If you were the boss, you’d know what work requires to be done in your company. Someone has to do the job. As the boss, you hire personnel to fill vacancies, and their qualifications must match your organization’s needs.
Najib Razak is the CEO of 1Malaysia. He recently brought on board his company two new guys — the Gerakan President Mah Siew Keong and MCA deputy president Wee Ka Siong.
He offered them each a job. The hitch is that when Najib “hired” them, he hadn’t yet quite figured out what it is he wanted Datuk Mah and Datuk Wee to do on his Starship Enterprise.
Najib’s approach is to put the Chinese duo in the Prime Minister’s Department first, and after that only to sort out their job responsibilities.
Thus Mah Siew Keong ended up with an appointment to oversee the Hindu Endowment Board and moving into the Bangunan Perdana Putra 3rd floor office earlier vacated by Hindraf’s P. Waytha Moorthy.
Now that we know Najib’s operational style, does his pet project TalentCorp then come as any surprise?
Remember, Najib is the boss that tasked Mah Siew Keong to look after Indian temples.
Holidaying: Sightseeing & Shopping
What is it that the TalentCorp CONSULTANTS were supposed to be doing again in Paris, Nice, Berlin, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Brussels …? (see screenshot Calendar of Events, bottom of page)
Talentcorp: “these engagements [in all those swanky hotels] help to establish channels for Malaysians to contribute from abroad, and potentially initiate conversations that lead to new ideas for cross-border business and professional opportunities”.
Eh, what’s with the fuzzy words?
What is it really that TalentCorp is hiring staff to do in their office? We’ll return to the outfit shortly but first, something about their Big Boss, Najib Razak.
Prime Ministerial primordial soup
Just a quick recap as to all the acronyms that Najib’s name is going to be forever immortalized for. We’ll begin our tour with MKRAs (Ministerial Key Result Areas). Aah so .. and Minister Mah’s MKRA is? He must memorize the names of all the major Hindu deities by October.
Other jumbles of alphabets linked with the Najib brand are KPI (Key Performance Indicator), NKEAs (National Key Economic Areas), NKRAs (National Key Result Areas), GTP (Government Transformation Programme), ETP (Economic Transformation Programme) …
KR1M, KIR1M, BR1M, BL1M, BB1M … BAM-BAM
BAM-BAM is a Flintstones cartoon character
GREAT
.
GREAT! is not a pat on the back for the PM. GREAT is the Government Regional Electronic Advancement Transformation programme.
SCORE is not about impressing the opposite sex. S-C-O-R-E is SMEs Competitive Rating for Enhancement. This being the case, BGF would obviously not be “Boy Friend, Girl Friend” but “Business Growth Fund”.
TAF is Technology Acquisition Fund. And there is the 1MDB (1Malaysia Development Bhd), Ekuinas (Ekuiti Nasional Berhad) and Khazanah (Khazanah Nasional Berhad), the toy for baby brother to play with.
Najib is all about Transformation and lush Funding but despite all of the PM’s alphabets rolling in funds, poor people are still homeless and depending on Soup Kitchens.
Soup kitchens are Christian charity
Scam
.
AFFIRM is Awareness, Faculty, Finance, Infrastructure, Research and Marketing, SPAD is Suruhanjaya Pengangkutan Awam Darat and SPAN is Suruhanjaya Perkhidmatan Air Negara.
The Putrajaya big government is not being sent to the ICU (Intensive Care Unit), okay, but to the Implementation Coordination Unit. The reason is Najib’s excesses have become such a cosmic goo alphabet soup that Pemandu (Performance Management & Delivery Unit) is being confused with Pemudah (Pasukan Petugas Khas Pemudahcara Peniagaan) and hence the need for Implementation Coordination Unit.
Before you scream that Najib’s pet projects are a SCAM, I hope that you realise it is really a SQEM, no kidding — Standard Quality Education Malaysia … S-Q-E-M.
