MALAYSIA is nurturing entrepreneurs and corporate leaders who are innovative and capable of thinking global, driving change and delivering results in the increasingly competitive business environment.

And China has become Malaysia’s learning ground and perfect platform to reach out to major players from around the world, especially the South-East Asian region.

Under a partnership agreement recently signed between Malaysia’s Human Resources Development Fund (HRDF), Cheung Kong Gra-duate School of Business and regional management consulting firm SRW&Co, 15 executives from the manufacturing and service sector in Malaysia will join leaders of companies from Indonesia and other Asean countries for customised education programmes at the school in Beijing next year.

The programmes will be tailor-made for the Asean participants with the hope to produce leaders who can drive the next wave of development in Asean apart from enabling them to gain insights into doing business in China.

HRDF chief executive officer Amirnuddin Mazlan said training courses for Malaysian executives would no longer be conducted only in Malaysia but also overseas to broaden their business know-how.

“We have already talked to Cambridge University and now entered a collaboration with Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business. China is now the world’s second largest economy and we want our executives to explore and tap into China’s market,” he said after the signing ceremony.

Amirnuddin said the HRDF would begin recruiting the first batch of executives next month for the programmes.

“We have 12,800 employers registered with the HRDF and there is a pool of 2.1 million workers. The participants for these programmes will come from here.

“The programmes are about building leadership capability and changing the way of thinking. So, the participants have to be from the top management who will drive the company,” he said.

Amirnuddin said the employers would draw out the mandatory Hu­man Resources Development levy, which they were paying to the Malaysian Government, to fund their executives to attend the programmes.

SRW&Co chairman Daniel Wong said they would also enrol business leaders from other Asean nations for the programmes so that all the participants would foster a more regional approach in changing and expanding their businesses.

“These programmes are timely and reflect the strategic importance of Asean as a regional bloc and the emergence of China as an economic power. There are many lessons to be learned and shared between China and Asean,” he said.

He said the participants could also take advantage of establishing business and social networks with players from the region and the alumni of the school.

The school’s assistant dean, Zhou Li, said the participants would learn about the economic and business structures in China and about how Chinese companies grow, transform and go global.

“When they come here, we will also help them network with our students and alumni. We will invite speakers from the industry for the programmes and organise visits to our alumni’s companies,” he said.

The school’s faculty of experts on China’s economic development and integration with the global economy would conduct seminars on topics such as strategic planning, product branding, innovation, business deve­lopment and financial and human resource management, he added.

Zhou said the school had received individual students from Malaysia previously but it was the first time for a group of Malaysian professionals under a regional collaboration initiated by its government.

“We believe that our school is the most globalised school in China. While expanding our operations to Europe and the United States, our focus remains in East Asia including Japan, South Korea and Asean countries.

“This collaboration gives us a very good opportunity to understand our neighbouring Asean countries better, he said.

Established in 2002, Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business is China’s first non-profit, independent business school. Headquarted in Beijing, the school aims to generate world-class insights into management theory and practices and develop business leaders for a new corporate era.

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