Public Forum On Outlooks For Sibu - Part 1

Mr. Tan Kee Hian speaking at the forum. Picture: Terrence Tan of MPI.

MPI organised a meaningful public forum on Oct. 25 at 7:15 pm in its Lecture Hall 1. The guest speaker for the evening was Mr. Tan Kee Hian, a widely acclaimed specialist in strategy and innovation.

Through the initiation of Mr. Daniel Ngien, the Deputy Chairman of SMC, Mr. Tan, an authentic Sibu guy, generously consented to shed some light on the outlooks for Sibu from his very personal and professional global exposure.

Kee Hian's impressive profile, the very profoundly relevant topic and my sheer concern for Sibu took me in a flash of a few seconds to make up my mind to go for it.

Tan is a no nonsense Sibuian. He has thirty years behind him in advising corporations and governments globally on strategy and innovation developments. Simply put, Kee Hian is no small player in its strictest sense.

You may ask: Is his expertise in global arena relevant to Sibu? Broadly speaking, yes.

Seriously, a two-hour forum was too swift for Kee Hian to focus on anything specifically. I sat through the session with my eyes glued to the speaker. What kee Hian propounded generally was a conceptual framework on outlook for Sibu, serving to provoke deep thinking of the dear Sibuians.

Yes, thinking - this is precisely what the people in Sibu have to invest in to help themselves out. You have got to have mindset change fundamentally in order for Sibu to spur on growth and breakthrough, Kee Hian posed a challenge to Sibuians.

Throughout the forum in his eloquent address with humours, Tan Kee Hian expertly linked his global experiences to the theme. Geographically, cities quoted by Kee Hian may not be comparable. But conceptually in terms of strategy and innovation, the cases are undoubtedly good to spur on thinking.