After getting up close and personal with Najib’s penchant for acronyms, does it surprise you that bapa borek, anak rintik?
ASPIRE is an acronym associated with TalentCorp, see below.
TalentCorp, which is parked in the Prime Minister’s Office, is hiring people to do SLA (service level agreement), MDO (multilevel disciplinary organization) etc, etc, etc with key responsibilities to “provide relevant feedback for customer and product segmentation” and “address customers with highest degree of respect and politeness…”
More fuzzy words and we still don’t know exactly what their jobs in TalentCorp are.
Please note that the 770 poll respondents above all want Pemandu dissolved — 75 percent of them responded “Yes” and 25 percent responded “Ya”.
Najib Razak’s RM8 billion consultancies are getting too much for the rakyat to bear. Not only is Najib Perdana Menteri Paling Boros Dalam Sejarah Negara, he is also going to be the first Umno president to lose the electoral support of the civil servants.
Kakitangan kerajaan pun tak nak undi BN lagi dalam PRU14.
If the Prime Minister doesn’t do something soon about his swarm of over-fed advisors buzzing around the honeypot, Pemandu is going to drive the BN bus off the edge of the cliff. And not many will be sorry to see it crash to the bottom of the ravine.
For a peek at the posh hotels where the TalentCorp events were held, see HERE.
Where is the TalentCorp REPORT CARD?
BELOW: TalentCorp’s European capitals itinerary
Helen Ang 
So depressing lah Helen. GR Kumar’s latest posting gives an idea of what’s going on in this country with the people’s money.
Yes, Ayah, orang kita hidup susah.
Tapi Najib lebih rela membiayai Cuti-cuti TalentCorp.
Their annual sightseeing tours of England, Australia and other holidays. TalentCorp’s programmes in these favourite places are playing in a recurrent loop.
OMG this is sooooo OOC. TalentCorp ni buat apa sebenarnya? Just look at the events listed under their STAR programme. Are all those listed events TalentCorp’s own initiative or they have the habit of practicing LPSSDN (Lembu Punya Susu, Sapi Dapat Nama)? Look at the list of 25 events.
1. BioMalaysia: Are they trying to recruit bright people who attended this event? This is always done in Malaysia and BioTechCorp together with KPM can easily do the recruiting, TalentCorp menyibuk buat apa?
2. UKEC: The students in UKEC have always organise career fairs in the UK for prospective Malaysian students to join various companies, even before TalentCorp was conceived. TalentCorp menyibuk buat apa?
3. GRADUAN: Is the company running GRADUAN related to TalentCorp in anyway or another? I’m confused jugak. TalentCorp menyibuk buat apa?
4. JobStreet Malaysia: TalentCorp menyibuk buat apa?
5. ACCA Career Fair: TalentCorp menyibuk buat apa?
Then there are other events listed too. But then, all of these recruitment events seemed to target Malaysian students abroad including via TalentCorp’s Outreach programme. I always thought they should be concentrating on recruiting highly-skilled Malaysian professionals abroad and not students. That they should be enticing Malaysians who are doing well at JPMorgan in NY to return home, Malaysians who excel at Linklaters in London to return home, Malaysians who made groundbreaking work at CERN to return home, Malaysians who drive innovation in Silicon Valley to return home bukannya bebudak yg selalu import mee Maggi dalam bag everytime balik bercuti. There are others who can do that type of recruitment la (unless TalentCorp is offering something special to them, which is unfair to other students).
What I found puzzling is what on earth do we, as Malaysian tax-payers had to fork out money to TalentCorp executives to travel the globe doing something that others have been doing for ages? We already have Education Malaysia which can easily organise big career fairs in major cities of the world where they have presence. Public funding bodies like MARA, JPA and others also have good records of making sure Malaysians return home (except those doktor-doktor perasan yang degil) and they can also join various career fairs for recruiting Malaysians. KPM and K Sumber Manusia can also throw in their weight and have various channels to help the recruitment process. The government has so many existing agencies, platforms and channels to attract Malaysian back home. So what exactly is the purpose of TalentCorp?
