Efforts to make 100 young entrepreneurs yearly in Sabah
Published on: Saturday, December 07, 2019
By: Larry Ralon
Phoong (seated, centre) posing with the participants.
Kota Kinabalu: The organisers of the V Creator 3 Days Start-up Camp plans to hold it twice yearly in the hope of producing 100 young entrepreneurs a year in Sabah.The camp is a project initiated by Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS), Malaysia Entrepreneurs Development Association (PUMM), GA Space Sdn Bhd and Vistage Malaysia, with Daily Express as the media partner. ADVERTISEMENT
PUMM National Vice President cum Sabah State Liaison Chairman and G&A Group CEO, Datuk George Lim, said about 50 per cent of the 50 participants of this first camp are from all over the State.
He said they are aspiring entrepreneurs while the rest are already in business for two to three years. “They are also very happy with the response received for the camp.
“This is the beginning of their journey. We, as the creators, create this programme to train more creators. The creator is similar like an entrepreneur. We create a business that we love. We want to create more young entrepreneurs and help those who aspire to become an entrepreneur,” he said, Friday.
As about 90 per cent of entrepreneurs failed in their respective ventures, he said the organisers hope that through the programme they (participants) would be able to get ideas on how to be successful and at the same time get support from those already in entrepreneurship.ADVERTISEMENT
“One thing about entrepreneurship is that they are very lonely people. Their ideas are unique and only they themselves understand their business and the problems they are facing. (But) By having a support group provided through this camp, they will be able to have knowledge and have confidence in themselves,” he said.
Lim thanked State Youth and Sports Minister Phoong Jin Zhe, who officiated the opening of the camp, for assuring assistance under his Ministry’s entrepreneurship fund for those who are successfully pitched in the camp.
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The camp’s facilitator, Vincent Chew, who has over 10 years experience in the business facilitation field, said young entrepreneurs and aspiring ones need a lot of support, not just in funding but also skills.
“To me, we focus very much on competency development. Without competency, without the skills, they cannot develop. And they also need to know how to develop a team. Without a good team, especially those in the digital world, especially now with the whole world into digitalisation, they need to pick up the relevant skills.
“I had a lot of people coming to me saying they have ideas of an app or whatever e-commerce related. So I just ask them simple questions, for example, in your team or you yourself, are you a programmer? Do you know about programming? If you don’t know, you are going to start something which you don’t have the knowledge or experience.
“You can easily outsource it to others, but whatever they will bring back to you, you will have to take it as it is. That’s where you don’t know whether this or that (which they are bringing to you) is right or wrong...so that’s why competency is very important.
Lim (centre) with Yeh (left) and Chew.
“Team is also important. The entrepreneurs themselves are also very important in terms of their competency building. So what we are trying to do here is to develop their competency first. And thereafter the support comes through the mentoring.
“(Because) there must be a structured programme. It is not just giving funding and then let it be, without tracks and measures on how they are progressing. That cannot work,” he said.
He said so many years throughout the journey, for a lot of entrepreneurs, they just get pitched, funding and all that, they just go for the valuation part, but that cannot work anymore.
“Because ultimately business is all about how to make money by you helping to solve and to view problems in the marketplace. So that is what we want to create here,” he said.
Asked how he finds the participants of the camp, Chew said surprisingly, they are quite active, energetic and passionate.
“So I think Sabah has a very good foundation. But it is just that the exposure needs to be more. Exposure not just within Sabah, as they need to think out of Sabah...because Sabah is not really a big market yet, but there are a lot of resources here which to me is quite untapped,” he said.
On advice to those interested to try out the next camp, Chew said it is very simple, just try it out.
“They need to join and test it out, they need to really explore it.
“It has nothing to do with failing. Failing is just part of learning. Without failing, without making mistakes, how would we know things work or not. So they just need to be brave and courageous enough to explore and then to fail...because failing is part of winning.”
There are 20 mentors from renowned business organisations taking part in the camp, including Deputy General Manager of Sabah Publishing House Sdn Bhd (SPH), Lawrence Yeh, who said he can see that the participants are mostly on the right track as they have a lot of ideas.
“But they do need a lot of inputs from people of the business areas where they are interested in,” he said.Stay up-to-date by following Daily Express’s Telegram channel.
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