ACCA Conference 2012

     This was the first time for 5 participants to participate in such a big event representing UTAR Accounting Society (Sungai Long campus). The participants would liked to thank the sponsors who fully sponsor all the five participants from our campus. This event was a 2 day 1 night event at Equatorial Bangi held on the 8th and 9th November 2012.

Left to right : Chen Shi Han, Lee Jia En, Tan Jia Wei, Mr.Ang (Head of event), Yap Min Che, Foo Seang Tian

     There were about 17 universities which include University Malaya and HELP University as well as over 300 participants. It was really crowded as participants approached the big companies booth to submit their resume. The program started with the opening speech by Ms. Jennifer Lopez, the Head of ACCA Malaysia.

The crowded environment

Ms. Jennifer Lopez, Head of ACCA Malaysia

The crowd in ballroom

     The first session was a talk given by Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) which shares about the art of communication and the importance of rapport building through physical and psychological matching and mirroring. Nowadays, many people think that poor communication leads to leadership failure, however the speaker rectified this by saying that whatever responses resulted from our communication, it is just a FEEDBACK, not a FAILURE. For example, it is interesting to note that when somebody ask you NOT to think about the colour blue, surprisingly our brain will automatically generate ‘blue colour’ scene first before it change to no “blue”.

The speaker of The Art of Communication by NLP

Participants is so happy towards the speech

     Participants were enriched by a panel discussion of all Big Four company, talking about the ultimate taboos at workplace. Youngsters nowadays are self-centred and used to have a lot of enjoyment which will bring troubles when they step into complex and intriguing society in future. Hence, Gen Y’s are advised to be patient and not to request anything that is unrealistic in return, said Ms. Lee Sue Chuen who is the People, Performance and Culture director at KPMG. In relation to Gen Y’s attitude, partner of Ernst & Young, Ms. Lee Soo Fern advised us not to job-hop so much. We should build our career and accumulate our career equity. Also, Mr Alex Lee, HR director from Deloitte advised us not to get distracted from our responsibilities by social media. In short, companies love Gen Y’s vibrancy and our flexibility. However, we should be more realistic about our career expectation, said Mr. Chan Chong Kong, Executive Director of PwC Malaysia.

Panel Discussion: Ultimate Taboos at Workplace

     Before another session started, there was another group of panel discussion which shared about shared services. This type of service is still considered new and growing rapidly in Malaysia. Personnel from shared services companies such as MDeC were invited to introduce shared services concept as one of the new career path for accounting students to consider after graduation.

Panel discussion about Shared Services

Following on was the highlighted talk of the day which is called ‘Fire Eating: Breakthrough to Success‘ which enlighten lots of participants as the important catalysts to become an effective leader. To be a successful leader, we need 3Cs (Character, Competency and Courage):

• Character: the inward motivation to do what is right in every situation. Jim Collins in his book ‘Good to Great' shows the pyramid of leadership. The pyramid started with a ‘High Capable Individual’, followed by ‘Competent Team Member’, ‘Competent Leader’, ‘Effective Leader’ and the last and most important Level 5 leadership are ‘Personal Humility’ and ‘Professional Will’. 
• Competency: refers to functional, personal, leadership and domain mastery within ourselves. We must equipped with learning agility so that we can close our competency gap between reality and our vision. 
• Courage: talking about changing and breaking through our current comfort zone to achieve another level of proficiency and competency. At the end of this talk we were asked to ‘eat fire’ in front of people. 

The fire stick

Fire eating time

Utarian cannot be avoided too

Mr.Ang implementing new house rule just before dinner time

2 people shared a room, The room were nice and comfortable.

     The next day we had our breakfast at Cafe Lavista. The food were nice. After breakfast, participants headed to the lawn and had their next program there. We were divided into 10 groups; each consisted of 30 members. The group forming is for station games.

Having some morning exercise before kick starting the activities

Activities: 

Paintball

Participants concentrate in doing their task

All the participants

     Lastly, although it was raining at the end but we have sunny smiles on all our faces. It was an awesome experience and we hope we can join again next year. 

Feedbacks from participants:

Mr. Yap Min Che

Well, it was an awesome event. Through this event, ACCA taught us self-esteem rather than narcissism; humble rather than modest; communicates rather than contact. In short, this event is the combination of equity, competency and of course, fun!!

Ms. Lee Jia En

Thank you ACCA for organizing such an awesome event. Through this event, ACCA provided us a stage of learning through various talks, activities and games. ACCA also provided guidance for us to get prepare for the outside world earlier by inviting well-known, experienced and talented speakers to share their valuable experience. Overall, it was as inspiring and enlightening event!

Ms. Tan Jia Wei

An extremely valuable event in terms of content, expert speakers and attending audience. Through this event, ACCA provided us firsthand information that equipped ourselves before we take our first step outside the classroom and into the working life. Well, this was one of the best events that I have ever attended!

Ms. Chen Shi Han

I have nothing but great things to say about this year’s ACCA conference. This event brings tremendous benefits to us through its well-planned activities and games which have provided us a lot of precious views about the outside world of our classroom. In brief, it is worthwhile to participate in this fun and motivating event.