Are they offering Malaysian students abroad who visited their booths (not events tau sbb LPSSDN) something different, lebih lumayan dan lebih baik compared to those who didn’t attended those events? And if so, show us the numbers la and why. Say, in Paris, out of 100 Malaysian students who attended the TalentCorp Outreach programme, how many actually sign-up to return home and will remain at home? 90, 40 or 2 Malaysians. Then in 25 events as shown by Helen, how many Malaysians dream of returning home? If they decided to return, what are the factors persuading them to do so, then we can see what we’ve done wrong in the past. There must be a mechanism(s) or rubric(s) for TalentCorp to measure all the recruitment effort kan? Takde KPI ke? Ini iklan je banyak, filem tak pernah start pun.
Ingat hotel kat Paris tu murah? Ke you all semua redha duduk kat hostel je?
Kalau setakat senaraikan semua acara, cakap buat itu dan buat ini, semua orang boleh buat kan? I am more interested with the impact/ benefits of having this very pricy TalentCorp operating. Kalau TalentCorp cakap diorang dah buat 1,500 acara di 50 negara, one can easily say ‘So what?’. Tengok kes Jabatan Keselamatan Jalanraya tu, ada impact ke? Setakat bagi pamphlet, buat kempen kesedaran dan bagi bubur lambuk dekat plaza tol, kerja yang bebudak sekolah pun boleh buat, how on earth can one justify their existence? Accident melambak semacam je and people still don’t use signal lights.
So TalentCorp, show us the number la (what you had spend and what Malaysia gets in return) and I might become your biggest supporter. Might, with capital M (not Madrid ok).
TalentCorp has burned hundreds of million ringgit in budget already.
In Melbourne they held their event at the Marriott and in Adelaide at the Hilton. I really doubt that the TalentCorp staff put up in student hostels and then took bus to the Marriott, Hilton, Plaza, Villa and all those other venues to conduct their career fairs.
Yes, Helen obviously they would not. Maybe one day I’ll just attend one or two of their events and see how my tax money is being wasted in such grandeur. Silap2 hari bulan, I’ll whack them with my Hermes Birkin handbag.
p.s. Not into Prada at the moment, coz of the ‘soalan mulut’ stigma.
Re That they should be enticing Malaysians who are doing well at JPMorgan in NY to return home, Malaysians who excel at Linklaters in London to return home, Malaysians who made groundbreaking work at CERN to return home, Malaysians who drive innovation in Silicon Valley to return home
You would struggle to name any Malaysian doing groundbreaking work in those places simply because there are few Malaysians working in those places. The Malaysians working in those places are doing mostly piecemeal stuff. They are no different than foreign workers working at factories in Malaysia. I know there are people trumpeting about Malaysians working in those places you mentioned but sadly, all the trumpeting is just nonsensical talk. They have nothing to shout about.
My point exactly la. TalentCorp was set-up supposedly to woo those ‘bright Malaysians’ to return home. So, if it is an open secret that those Malaysians abroad are doing piecemeal stuff and everything is just being hyped up, then why must the gomen set-up TalentCorp to spend our money just to bring mediocre Malaysians home and give them all the goodies.
I bet, even if there are small number of Malaysian in places like that, why would they want to leave all that and return to Malaysia kan? I know I wouldn’t, buat sakit hati je balik kerja kat Malaysia kalau bos pun dungu yg ada diploma IPTS je tp cakap besar.
Re then why must the gomen set-up TalentCorp to spend our money just to bring mediocre Malaysians home and give them all the goodies.
To hoodwink the people. People who are ignorant will believe all the crap that’s thrown at them.
Er, my comment “then why must the gomen set-up TalentCorp to spend our money just to bring mediocre Malaysians home and give them all the goodies.” was preceded by “So, if it is an open secret that those Malaysians abroad are doing piecemeal stuff and everything is just being hyped up”.
