CYBERJAYA, 5 August 2015: Cyberview Sdn Bhd, the Technology Hub Enabler, together with Talent Corporation Malaysia (TalentCorp) gathered top women leaders and advocators at Cyberjaya Resort & Spa for the Cyberjaya Women Forum 2015. Extensive discussions on best practices, incentives and policies toward developing opportunities for growth for women in the workforce were key focus this year. The full day event was held as part of Cyberview’s ongoing efforts to move Cyberjaya into a Global Tech Hub.
Themed ‘Advancing Women in the Workforce’, the forum saw eight influencers and more than 100 guests from the public and private sectors, including leaders from TalentCorp, Mul-timedia Development Corporation (MDeC), IBM, HSBC, Experian Malaysia, AMD Global Ser-vices Malaysia, and Malaysian Global Innovation & Creativity Centre (MaGIC).
Faris Yahaya, the Managing Director of Cyberview Sdn Bhd expressed, “As pointed out by our Prime Minister in his National Transformation Programme speech earlier this year, women are the backbone and co-developers of the country. They make up 48.7 percent of the total population and account for 61 percent of the total graduate enrolment in Malaysia. To fur-ther elevate Cyberjaya as the Global Technology Hub, women play a vital role in reshaping the future state of the city and this interactive forum is one of our initiatives to empower working women to enlist and stay in the workforce.”
“Malaysia’s technology sector is peopled by talented women. This is unsurprising given that 63 percent of Malaysia’s public university graduates are women. Sadly, 46 percent of Malay-sian women are not working, caught in a “double-burden syndrome” of taking on the added responsibilities of managing their home, caring for their children or the elderly. Platforms like the Cyberjaya Women Forum 2015 is critical therefore to build a network of employers intent to advance women from the classroom to the boardroom and encourage women to return to work through TalentCorp’s Career Comeback programme,” said Johan Mahmood Merican, CEO of Talent Corporation Malaysia (TalentCorp).
To support the government’s call to offer more women & family-friendly workplaces, Cyber-view and many companies have established a flexible and conducive working environment for women employees. These support and facilities include flexible working hours, 90-day maternity leave, and providing family-friendly facilities such as crèches and nursing rooms which have reduced some of the challenges and worries faced by working women. As a re-sult, it has yield in better performance, productivity and increased loyalty to the organisa-tion.
According to Faris, Cyberview is also in the midst of discussing areas of development for the Talent Blueprint with MDeC, which they hope to announce by the end of this year. “We are continuously looking for ways to formulate policies that are women and family-friendly. With the findings from the Talent Blueprint, we hope there will be a more radical approach for Cyberview and other agencies to further advocate diversity at the workplace. Simultaneous-ly, we hope to enhance our talents’ skillsets to grow in line with the Digital Malaysia vision.”
Growing leaps and bounds over the past 19 years, Cyberjaya today is the host for more than 800 Malaysian and international companies including Hewlett Packard (HP), DELL, Fujitsu, AMD, HSBC, Shell and BMW. The tech city is on its way to becoming a Global Technology Hub with a mission of taking technology leadership to create high-income job opportunities, as well as a preferred investment hub.
Cyberview, as the Technology Hub Enabler that fronts the tech city development in the country, has been supporting the national agenda of increasing women in the workforce. Various talent facilitation and development projects such as Cyberjaya eJob Portal and Cyberview Living Lab – Enterprise have been implemented to boost more knowledge workers in Cyberjaya. The latter consists of programmes that provide training and network opportu-nities via forums, capability development programmes, industry market access, promotional activities and 1:1 funding clinics with authorities.
