Shanghai. Indonesian students need to revolutionize their learning approach to compete as multinational companies battle it out to lure the top talent from emerging markets, experts contend.
In 2008, the German chemicals giant Henkel created an international business game called the Henkel Innovation Challenge. The task for participants in this year’s competition was to develop a concept for an innovative and sustainability-related product according to the vision and market needs in 2050.
Eighteen student teams, each consisting of two students, from all over the world were summoned to develop innovative ideas for one of the company’s business areas: home care products, beauty care products and adhesive technologies.
This year marks the second time that teams from Indonesia are participating in the competition. Last year, a team from the University of Indonesia won third prize during the HIC 5 Southeast Asia National Finals. The students, Rena Carissa and Wiwin Wijaya, came up with an idea for a dry-cleaning shampoo, suitable for all hair types, that would dry upon usage, without the need to rinse with water.
This year, however, no Indonesian teams managed to replicate the success.
“In selecting the teams for the Southeast Asia Finals, we use strict evaluation criteria which include uniqueness of the idea, customer orientation and clarity and logic of the idea concept,” Allan Yong, the president of Henkel Indonesia, told the Jakarta Globe in a written statement.
“[The Indonesian] team submitted a very good concept, but we later found that the idea was not original. After much deliberation, we decided not to send a team from Indonesia.”
Utomo Dananjaya, an education expert at Paramadina University in Jakarta, said the problem lay with the country’s education system for failing to properly nurture its students’ creativity.
“Our education system heavily relies on memorizing texts. It doesn’t let the students’ ideas flow, and it dampens their creativity,” he said.
Memorization as a learning method is outdated and should be replaced with an approach that fosters the students’ creativity, he argued.
The Indonesian education system, Utomo went on, relies on one-way teaching with no interaction. It cultivates the students to be obedient, to regurgitate what the teachers say and does not allow them to think outside the box, he said.
“How can a student breed an original idea if, in order to excel in university, what they do in class is to memorize?” he said.
To prepare talented Indonesian youths to compete in the global market, what the nation needs is an education reform that strongly emphasizes reasoning and allows the students to think critically, and not simply to memorize.
“Then they are ready for work in a global environment,” Utomo said.
Sumarjono Suwito, the chairman of the Indonesian International Education Consultants Association, said corruption was also hampering developments in the national education sector.
The government has allocated Rp 286.85 trillion ($30.4 billion) for education this year, or 20 percent of the state budget, but no major changes have been made.
“The problem with education in Indonesia is that we don’t know where this money is going,” Sumarjono said.
He also stressed that the level of innovation in Indonesia was still low. He said it was regrettable that the government had overlooked the importance of the research and development sector.
“Look at how many of our bright minds have migrated overseas because they’re not supported in their own country,” Sumarjono said.
He added that to succeed economically, Indonesia should place greater emphasis on research and development.
The right mentoring
Students looking at exhibits created by students from schools across Indonesia to compete in the Indonesian Science Project Olympiad at Balai Kartini, Jakarta, in this file photo. (JG Photo/Safir Makki)
In China, meanwhile, Niels Henning Adler and Susann Tiffany Leuchtmann admitted to feeling a sense of both excitement and nervousness on a winter day in Shanghai last week.
Having prepared for this day since September last year, the pair, both business students from Germany, set their eyes on the prospect of winning the Henkel Innovation Challenge.
During the final presentation, Adler and Leuchtmann addressed China’s severe pollution problem that, based on their forecast, would only worsen by 2050.
“In 2050, oxygen will become scarce. Our vision, thus, is to produce more oxygen … And make Chinese [people] enjoy being outside,” Adler told the jury made up of Henkel’s top managers.
They named their product, Syoss Breathe, a line of hair care products that would allow human hair to produce oxygen when exposed to sunlight, along the same principle of photosynthesis used by plants. The extra fresh air, they argued, would improve the quality of life, particularly in urban living environments.
