Khazanah Nasional chief Tan Sri Azman Mokhtar said that having an international and diverse group working for companies can, in turn, attract top Malaysian talents to work for them.
He was among a group of panellists speaking at a forum on the sidelines of the GLC Open Day here today.
Group CEO of Axiata Group Berhad Datuk Seri Jamaludin Ibrahim echoed Azman’s views, pointing out that Malaysian companies must look at attracting the best talents.
“Until you build the reputation of attracting the best people, and then the second best will come, and then the lower end will come and now, recently we tried to get people, it’s a lot easier.
“Almost any top earners in the world are willing to join us and some Malaysians working outside are willing to take a pay cut to join us,” Jamaludin said.
He said the starting point was to attract the best.
“This notion that you have to have all Malaysians running the company is one of the biggest flaws, I think,” Jamaludin said, stressing that this strategy can help build a new pipeline of Malaysian talents.Jamaludin then highlighted the weak communication skills and lack of creativity in local graduates, adding that his firm often needed to retrain new hires.
Ekuiti Nasional Berhad CEO Datuk Abdul Rahman Ahmad concurred and said Malaysian education was in need of reform to be able to provide the calibre of employees needed by the firms.
“Malaysia’s biggest challenge is education. We spend a lot but somehow, somewhere, the output is not there,” he said.
The Straits Times’ senior regional correspondent Leslie Jude Lopez disagreed, however, saying it was simply a case of local companies not doing enough to unearth existing talents.
Lopez added that there needs to be less intervention by the government in order for companies to grow.
“I think the state needs to let go and if you compare say Malaysia with Indonesia, Thailand, we are economically top-down, dictated by the state and driven by the state,” he said.
Jamaludin, however, believed the only way to find sustainable growth was to look beyond our borders.
“In Malaysia, we can’t get that scale and the only way to build that scale is to go beyond Malaysia,” he said, adding that the company has to be strong internally first,” said Jamaludin.
Meanwhile, Time Dotcom chief executive Afzal Abdul Rahim said there are still plenty of opportunities in Malaysia, despite the negativity that persists.
“The opportunities are everywhere and I really have very little time for the naysayers that say there is nothing to do, no business to do,” he said.
