By YS Chan

Although Standard 6 and Form 3 students have to sit for national examinations, automatic promotions allow most to remain in school until Form 5 to sit for the all-important SPM.

School leavers who don’t have to work to support themselves or their families normally enrol for a course at one of the many public or private tertiary institutions, funded by parents, loans or scholarships.

Good SPM results are essential for admission into public university courses with limited seats, as tuition fees at private universities are high and beyond the means of parents with average income.

A university degree is needed to work in licensed professions, senior positions in the education field or in government agencies. But in the private sector, paper qualifications counts for little when holders are unable to communicate and interact well with others.

Many Malaysians can speak several languages or dialects but are masters of none. They can chat for hours but may not be able to write an intelligent report or describe well something everyone seems to know.

Few Malaysians can think, speak and write clearly as clarity of thought is not given due importance. Many tend to generalise instead of being accurate or specific.

Access to vast amount of information does not necessarily make one well-informed, as such superficial knowledge has little application and minimal benefit.

On the other hand, mastering a language and mathematics will empower any student to excel in arts or science subjects, or professional programmes such as law or accountancy.

Deeper understanding and fuller use of a language would greatly help in personal development, which is grossly lacking in our education system, and not through rote-learning or memorising religious texts.

We have succeeded in churning out millions of graduates lacking in confidence and acting immaturely during job interviews, with many unable to describe in their own words what they have studied for a few years.

While parents are prepared to spend a fortune on their children’s education, hardly any of these graduates are willing to spend their own money to undergo training in order to perform well at the work place.

Training is essential for all levels of employees, more so for fresh graduates, as most do not have industry-relevant knowledge and skills, apart from soft skills needed to interact well with colleagues and customers.

Much-needed skills

But few people, including those in high positions, are clear about training. Many think that it is nothing more than a group of people listening to a speaker or watching fancy presentations.

Many trainers too are keener to impress the participants by disclosing fantastic facts and figures, than equipping the trainees with the much-needed skills and the right mind-set.

Key performance indicators of many organisations are measured by the number of people who have attended training and received course certificates.

Most of those who attend training are sent by their employers, with the better ones trying to learn something from the course.

Training would be more effective if participants are required to identify what they wish to achieve or their desired level of performance.

Trainees should think through in order to be aware of the challenges. They may not have all the answers but half the battle is won by asking intelligent or probing questions.

Trainers should not spoon feed trainees but guide them to find suitable solutions for themselves.

Finding the right answers may be the least of the problems as ready solutions are well known or easily accessible.

However, diagnosing problems or interpreting situations well can be very difficult than learning that requires mentoring, coaching or training. They must be set against the right context so that participants could apply at work what they learned in training.

If training is centred on delivering contents, it would be a waste of precious time as trainees can access that from books or online. Sadly, much of this so-called training are nothing more than briefing sessions, as little is remembered or applied after training.

Training is most effective when trainees get to speak or practise in a group of less than 25 participants, and contents learned are correctly applied in the right contexts.

YS Chan is an FMT reader.

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