Time for Indonesians to wake up and work seriously
Time for Indonesians to wake up and work seriously
JAKARTA (JP): Enroll in a prestigious business school and
within two years, you'll become a "professional" executive.
As Indonesia now has numerous postgraduate management and
business schools, private and state-run, the country can expect
an ample supply of professional workers.
"This is a misconception of the term 'professional' by many
people," said Djisman Simanjuntak, executive director of Prasetya
Mulya business school.
Every person, from blue-collar to white-collar worker, has to
be professional in his/her own field and the term is not limited
to just top-level people, he maintained.
Business and management schools will only provide a stronger
theoretical background and practical skills to enable students to
solve various problems in the workplace.
To be professional, he said, one should meet certain basic
requirements -- competency, skills and discipline.
Djisman also added that it was not fair to demand that people
be professional as it was closely related to the work culture as
well as the socioeconomic and political environment.
"Indonesia has long been recognized as a country which
tolerates incompetency, laziness and unpunctuality because of our
existing social and economic system, a legacy of the New Order
period," Djisman said.
There are also some factors which may shape one's sense of
professionalism, including educational and cultural background,
skills, moral values and attitudes.
In term of skills, Indonesians lag behind people from other
countries, even in the Southeast Asian region. "We don't have a
sense of perseverance in every field. We are not used to saying
'Yes, I can make it!,'" Djisman said.
"If you are a tempeh maker, you have to produce a high-quality
and saleable product. If you are a sportsman, you have to achieve
your dream to at least win a gold medal."
What we are lacking now is communication skills and the art of
negotiation. "Our lives are full of negotiation. If we don't have
skills to transfer our messages, nobody will understand our
intentions," Djisman said.
One of the handicaps in communication skills is that only a
few of us have mastered the global language of English.
There is a tendency for Indonesians to be satisfied if they
master only one subject like economics, medicine or politics, and
ignore other subjects.
"But most of all, we have a serious attitude problem. It is a
very big question mark," Djisman said.
Since childhood, attitudes have been shaped by internal and
external factors, including the home, school and working
environments.
At business schools, it is difficult to change one's attitude
because the students have already matured and have adopted
certain moral and ethical values from various sources.
"What we can do now is encourage them to 'rediscover' good
ethical values and remind them about good and bad things in
business and daily lives," Djisman said.
"Our business sector collapsed partly because of moral and
ethical problems. We need good role models."
Sukono Soebekti, executive director of the Institute of
Management Education and Development (IPPM), shared a similar
opinion. He said it was leaders or bosses that should set good
examples to their subordinates about how to be effective and
professional.
Lets say, a boss of a consumer service company should be
consistent. He or she, for instance, cannot put a sign "parking
for director." The best parking space must be available for the
guests. All employees -- from the front office staff to security
guards should act the same.
Respect
Employees, Sukono said, should feel they are respected by
their boss. They are regarded as the backbone of the company,
therefore their sense of ownership will increase accordingly.
There are several problems in our working organization which
hamper professionalism. Meager incomes, little chance of
promotion, unclear career paths and lack of job satisfaction.
The question of the right environment within the organization
and the opportunities offered to an individual for job
satisfaction constitute incentives resulting in loyalty and even
motivation for better performance, he said.
"This usually occurs in multinational companies which have a
well-organized work structure," he said.
Despite the shortcomings, however, Sukono feels optimistic
about seeing a rapid change in the country's social, political
and economical condition.
"Yes, we are now facing a very difficult time. But, it is only
part of the 'growing pains' period which will end somehow,"
Sukono said.
The openness and democratization processes have enabled people
to freely express their aspirations, something that never
happened in the past (the New Order era).
"People are now starting to feel 'guilty' if they are involved
in corruption, collusion and nepotism because of strong and tight
social control. It is good if we want to create a healthier
social and working environment," he said.
In previous years, there were a lot of people who received
certain privileges because of their close relations to powerful
figures.
"You could be a lazy security guard or an incompetent
supervisor in the past. That era will be gone soon because now we
are competing with other, skilled workers who are ready to
replace us," he said.
Government officials can no longer sit and do nothing. In the
past, being a government worker meant shorter working hours, a
job for life, a pension and security. "At present, many
government institutions were dismissed, leaving their workers
unemployed," Sukono pointed out.
Indonesians will have to work extremely hard to prepare
themselves for the so-called New Economy era in which we are part
of the global community and succumb to the international market
rules.
"We have to totally change our mindset, to reform our
education, social and economical systems to face the global
challenges -- something which has been almost impossible for
Indonesians to achieve up to now," Djisman said.
Indonesia can't wait or else it will drift away from the
global community. "Something must be done right now," he said.
(raw)