So yes la, to hoodwink idiots, the majority of whom read Kosmo and watch Melodi and Meletop.
Interesting.
Can you quote any data or reports to support your view that there are few Malaysians “doing groundbreaking work” overseas?
Come to think of it, are there any Malaysians doing “groundbreaking” work here in Malaysia?
By “groundbreaking”, I presume you mean R&D? What is the R&D expenditure as a percentage of GDP in Malaysia compared with the West, or even with China, Japan, South Korea or Singapore?
Why mention JP Morgan without mentioning Goldman Sachs or any of the other top investment banks? Why talk about Linklaters and leave out the other top law firms in the UK and the US? Why mention CERN and leave out JPL and Caltech? Why not mention Apple, Microsoft, Google, Facebook or Amazon.com? Can you swear, hand on heart, that Malaysians are only doing “grunt work” in these banks, law firms and companies?
Oh, btw – if what you have posted is even halfway correct, then it only goes to show that Malaysians have yet to make it globally in knowledge-intensive fields, professions and industries.
Can we blame this on the Malaysian education system and the “culture of entitlement”?
Interesting indeed.
Q: “Can you quote any data or reports to support your view that there are few Malaysians “doing groundbreaking work” overseas?”
Pwincess: Can TalentCorp show otherwise? If they have the data, how many of these Malaysians were successfully recruited to return?
Q: “Come to think of it, are there any Malaysians doing “groundbreaking” work here in Malaysia?”
Pwincess: Yes, but not many. “Groundbreaking” can be subjective and innovation comes in many forms, but the benefits/impact to the society, economy and others can be easily measured (something TalentCorp has yet to show after spending millions). For example, the Royal Prof. Ungku Aziz conceived the idea of setting-up Tabung Haji, allowing muslims to go for pilgrimage to Mecca without having to sell off their land and belongings. This innovative idea has been replicated across the Muslim world. Malaysia is also doing quite well in other fields too especially related to palm oil, rubber etc. but innovation is not something which is restricted to science and technology.
Q: “By “groundbreaking”, I presume you mean R&D? What is the R&D expenditure as a percentage of GDP in Malaysia compared with the West, or even with China, Japan, South Korea or Singapore?”
Pwincess: No, not just on R&D la. As Pwincess said before, innovation comes in many forms and is not restricted to just R&D. So “groundbreaking” should be viewed as any activity/process that is positively disruptive. Unable to operate Microsoft Excel properly during party elections and inability to locate 40,000 Bangladeshi ‘ghost’ voters should not be considered as innovatively groundbreaking.
If we look at R&D as percentage of Malaysian GDP compared to the countries you’d listed, it is relatively lower but the gomen is committed to increase this percentage gradually. Please look at the RMKs, obviously the country has other needs too. Over the years, R&D expenditure specifically on science & technology has increased steadily involving IPTAs, GRIs and others. And if we stop TalentCorp and other stupid programs from wasting millions of our money, we can easily channel the funds to more R&D kan?
Q: “Why mention JP Morgan without mentioning Goldman Sachs or any of the other top investment banks? Why talk about Linklaters and leave out the other top law firms in the UK and the US? Why mention CERN and leave out JPL and Caltech? Why not mention Apple, Microsoft, Google, Facebook or Amazon.com?”
Pwincess: Darling, do Pwincess has to cite every single Fortune 500 corporations, every top international legal firms, Ivy League institutions, every promising Silicon Valley start-ups and every universities ranked by QS, Times and SJT to make a point? Itu example je la. So, kalau ramai sangat kat tempat-tempat macam tu, ask TalentCorp la whether the Malaysians there nak balik menetap di KL or Iskandar., or they are happy with the status quo.
Q: “Can you swear, hand on heart, that Malaysians are only doing “grunt work” in these banks, law firms and companies?”