Later that night, at a fashionable gala dinner and awards ceremony, the duo’s idea saw off the concepts submitted by their international rivals to secure the first place in the competition.
“We are absolutely thrilled to win,” Adler said after the awards. “But what’s more valuable to us than first prize is the international network of Henkel managers and fellow students that we have built up here in Shanghai over the last three days.”
The international finals ran from March 18-20 in Shanghai, home of last year’s competition winner. The winner received an around-the-world flight ticket and travel vouchers worth 10,000 euros ($12,870). The first and second runners-up, from Russia and Belgium respectively, also received travel vouchers.
The three winning teams will also get an opportunity to personally meet Kasper Rorsted, the Henkel chief executive.
Adler acknowledged to the Globe that the idea of hair care products that could help hair photosynthesize and generate oxygen sounded ridiculous.
“It is unthinkable right now. But in the year 2050, it is possible,” he said.
“The shampoo includes chlorophyll and the mineral tourmaline as active agents. These enable your hair to photosynthesize, and thus become your own source of oxygen supply, while also providing improved hair care performance.”
Jens Plinke, Henkel’s global head for employer branding, told the Globe that the competition offered students from around the world an opportunity to translate theoretical knowledge into practice and to gain business experience by working in close contact with Henkel’s managers.
“In the competition, the teams will be assisted by experienced Henkel managers who act as mentors. These students experience real business situations under deadline and motivating pressure,” he said.
Walter Brattinga, Henkel’s general manager for adhesive technologies, said he was impressed by the students’ ideas.
“They have such amazing ideas. But our role is to steer them in the right direction,” he said.
Brattinga, who mentored the Belgian team, said he was proud of the students.
“They presented a revolutionary idea. It was a bit rough … but with guidance they improved a lot,” he said.
Leuchtmann said she was enthralled by how humble the managers were.
“They are managers of a big multinational company, but they treated us like we are one of them and they are one of us. We benefited a lot from this mentorship program and gained insights into the company’s way of doing business,” she said.
Battleground for talent
For Henkel, the event offered company executives the chance to get to know outstanding international students in person and also to profile Henkel as a potential future employer.
For Henkel, the event offered company executives the chance to get to know outstanding international students in person and also to profile Henkel as a potential future employer.
Henkel, whose product portfolio includes well-known household brands such as Persil detergent and Schwarzkopf hair care products, has a workforce of around 47,000 people from more than 120 nations in over 75 countries worldwide.
The company is also one of countless multinational corporations taking advantage of the globalization of the world economy to gain access to a wider pool of talented workers.
In responding to changes in the global workforce, Henkel’s competition is an important strategy to encourage promising and talented individuals from around the world to consider a career with the company. Since the competition began in 2008, Henkel got to know more than 20,000 students, and recruited several of the past participants once they graduated.
With the battle for global talent becoming more intense, Henkel says it places high value and massive presence among university students.
“HIC enables us to establish valuable personal touch with talented, young students early,” said Ellen Imasa, the company’s head of talent management for the Asia Pacific.
The company forms partnerships with universities through student unions, predominantly in emerging markets.
“We mostly target first- and second-year students. By the time they graduate, they have Henkel in mind,” Imasa said.
Hayden Lee, a participant from Singapore, said that prior to entering the tournament, he did not know about Henkel.
“I was unaware of Henkel before. I only found out about the company and the competition from a career talk in my university,” he said, referring to the National University of Singapore.
Henkel Indonesia’s Yong said, “For [the competition], we target students from the three top universities: University of Indonesia in Jakarta, University of Gadjah Mada in Yogyakarta, and the Bandung Institute of Technology. Most of our employees graduated from those universities. Every year, these universities conduct career fairs which other universities in Indonesia also participate [in].
“These career fairs give us the opportunity to identify the best graduates and ask them to join our management trainee program. For example, in 2012, around 700 students from those universities applied to join our program in Indonesia.”
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