The Scene with VC UiTM 2016

After months of preparations (ding donging here and there, Seremban Shah Alam, Shah Alam Seremban) and a couple of babies later (imagine how long it took), the UiTMNS Memorandum of Agreement with MAINS Zakat Sdn Bhd was finally materialized last Thursday. 

As usual, I was almost not invited to the whole MOA ceremony. Haha that's typical treatment for people who love to do kerja di sebalik tabir - and make that tabir siap dengan 'blockouts' sekali yer. And as usual, orang yang ingat kat orang yang buat kerja belakang tabir ni would be orang-orang yang seangkatan jua. Terima kasih lah sebab teringatkan saya. The lady that had the ball rolling thanked me various times, sampai nak naik malu aku. Rasa terharu pulak, sbb ada orang-orang macam ni. She would also be watching from the sidelines, not going to be in the official pictures with all the big shots, because in ranks she's a nobody. But on Thursday, she was the happiest person in UiTMNS. I was thinking had it not been for all the behind the scene hard work these people did, including her, would you even have the VC sitting there with the NS YB Speaker waiting to sign the MOA? Oh well, that's life ;-) And as usual, the people behind the scenes would always learn to take it gracefully.

The ceremony, interesting enough also allowed our newly appointed Rector, Prof Nash to start off his commandeering of the soon to be 3 campuses with a bang. Rezeki hasil kerja orang-orang di balik tabir semuanya, 10 months in the making, if only he knew. But malas nak ponder dah. Let's move on to another topic - the VC, Prof Emeritus Dato' Dr Hassan Said!

Ok, we all met the VC for the first time on Thursday. After the MOA ceremony, he spent almost 2 hours with the rest of the warga kampus. Personally, I think he's such a lovely man. He did not appear pompous, although his position could easily 'allow' that 'projection'. He's so generous with his smile and his choice of words in his speech although carefully chosen, reflected his humility. Funny, I said all that. I met a lot of people like him in my life, so what's the difference?? It's just that we are not used to such characterization when it comes to describing all our previous VCs (for the record I have only gone through 2 VCs before) hikhikhik...

Ni bukti kehadiran hihi, with two lovely lady bosses, Dr Rozita & Dr Norwati

Alhamdulillah :-)

The Rector introducing UiTMNS to the VC

The VC emphasized on a couple of things, one of the main thing is in the use of technology in teaching, and in improving the quality of our graduates as a whole, and of course to focus not only in the ability for them to communicate but also how to communicate. The key according to him is to produce students that can apply the 3 H - Hand (Skills), Head (Mind) and Heart (Values). He also stressed on the need to change some of the process in implementing our work in UiTM (so that most task can be completed efficiently and effectively), improving the role of alumni and to manage our assets into low risk income generation projects. He appeared calm and collected in answering most of the questions asked and from time to time shared his experience when managing Taylor's and USM. In fact, I don't really think the time allocated was really enough. There's just so many things running through our minds. And of course, some of us were a bit cautious - a norm that is.

In the end, in gist, he was quoted saying, 'we want our staff to be happy working with us because then they will perform better'. That's nothing new actually, but how that 'thought' translates to the grounds remained to be seen. In Sya Allah, may Allah grant him the ease to perform what he planned for UiTM. I believe he has it in him, I pray he will manage to get it through to all the warga UiTM.