Pwincess: Can TalentCorp? Also, please ask ‘Survivor’, he/she said that. Pwincess just pointed out that if there are so many not doing ‘grunt work’, then TalentCorp can show the numbers. If not, then why bother spending millions recruiting them back. Plus, Pwincess is not into swear-swear ok, go ask Anwar Ibrahim.
Q: “Oh, btw – if what you have posted is even halfway correct, then it only goes to show that Malaysians have yet to make it globally in knowledge-intensive fields, professions and industries.”
Pwincess: Er, Pwincess thought that there were so many of them abroad which is why people kept on shouting ‘brain drain, brain drain’. So the gomen came up with TalentCorp to supposedly reverse the ‘brain drain’. Now, if more and more Malaysians are joining the ‘brain drain’ then we must recognise the root of the problem and address that cause(s). It would be stupid for example, that if 1000 graduates being produced at any one time, 900 left the country and TalentCorp had to chase after them, how much will that cost us? Is it sustainable for the long term? So what is the problem exactly? If the main problems are working conditions, uninspiring work environment, stupid bosses, relatively low pay, chronic brown-nosing culture and suites of other factors, which drove our brightest talents out of the country, can giving millions of tax-payers money to TalentCorp to bring them home solve the problem? Or do we actually have to look closer to home? Secondly, the private sector like to shout about the ‘brain drain’ issue and kept on harping at the gomen (and of course la, some people in the gomen tend to have knee-jerk reactions which gave birth to bencana like ‘Pemandu’, ‘TalentCorp’, AES, BestariNet among others) but what have the private sector done to help keep our brightest talents within our shores? Anything constructive? There might be some, but then the problem seems to persist.
Q: “Can we blame this on the Malaysian education system and the “culture of entitlement”?”
Pwincess: Chicken and egg issue. If our education system is bad, then we’ve been producing idiots, and idiots are not wanted abroad. Idiots are not an integral component of the ‘brain drain’ problem. I’d rather not start about our education system.
What do you mean by “culture of entitlement”? Well, you see, Lim Guan Eng has been serving as the CM of Penang, even though some questioned that he is not a native or Penang. But we all must remember, that he is Lim Kit Siang’s son. Perhaps, he’s the brightest in DAP too, which attract other bright talents like Ong Kian Ming, highlighting that MCA and Gerakan seems to experience the brain drain problem too. But then I always wonder why that ‘High-class soalan mulut’ was not wanted in Australia.
Love,
Pwincess.
Permit me to contribute my two sen to Kineas.
re: “something TalentCorp has yet to show after spending millions”
After spending HUNDREDS of millions.
re: “What do you mean by ‘culture of entitlement’? Well, you see, Lim Guan Eng has been serving as the CM of Penang, even though some questioned that he is not a native of Penang.”
ROTFL. You go girl.
Re Can you quote any data or reports to support your view that there are few Malaysians “doing groundbreaking work” overseas?
No mention of Malaysians in either scientific journals etc but if you were to say there is, by all means show links to such works.
Re Come to think of it, are there any Malaysians doing “groundbreaking” work here in Malaysia?
No either. But I will validate my answer later below.
Re Why mention JP Morgan without mentioning Goldman Sachs or any of the other top investment banks? Why talk about Linklaters and leave out the other top law firms in the UK and the US?
I used to work for Goldman Sachs albeit in Singapore for 2 years between 2004-2006, now residing in Malaysia. We worked closely with law firms mainly in M&A. As for the hiring practice, in investment banking, most hires are determined to an extend by the sort of connections you bring to the firm, this applies to investment banking and legal practices. I m sure you do know that these 2 “industries” as I call them are principally driven by relationships. During my stay in Singapore I had colleagues from NY coming to Singapore on a regular basis working on deals in Asia and it was through my interaction with them that I got to know Malaysians were/are doing the grunt work, or as I mentioned in my earlier comment, piecemeal stuff.
