiary of Sime Darby) studying from all over the world. Some of them came from one of the best university in the world, Cambridge, LSE, Imperial, to name a few. But the sense of humbleness and belonging was there for the taking. And I am glad to rub shoulders and learn with them. And I also learnt that there's a junior from USM who just recently received the scholarship. Awesome.
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