Friday, August 13, 2010

Going back to my roots through a road less travelled

A century ago, two families embarked upon a voyage to Indonesia in search for a better life. Setting sail from Southern China, my grandparents - in their early years - were among them. Having established themselves in the new land of opportunities, my parents and I were subsequently raised in the tropical archipelago down south. After a century and two generations, at the dawn of the new millennium, I set foot for the first time in Australia in pursuit of higher quality education. A decade later, in 2010, I am about to embrace the greatest opportunity of my life so far by making my way back to my roots, exploring the rich heritage of those who came before me and creating positive and lasting impact in China - the golden land of our time.

This is how my Corporate Service Corps story began...

Before getting into much details about my experience in China, I thought it would be useful to elaborate a little about the IBM's Corporate Service Corps (CSC) program.

According to IBM's website, "the CSC exposes high performance IBM employees to the 21st century context for doing business --- emerging markets, global teaming, diverse cultures, working outside the traditional office, and increased societal expectations for more responsible and sustainable business practices. CSC participants perform community-driven economic development projects in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe and Latin America, working at the intersection of business, technology and society." It is IBM's answer to the question: "How does a company develop leaders who have the skills needed for a globally integrated, smarter planet?" Some people call it the corporate version of the Peace Corps.

Harvard Business School (HBS) has been engaged by IBM to evaluate the impact of the program since its inception. Prof. Chris Marquis from HBS summarised these impacts in three broad categories:
  1. impact on individualsglobal leadership skill development, fostering cultural intelligence & global awareness and facilitating intrapersonal growth
  2. impact on local partner organisations and their communities: improvement in business processes & models, capacity & capability development of local organisation staff and establishment of internal & external network relationships
  3. impact on IBM: increased employee retention & commitment to IBM, new knowledge & skill contribution to IBM and enhanced perception of IBM
The CSC is also a very selective program - it truly is an honour and privilege for me to be invited. Back in 2008, as many as 5,500 top performing IBMers from more than 50 countries applied for the program - only 200 of them were selected. Kevin Thompson, Senior Program Manager of the CSC described the selection process: "We realised we had to set initial qualification criteria if we were trying to get the best of the best. To apply, an employee had to have at least two years of IBM tenure and performance rating in the top 15-20% over a three-year period, so 80% of the company didn't even qualify. Being part of IBM talent development program qualified for points. Having a history of being a volunteer counted as points. We wanted to make sure people already had some experience in volunteerism or giving back to guard against this as a sort of vacation junket. The essay was the primary mechanism for distinguishing the really, really exceptional applicants from the otherwise very good."

Being a part of CSC will surely be once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Not only that I have been lucky enough to be selected as a part of this amazing program, I have been luckier to be assigned to a team with China as deployment destination. Along with 9 colleagues from 8 countries: India, United States, Canada, Hungary, Germany, Argentina, France and Australia (me); we will be delivering consulting engagements for 5 local clients located in Ji'nan, Shandong province, 400 kms south of Beijing during September 2010. China, as you know is the emerging world's super power. The staggering economic growth in the country will surely be an eye-opener and the cross-cultural exposures from interacting with clients, colleagues and local communities will be exciting to learn from. I look forward to developing my leadership skills, making a difference and getting the most out of this experience, while at the same time exploring the traditions of my origin.

Although the whole blogging thing is quite new for me, I have pledged myself to document this experience as best as I can and share this with all of you - my friends. In the next two weeks, I hope to give you a bit of insights & thoughts about the scope of work & the clients, China in general, the CSC team composition, preparatory efforts undertaken so far, trip plan, Ji'nan - the destination city and Shanghai World Expo. There will be so many things going on and it will be a challenge for me to be able to clearly and accurately articulate this complex undertaking. However, I will do my best to peel this "onion" layer by layer for you. If you have any suggestions, feedback, comments and questions, please post them in the comment section!~ :)

For more info about CSC program, click here:

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