SMEAS II – Event Write Up: SME Accelerator Series: Educating SMEs in Productivity & Profitability
SME Accelerator Series is an annual business event where we provide a platform and channel for SMEs to source for practical solutions to their day to day business issues.
Founder and Managing Consultant of iCFO Solutions Sdn Bhd, Mr. Gan Teck Hooi is ahead of his time when he planned out the SME Accelerator Series late last year.
Considering himself in the juggling world of business, he took the matter of problems faced by SMEs to his hands by helping crisis-hit businesses.
It wasn’t anything major by donating billion ringgit to make these business owners staying afloat or such, but more of an advice and solution sharing session.
“You give a man a fish and he’ll be full for a day, but you teach a man to fish, he’ll be full for the rest of his life.” said Gan.
On July 25th, 2017, Gan organizes a sharing session wishful to share solutions to the concerning business owners.
Joining in for the second series of the event, are lineups of key-players in the industry. Gan brought in Vice President for Career Services of INTI International University & Colleges, Mr. Jesus. C. Tinawin, Senior Associate of Wong & Partners, Ms. Krystal Ng, Group CEO and Group Chief Editor of Malaysia SME Media Group, Mr. Wayne Lim and Business Group Lead of Apps and Services Marketing at Microsoft Malaysia, Mr. Ananthram Balakrishnan.
The event covers two major topics concerning problems that SMEs are currently facing. One being, productivity and the second one is profitability.
In line with the productivity issue, Mr. Balakrishnan commented “In business, we look at how we can empower people by giving them the right places to work, whether it is mobile or office, as well as whether we could provide chain support for our people”
“We’re trying to bring a comprehensive platform that can support everybody in the company, and this includes social or collaboration” he added. At the end of the day, Microsoft always strive in developing constant innovation for the people and making employer’s and employee’s lives easier.
As for Ms. Ng, she elaborated on key trends and challenges in the taxation world for SMEs, and all SMEs should be attentive to the issue as it has rapidly become more aggressive in Inland Revenue Board (IRB). According to the data collected from 2013 to 2017, IRB targets for tax collection are getting higher and higher, and as she warmly reminding business owners to be mindful of their taxation and not to be surprised if the company is loss-making or not paying enough taxes against their company, to expect an audit from the IRB.
Gan in his keynote segment shared with the audience how he came to the idea of such sharing session. A lot of SMEs out there are silently struggling with no practical solutions or whenever they went to business events out there, sometimes they can’t seem to relate to what they’re currently facing as it is not relevant to them.
“Being an SME like them, I could very much relate to that. Are SMEs here really connected or affected by these big, global issues,” asked Gan. “This is where I find that a lot of SME events are not engaging or in simple word, not personal to the SMEs” This was proven as he got a lot of positive feedback from the same event the year before.
What he did was the pilot-test with the first SME Accelerator Series with close SME friends and asked the participants to submit an issue they are dealing with within the business world. In return, the event itself acts as a bigger picture to solve their problems.
“The SME community agrees that entrepreneurship is a big one-man journey and at times it felt lonely. But with the right community and help from the right people, we’re on the same boat trying to make ends meet and aim for the best in this field” Gan added.
Along with this year’s theme of education, SME Accelerator Series II was held at Tan Yew Sing Auditorium, INTI International College Subang. The event witnessed a five times participation from both entrepreneurs and students alike at 200 crowds filling the auditorium as compared to last year’s audience.
“Entrepreneurship is a tough and challenging journey. So if there is an existing ecosystem in place to help these SMEs and entrepreneurs who barely have any experience to get them by, why not?” he continued.
Co-piloting the event as supporting partners are iCFO Solutions Sdn Bhd, Malaysia SME, INTI International University & Colleges, Microsoft, Wong & Partners, and International Council for SME & Entrepreneurship, Malaysia (“ICSMEE”)