By G. Sharmila
It isn’t just local companies that have problems obtaining the calibre of engineering talent they need to grow their business, multinational corporations in Malaysia are having the same problem too, it seems.
“We do consider it a little bit more difficult to hire talent, engineering talent in Malaysia. We have not specifically compared to Singapore, as we do not have similar operations there, but what we do compare is with our parent company in the US and even talent out of India and China.
“So if you compare against these three, we do find that it is a little bit more difficult to get the calibre of engineering talent in Malaysia,” National Instruments Malaysia managing director Rajesh Purushothaman told KINIBIZ over the phone.
The issue is with engineering talent fresh out of local universities. When asked what skills fresh graduates lack, Rajesh replied that while the talent is there, they have to invest in a lot more as it takes an additional six months to get to the level of knowledge and the standards that National Instruments requires.
What kind of skill sets do fresh graduates lack? “We require primarily technical knowledge and it goes back to their university curriculum, we do not believe they are as challenging as what you would find in the US, for example,” Rajesh said in reply to a question on the subject.
Anna Maria Braun
Meanwhile. B Braun president of Asia-Pacific Anna Maria Braun said that the company is able to source high-calibre engineering talent in Malaysia. “There exists, however, a challenge in sourcing for talent in niche engineering specialisations, not only in Malaysia but within the region. Some examples of the specialisations in this category for B Braun prevail in R&D, plastic injection moulding, facilities automation and SAP,” she told KINIBIZ via email.
When asked how she would compare the quality of local engineering talent with that from neighbouring countries, she replied: “I would not generalise about the quality of talent between local talent and the neighbouring countries as there are many different parameters involved and there are highly talented individuals in every country. It can just be more difficult to locate them.”
So how do multinationals bridge the gap when it comes to junior talent? National Instruments’ Rajesh said that they have an internal rigorous training programme where they get in-house engineers to train the fresh graduates, typically over a period of six months.
B Braun also trains talent internally, according to Braun. “B Braun is working closely with Malaysian universities, government authorities and other partners on many different initiatives to develop highly skilled Malaysian talent and ensure that the skills they learn are aligned with what the industry needs.
“The key areas we are collaborating on are to ensure that industry-relevant components are incorporated into the university curriculum, and that the students obtain practical hands-on and real-time training in our B Braun facilities through our structured programmes. But we will also always train our people internally. So, it’s really about ensuring the right alignment,” she said.
There’s also the matter of experienced local engineering talent leaving Malaysian shores for greener pastures abroad. How do multinationals such as National Instruments and B Braun retain Malaysian talent?
Commenting on the matter, Rajesh said that the company ensures that there are opportunities and noted that it has a more attractive compensation package compared to the rest of the market. “Once we get talent and they are working for us, they are aware of the opportunities and the challenges we provide. We do not have a lot of talent leaving for Singapore, for example.
“However, they (local engineers) have this feeling that opportunities are a lot better in Singapore and that’s why we’re working with government institutions like TalentCorp to change that, to expose them to the opportunities here in Malaysia via programmes like Innovate Malaysia,” he explained. (Note: Innovate Malaysia Design Competition is a multi-discipline engineering design competition open to all final-year undergraduate engineering or computer science students in Malaysia).
“I cannot speak for them (local engineers) but I assume aspects such as global exposure, career and growth opportunities are among the factors involved. After all, they are what motivated me to go abroad! To retain talent, companies based in Malaysia have to ensure that these benefits are also available in their organisations,” Braun commented.
Another issue when it comes to retaining talent is compensation. Often, local talent leave for greener pastures (whether abroad or locally) because their organisation practices double standards. For example, a local engineer may have a far lower salary than his counterpart who is an expatriate in the same company.
Rajesh said it depends on how one defines “expatriate”. “Let me first define on what we mean by expat. First, we have engineers coming here from our parent or sister companies for knowledge transfer. They are not employees of National Instruments Malaysia they are still employees of our overseas parent or of sister facilities or subsidiaries of the parent company. So for the purpose of that, they are expats.
“Then it comes to those who have been hired locally as expat engineers. In general, we try to avoid that. In the rare instance we do hire someone from a foreign country to work here, their pay is similar to Malaysian engineers. We do not pay them higher than what we do the locals,” he explained.
In reply to a question on B Braun’s practices with regards to local versus expatriate engineers, Braun said: “There are challenges in sourcing for talent in niche specialisations. This is when we may have to source for talent from other countries.
“Many of them are hired on local contracts. Knowledge transfers happen as they work alongside their Malaysian counterparts. Our local talent benefit from this arrangement and acquire the necessary skills and competencies, which result in their career growth and development.”
She explained that their Malaysian talent is also sent abroad, especially to Germany, to gain global exposure and training. “B Braun has in place global assignment guidelines which govern all international assignments. Wherever our employees are transferred to in the world, they come under the similar standards and this helps to ensure fairness,” she added.
KINIBIZ also asked the two companies what measures the government and institutions such as TalentCorp can take to improve the quality of engineering talent coming out of local universities.
“In our opinion, the primary focus should be the quality of the graduates coming from the universities’ engineering schools. There is good talent coming out, if they can increase that pool, that is, in our opinion, the primary thing they can do to solve this problem.
“It’s an issue of supply and demand, if the supply is here, the demand will come. Multinationals all over the world are searching for quality talent and if the supply is there, they will come. So once we do that, more and more opportunities will be created and the overall ecosystem will improve.
“As for Malaysians leaving for better opportunities, that will always be there, that exists in all countries. But if you have enough supply, more investors will come and more opportunities will be created,” Rajesh opined.
Commenting on the matter, Braun said: “It would be for the government and academia to continually engage in active dialogue with industry to identify how the national curricula can be improved to address the gaps.
“I have described the many collaborative initiatives that B Braun has embarked on, in this respect. It is also crucial to ensure that Malaysians learn more languages, especially to gain fluency in the English language,” she concluded.
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