Re Oh, btw – if what you have posted is even halfway correct, then it only goes to show that Malaysians have yet to make it globally in knowledge-intensive fields, professions and industries.
My experience is based on my previous vocation at Goldman Sachs so in terms of banking and financial services, I can say that I m correct, but I repeat only on investment banking and financial services. As for the tech sector you’ve mentioned, I do stay in touch with my former colleagues who have moved on to the venture capital sector so perhaps, if you insists on getting some clarity, I can glean some information but this will take some time. And yes, Malaysians have yet to make it in those fields, but I do understand why some sections of our country are trumpeting that Malaysians are doing well “over there”. The need to feel good although it is built on unsubstantiated “facts”.
Re Can we blame this on the Malaysian education system and the “culture of entitlement”?
My take on the education system. The whole system is basically beyond repair. I doubt the government is interested in doing anything at all. All the education blueprints etc, they are merely window dressing, I don’t think they will fix the problems even if they have the time and resources to do so. As for the culture of entitlement you spoke of, this is also true to a certain extend. One example is PTPTN. I would say PTPTN accelerates the decline of our higher education system. Basically you are, I mean, the government is “giving” money to undeserving candidates the opportunity to enter our universities. You put the deserving kids together with the ‘garbage’ and what do you think is going to transpire ? As the Chinese saying goes, it is difficult for someone to learn good values in 3 years but it is fairly easy for someone to learn all the bad stuff within 3 days. You put those with good grades and bad grades together and you drag those with good grades down the drain.
I do hope that the government would just abolish PTPTN so that only those that are deserving and well off are accepted into universities but I know this is not going to happen because if they were to do that, we could have demos in the streets by younger people who will then accuse the government of denying them the right to tertiary education. Since this “culture of entitlement” as you put it is so ingrained in the mindset of our people, the situation is only going to get worse for our country. Malays, Chinese, Indians, bottom line is, most of them are addicted to this “entitlement” opium.
And the populist Pakatan even offered that PTPTN need not be paid back.
What to do Helen One PM for Malaysia and he the best we have thus so far in the land of far far away and lets be superman up up and away then langar dinding tembok putra jaja aduhh.
Maybe Mah was put in charge of Hindu funds to avoid squabbling between rival Hindu groups. Similar to the Muslim family in Jerusalem that for generations has held the key to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre because the Christian denominations don’t trust each other with it.
As for Najib’s obsession with acronyms, I’ve lost count and can’t be bothered anymore. Bet even he or his staff can’t name all. For all you know, he’ll unthinkingly announce tomorrow a Persatuan Untuk Kaum Ibu. Sorry, old joke I learnt years back about being careful with acronyms.
re: “Maybe Mah was put in charge of Hindu funds to avoid squabbling between rival Hindu groups.”
Ouch. Pukul anak sindir menantu? MIC given subtle hint?
‘Pukul anak sindir menantu?’
I bet Hannah-Soalan-Mulut-Yeoh tergaru-garu kepala, tak tahu hujung pangkal apa yang diperkatakan antara Helen dan Irma. Hehehe!
Why keep searching for talents abroad, if there are still fresh graduate looking for a job ? You ‘re right maybe just want that gov-sponsored oversea vacation while half-heartedly asking those pro to comeback home. That was sure a wham-bam-thank-you ma’am!.
Anyway what does this newspaper says ?https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=871504642877630&set=a.101874766507292.4274.100000543084712&type=1&theater
R.U.O.K.? Acronym overloads are known to dull the intelligence
‘Hartawan derma harta RM6.56b’
http://www.hmetro.com.my/myMetro/articles/HartawandermahartaRM6_56b//Article/article_print
Cina Malaysia yang kaya-raya bayar income tax paling tinggi bila lagi? Takkan top ten Forbes macam Robert Kuok and gangs nak harap Syed Bukhary saja bagi naik graf philantrophy kat Malaysia ni dengan derma sebanyak USD500 Juta?