being an entrepreneurial university - … hamid abu bakar.pdf · being an entrepreneurial...

BEING AN ENTREPRENEURIAL

UNIVERSITY

lessons learnt from Malaysia

SAHOL HAMID ABU BAKAR

Vice Chancellor

Universiti Teknologi MARA

Malaysia

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• Sharing my hopes, dreams and plans about the problems and challenges of higher education in a developing country like Malaysia.

• Nobody is Perfect but Everyone is Perfectable

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3

I shall be sharing in full appreciation of the following factors:

1. cultural differences between the West and the East

2. disparity between developed and developing countries

3. differences between the rich and the poor

• Looking beyond red bricks and mortar boards – we have

different roles in building national economies and capacity

building

• These lead to different approaches in managing universities

• UiTM which I have the privilege of helming is Malaysia’s largest institution of tertiary education

• 200,000 students, 10,000 faculty members, 9000 support staff, 40 campuses throughout the nation

• Need a huge budget • No tuition fees • Catering for the bottom millions • It has played a pivotal role in meeting

the nation’s manpower needs

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• A large portion of excellent students based on national exams apply to study at UiTM and they are chosen based on merit

• 250K apply for 373 academic programmes offered but only 25K are admitted in a year (only about 10%)

• These students form the core group of our student population

• Recent survey showed that 80% came from well to do families and from selected boarding schools

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• But what about the poor and the under privileged?

• We also mold the low achievers from poor families to become successful

• We have trained about 20,000 from this group since 2010

• 85% have been successful in their pre-diploma programmes and now they are joining the main stream diploma students

• Our alumni have been supporting this programme financially

• The Prime Minister is the patron

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GRADUATE EMPLOYABILITY - CHALLENGES SOME RECENT FACTS AND FIGURES:

• About 76,200 graduates are still unemployed in spite of Malaysia maintaining a very low unemployment rate

• Every year 180,000 new graduates enter the job market

• In 2013, 72% of UiTM recent graduates (6 months after

completion of study) claimed that they had some form of jobs and the rest of them have become entrepreneurs

• Private sector recorded job vacancy in June 2013

dropped 35.7 % to 107,796 compared to 167,968 vacancies at the same time last year

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GRADUATE EMPLOYABILTY IS THE NUMBER ONE KPI FOR THE VICE CHANCELLOR

Huge responsibility that requires a revamp of curriculum and policies, vision and mission

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Challenges in managing a university

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• Universities are complex social organization with

distinctive cultures

• Handling stakeholders

• Securing budgets

• Handling academic staff

• Handling administrative staff

• Managing infrastructure

• Handling students

• Dealing with the public

• Safety & security issues

• Focusing on social responsibility

• Engaging the alumni

• Linking with the industry

Challenges in managing a university

…cont

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• Research

• Publication

• Ranking

• Internationalization

• Promotions

• Innovations – curriculum, etc.

• Communications

• Politics

• Managing Perceptions

• Quantity vs Quality

• Influence of the new media

HOW DO WE MANAGE?

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• Distributed leadership/delegate

•Putting the right people in the right place

•In every decision put the University first

•As the CEO do not get involved with or chair the tender

board

•Manage office politics and external politics

systematically

•Manage and engage the students. Reach out to the

grassroots

•Create a happy working environment for academic and

administrative staff

•Communicate, communicate and communicate

through facebook, teleconferencing, etc.

•Develop strong sixth sense. Use psywar

•Do not listen to the so called advisors

•Need to have good and loyal support staff

New Tag Line

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WE CREATE EMPLOYERS

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With the new strategies

University was declared

MOST ENTREPRENEURIAL

UNIVERSITY

for

TWO YEARS IN A ROW

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STRATEGY IMPLEMENTATION

Providing conducive ecosystem for entrepreneurship agenda

1. Establishing MASMED

2. Setting up of entrepreneurship centres at branch

campuses

3. Developing academic programmes

4. Organising acculturation programmes

5. Creating programmes for nascent entrepreneurs

6. Recognising staff involvement in innovation &

entrepreneurship activities

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…cont

7. Encouraging innovations

8. Developing new pedagogical initiatives to

encourage higher degree of learner autonomy &

produce more entrepreneurial graduates

9. Introducing new initiatives & procedures on cost

reduction and income generation to support new

activities & lessen dependency on public funds

10. Promoting social entrepreneurship & encouraging

spirit of volunteerism among staff & students

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…cont

11. Introducing a flagship social programme for

uplifting the social mobility of the most under-

privileged segment of the society (MDAB)

12. Establishing RIBU to manage intellectual property

& facilitate commercialisation of research findings

13. Building the UiTM-MTDC technopreneur

incubation centre to spearhead commercialisation

efforts

14. Establishing an innovation academy to nurture

creativity & innovative thinking among

postgraduate students

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CHALLENGES

1. Size of UiTM & the mix of courses offered

2. Diverse quality & background of students

3. Measurement & evaluation

4. Teaching & learning strategies

5. Maintaining full support & services

6. Provision for coordinated university-wide

entrepreneurship education policy

RECENT ACHIEVEMENTS

THE FIRST WINNER OF ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY OF THE YEAR 2012

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ENTREPRENEURIAL UNIVERSITY OF THE YEAR 2013

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• Only 20% of UiTM graduates joined government

sector in 2012. A sizeable portion of these

graduates are from Faculty of Education,

Faculty of Medicine, Faculty of Pharmacy, and

Faculty of Dentistry, which, by statute is

required to work with the government

• Majority – private sectors

UiTM GRADUATES EMPLOYMENT BY SECTOR

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GRADUATES EMPLOYABILITY and UITM

RECENT GRADUATE EMPLOYMENT PERFORMANCE

Some Recent Facts and Figures in Malaysia: •Unemployment rate (Dec 2012) : 3.3 percent •76,200 graduates are still unemployed

•180,000 new graduates enter the job market yearly

•Job vacancy in June 2013 dropped 35.7 % to 107,796

compared to 167,968 vacancies at the same time last year

•UITM RECENT GRADUATE EMPLOYMENT PERFORMANCE

•In 2013, more than 70% of UiTM recent graduates are

employed (6 months after completion of study)

• (1.9 % of them declared to be self-employed).

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Thank You

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