Senang Dengan ICT: How Has ICT Changed Our Lives?
by Ir. Dr. Karl Ng, Head of Capability Development Department

The Chief Executive Officer and the employee of any local company have many roles and challenges. The CEO needs to provide directions, steer the organisation through roadblocks and align the resources to meet organisation objectives at the same time balance short term goals such as sales ignoring other long term goals such as investment in core delivery processes, ICT, talent and product development. Meanwhile, the employee needs to contribute towards organisation goals and undertake his or her professional development needs in a cost effective manner. The CEO and the employee constantly look for simple and easy solution to solve their challenges. This is where the Senang Dengan ICT campaign could help to communicate how MDeC through ICT can benefit the individuals such as the employees, business communities and finally the nation. Recognising these needs, the Capability Development Programme (CDP) has been developed and structured to help companies and professionals address their business and professional challenges. Currently, there are 13 Capability Development Programmes that looks into various aspects of organisation development in 3 broad categories, 1) Professional Development, 2) Product and Technology and 3) Process, Management and Innovation.

Currently more than 500 MSC Malaysia status companies have successfully participated and graduated from CDP. Companies that participated in CDP have performed 3 times better in terms of export growth compared to average MSC Malaysia company. At the same time, more than 2000 working professionals have been trained and certified as well. Another 10,000 working professionals from over 4,000 organisations have also benefited from the talks, seminars, dialogues and conferences organized under CDP. Many of working professionals been empowered to deliver better products and services in their current workplace in line with the Senang Dengan ICT goals of empowering lives.

Recognising the importance of community empowerment, CDP has successfully nurtured a vibrant community of practices that promote global practices that promote global practices to Malaysian ICT industry. Some of the professional bodies that CDP supported included International Association of Software Architects (IASA), Malaysian Software Testing Board (MSTB), Project Management Institute (PMI), IT Service Management Forum (ITSMF) and Software Process Improvement Network (SPIN).

CDP has also successful in raising the competitiveness and quality standards of Malaysia ICT industry by raising the number of certified organizations and professionals. For instance, CDP has successfully increased the number of CMMI assessed organizations from 1 in 2003 to more than 60 to date. Currently, Malaysia is ranked number 1 in South East Asia with the most number of CMMI Appraisals.

Through CDP efforts, the ICT community in Malaysia have been more willing to invest in long terms development initiatives such as professional development, process improvement and organisation development. All these initiatives are crucial building blocks to achieve the government’s aspiration to become a knowledge based economy by 2020. This is in line with the Senang Dengan ICT aspirations of empowering the individuals and the communities through ICT and MSC Malaysia programmes.