A New Year Beckons!

A New Year Beckons!

Prof. Arfah Salleh

Dean, Graduate School of Management

UPM

Happy New Year! Despite the challenges, we did well last year.  Both the MBA and Ph.D. programmes saw a marked increase in student intake.   This has been as much due to the hard work of the faculty and staff as it is of the students who have spread the reputation of GSM   through their academic excellence. 

The quality of teaching, consulting and research has improved demonstrably.  We have brought industry experience into the classroom by opening our faculty to industry professionals.  With an energetic faculty, our efforts at greater autonomy, through the establishment of the Putra Business School, and at securing AACSB accreditation have gathered even greater momentum.  It is important that we accelerate this momentum to make these initiatives a reality this year.

I take this opportunity to express my heartfelt thanks to my faculty, staff, students, alumni, captains of industry and friends who are contributing to the development of the School as the premier business school in the country.  

Each new year comes with great expectations.  We need to maintain our status as the premier business school in the country. We need to continue to be relevant to the industry through our research and consultancy.  We want to make sure that our students understand the needs of the local industry and community as well as that of the global business. Only in that way can we maintain our relevance and purpose as a business school. 

As such, this year, the School has modified its course offerings to inject greater industry experience in classrooms.  Industry experts will be invited to expose students beyond the text books to the real world out there. 

However, such exposure will not compromise the student-based learning which will remain the mainstay of the pedagogy of this School.  Students will have to take responsibility for their learning and growth with the coaching and counsel of the faculty.

Our guiding philosophy of human governance will continue to be the bedrock of all our efforts in teaching and reaching out to the industry and community.   Indeed, human governance has been the lodestar for all that we do at the School. 

We have researched the developments in science and have discovered that, unlike classical Newtonian science that focuses on mechanics and empirical data, contemporary science elucidates the reality of consciousness. That reality parallels the doctrines of religion and Eastern traditions. And human governance mirrors these doctrines. 

We have a mission to ensure that in their learning and growth, students are imbued with the immanent and universal principles of human governance.  We seek to actualise virtues and ethical practices through human governance. 

As we embark on this journey to mainstream human governance as a way of life, and of doing business, we are encouraged to see a pattern, lately in the international scene – a pattern that lends credence to human governance.  We observe management gurus who espouse values and truth connecting with quantum physicists. Witness, for example, Peter Senge and Jaworski – two management experts – aligning their views with that of David Bohm, the quantum physicist who had this unquenchable quest for truth.  In turn, Western quantum physicists, like Bohm, have sought inspiration and insights from Eastern spiritual masters such as Krishnamurti. 

This interplay of management values, quantum physics and spiritual values mirrors the efforts of GSM in propagating, since 2007, human governance based on quantum physics, religion and native and Eastern traditions.

As we herald the new year, I exhort the faculty, staff, students and alumni to redouble our efforts at spreading this governing principle of business and everyday life beyond the classrooms to the industry and community as well.

As we celebrate the dawn of the new year, we need to profit from the experience of previous years to prepare for the journey ahead.  We call for a migration to a new MINDSIGHT where we not only just look but see.  As the old proverb goes, “There is none so blind as he who cannot see.”  And so, we call on everyone to reflect within to discover our purpose in life. May our respective faiths, encapsulated in our concept of human governance, illuminate our lives so that we may make this world a better place. 

We welcome the 2012 batch of students who will be starting their first semester this month. And I wish everyone, faculty, staff and students a good year ahead.

Posted in: HUMAN GOVERNANCE