Talent the key to competitive edge for Malaysian firms as growth scales up

90% of Malaysian firms shifting back to growth focus – with talent the key differentiator

SINGAPORE (11 April 2011) – With the credit crisis feeling more and more squarely in the past, 90 percent of Malaysian firms are refocusing on growth, says a recent study by consulting firm Accenture. This marked re-emphasis on growth is more discernible compared with the situation just two years ago, with the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) noting back then that a majority 66 percent of companies put cost reduction as the overriding driver of organisational initiatives. In a more recent survey, the EIU confirms the shift to growth footing, with 86 percent of firms now facing more complex operating environments as a result of greater customer expectations in post-downturn conditions.

Malaysian firms in particular now face a more complex market filled with growth opportunities, pushed forward by the 10th Malaysia Plan (10MP) initiative and its push to grow the country into a high-income economy. Although on one hand the market outlook is generally buoyant – meaning increased primary demand and more business for all – on the other hand current developments point to game-changing competition creating an imminent need for top players in key industries to ensure continued performance or else risk losing market share and position.

Replication of competitors’ strategies and even products has usually been the easy street to upward growth, with lower-ranked competitors following suit and acquiring the necessary hardware quickly, however the one key ingredient that’s acknowledged to be impossible to import and copy is a strong management team and a talented workforce. This identifies a definitively secure source of competitive advantage for top-tier firms and SMBs with high-quality products and services, in today’s high stakes, high-growth market. Investments toward this direction to the tune of RM 1.34 trillion (US$444 billion) are expected to be devoted from business and government, enabling Malaysia to achieve developed-nation status within the next ten years according to Dato’ Sri Idris Jala, Minister in the Prime Minister’s Department, former CEO of Malaysian Airlines, and current CEO of Pemandu (Performance Management Delivery Unit).

Nestlé (Malaysia) Bhd, for one, takes its talent management seriously with a multi-pronged approach comprising performance evaluation, talent assessment, succession planning and progress development. Yearly assessments on performance and achievement are conducted for performance evaluation whereas talent assessment measures employees’ sustained performance and potential growth. Succession planning involves development of potential successors for key positions while progress development relates to employees’ individual development plans.

CIMB Group Holdings Bhd too has a talent management strategy for group sustainability. “Studies show that retaining talent through money can only go so far,” says Hamidah Naziadin, CIMB Group Holdings Bhd Head of Group Corporate Resources. Training and development programmes are based on employee value propositions and the Group’s managers are also career coaches.

SMBs traditionally find it harder to attract and retain talent. Moreover, Malaysian SMBs in general, are not promoting these advantages to potential employees and so struggle to attract the necessary talent, according to Chua Tiam Wee, president of the National SMI Association.

Hence in order to:

• Attract top talent

• Ensure continued leadership and business continuity

• Tap growth opportunities

• Protect strategic market positioning, and even

• Raise profitability

SMBs, MNCs and local conglomerates are pushed inevitably toward investing in their talent to gain critical competitive advantage by nimbly seizing the fleeting windows of opportunity opening up during the current growth phase.

Malaysian companies are now asking themselves:

• What are our new challenges now, in this faster-paced, more complex business environment?

• How can we improve HR processes and practices to create all-important competitive advantage?

• Are we doing enough to build a robust talent pipeline? Have we identified key talents for grooming, or are we just allowing competitors to poach our talented staff and the training we’ve invested in them?

• Aside from just increasing remuneration do we truly understand the most effective means to engage and retain Malaysian talent?


Malaysia’s top SMBs, regional MNCs and even government agencies who are major employers will be using a unique opportunity to interactively retool their specific HR processes and practices and secure competitive advantage in Malaysia’s quickening growth market at the HR Talk Show’s A-list CEO-level panels come Wednesday, 25 May 2011 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

The HR Talk Show series is a high-impact interactive platform bridging the gap between government and business initiatives to drive human capital best practices and actionable insights into talent, technology and strategic HR. In a unique talk show format, CEOs, HR Directors, CIOs/CTOs and their CFOs from Malaysia’s most admired companies will be working with 400 participants to interactively walk through the most current human capital challenges in a fast-growing economy like Malaysia’s to ensure that the most important leaders in businesses and public organisations:

• Drive improved talent productivity and leadership succession

• Cast off accident-prone legacy strategies for talent management

• Secure proper methodologies to evaluate and implement HR technology and services

• Resume their strategic roles with a greater clarity of thought and vision

all with the aim to support, harmonise and put into action the initiatives from both government and private sector to transform and grow Malaysia into a high-income economy and grow the local highly-skilled workforce to 33 percent by 2015 and 50 percent by 2020 as outlined in the 10th Malaysia Plan (10MP).

The series is organised by the Center for Business Strategy and Tactics and promoted by Arc Media Global with a high-profile network of international and local partners and supporting organisations, including sponsors Oracle PeopleSoft Enterprise, Northgate Arinso, and Ramco Systems; exhibitors KZEN Solutions and StepStone Solutions; and strategic partners Corporate Executive Board, World HRD Congress, and Young Business Owners – ASEAN; among many others. Please call the production team at +65 6844 2080, email hrtalkshow@arcmediaglobal.com or visit the official website www.arcmediaglobal.com/hrtalkshow for details on programme, attendees, and other key features of the May 2011 talk show.

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If you’d like more information about this topic, or to schedule an interview with the speakers at the HR Talk Show, please call Eunice Wee at (+65) 6844 2080 or email Eunice at hrtalkshow@arcmediaglobal.com


Keywords: customer expectations, post-downturn, 10th Malaysia Plan, 10MP, competition, Pemandu, Nestlé, CIMB, National SMI Association, talent management, succession planning, SMEs, HR technology, Oracle PeopleSoft Enterprise, Northgate Arinso, Ramco Systems, KZEN Solutions, StepStone Solutions, Corporate Executive Board, World HRD Congress, Young Business Owners – ASEAN

The Center for Business Strategy and Tactics (Center for Business) is an industry research centre (IRC) that works to bring top executives together in communities of learning and practice to act as a catalyst for generating high-value energy business insight and channel top expertise to where the world needs it most. Center for Business meetings are powered by Arc Media Global, a B2B/G2B integrated international marketing specialist headquartered in Singapore.

Contact: Eunice Wee
Arc Media Global
Robinson Road PO Box 176, Singapore 900326
(+65) 6844 2080
hrtalkshow@arcmediaglobal.com
www.arcmediaglobal.com/hrtalkshow

This release was published on openPR.