Bangkok--11 May--ARC Worldwide
P&G offers an opportunity for the new generation of management executive to further develop their capability and experience real working environment with “P&G ASEAN Business Challenge 2010”.
In the competitive world of business, besides the ability and potential of each individual, it is without a doubt that “Opportunity” is also a major factor in the success of an individual’s future, which is an issue for the current youth to be able to have the opportunity to experience the structure of a real working environment. For this very reason, organizations like P&G who have always focus on the development of their personnel, took aim at the importance of providing the opportunity in developing the potential of Thai youth. Organized as an annual event, the P&G ASEAN Business Challenge project, in its third year running, provides Thai youth who are studying at a master level to learn and experience together with real P&G business executives in a real business environment under real circumstances while also providing a stage for them to show their capability in these environments. This will help to develop the potential in their mentality, strategic planning, and business planning. Furthermore, it also provides a setup for the competition to find the best team of new generation of management executives to represent Thailand in the regional competition for ASEAN.
Khun Medhee Jarumaneeroj, Senior Marketing & Corporate Communications Manager, Procter & Gamble Trading (Thailand) Ltd., one of P&G Thailand managing executives was present to share his knowledge and advices with the participants of this year’s “P&G ASEAN Business Challenge 2010”, said about the project,
“P&G foresees the importance of development in mentality and strategic planning for children who are currently pursuing a Master degree, to further enhance the business skills required for these Master degree students in Thailand to have the opportunity to train themselves in business strategy and actually execute these business plans for real. For this we have granted the chance to learn the arts of business planning and strategy under a real life-working environment. Furthermore, it is also a good way to expose the culture of our organization to the students who are participating in this program, which shows the thinking and the inner workings of P&G that is considered to be an internationally recognized company in the system of personnel development for future success.
For that purpose, students joining the “P&G ASEAN Business Challenge 2010” program will all have to complete a written test and an interview before they can be selected. From then on, the chosen students would be separated into different working teams to create a chance for them to get to know people from different Universities and learn how to work with strangers. This will help them to develop their communication skills and teamwork. Furthermore, there will be training session in which students will be educated on the working system and different departments that are involved so to get a better understanding of how planning would be connected to an actual working system. For this competition, there will be only two rounds, which are plan presentation round and actual plan execution round. Afterwards, the results from the actual execution round will be added with the first plan presentation round to determine the winning team with the best innovative business plan that can actually be executed in a real situation. The winning team from Thailand will also be representing the country in the ASEAN region with winning teams from other countries, which will be held in Singapore this coming June.”
This year is the third time that the “P&G ASEAN Business Challenge 2010” program was held, in which it has been very well received. There are large amount of interest from students who register to participate in the program with more than a hundred students from different Institutions and a variety of leading Universities from across Thailand. Applicants for the program have to be a current student of a Master degree program at any year level to join the written test session in analysis and psychology. After which they will be interviewed until the number of participants in the programs is cut down to only 22 candidates, which are considered the best group of potentials. However, in the end, there can be only one winner which is the 4G team that includes 6 members, who are: Korapin Chaimongkalanon, Nida Malasit and Kullawat Jitmaneeroj, Master degree in Marketing program English section (MIM), Finance and Commerce faculty, Thammasat University, Kiattisak Asavasanti, Master degree Institute of Business Management, Sasin Chulalongkorn University Chanaphan Ekchookiat and Montra Praisun, Master degree in Management, Mahidol University. They have achieved the highest sales value according to their strategy, which fulfills all of the requirement needed and they have also adapted their execution according to suitable situation without straying from the original plan. Furthermore, they have impressed the judges by illustrating their capability in presenting the working plan also. The 4G team will be representing Thailand and will travel to compete with other winning teams from other countries in the ASEAN region, which will be held in Singapore this coming June.
Kullawat Jitmaneeroj, one of the 4G team members, told about the real experience that they have received from participating in the “P&G ASEAN Business Challenge 2010”, saying:
“When I first heard that I was chosen to participate in the program, I was very happy, but I didn’t expect that we would be able to learn such valuable experiences, from working in a real environment with different departments, both internally and outside of P&G, and to be able to do a business plan for a working product that is actually being sold. The first step started with P&G showing us the inner workings in different areas so that we can understand the big picture of how everything works internally for P&G. From then, we were split into different groups from different Institutions with a total of 4 teams being assembled. Each team was then given a task of coming up with a marketing plan for a shaving product, Gillette Mach3, which case studies were uses as reference to allow us to study the many pros and cons from past marketing plan that was developed before. Also, we were taken to experience how an actual market research is executed through Focus Group with real consumers, real market analysis and discussion with the clients. From this it allows us to truly understand the needs and the different problems that consumers have and for us to utilize it in drawing up a better marketing plan. With this, the main challenge for us other than coming up with different strategic plan with the given amount of budget for the highest benefits, there are conditions in which we need to meet that adds that extra challenge for us all the time too. From competing bids on branches of the trading alliance who are joining in this year’s program, such as Big C Supercenter that we have organized a sale supporting event with the other teams and competing against product promotion through strategic pricing and also the challenge of turning crisis into opportunities. We have to find the advantages or the strong point that happens from the changes to the marketing environment that we didn’t expect, which is also a scenario that actually happen, for us to analyze and use to strengthen our plan. Through out the competition, there are discussion within the team of the reason why each strategy is chosen for a particular plan so that the team is in total agreement of what to use in the plan and who will be responsible for certain assignments. But everyone will also be kept informed on equal terms with the same information within the team. Each team is also given a caretaker, who is a highly experienced member of staff from P&G to help advise and guide us. Additionally, we were given the opportunity to present our plan to P&G’s managing executives, which there was a lot of different questions asked that allows us to practice presenting, answering questions and received many advise in which we can use to revise our plans till in the end we were able to execute according to our plan, with organized events which supports marketing and different promotions with products in real scenario. We trained in solving problems before hand while executing the plan where time is limited, which I have to say that if we didn’t get this opportunity from P&G to join as participants in such a good program, we would have never experience the feel of working in a real environment with real products from a world class organization like this.”
As for Korapin Chaimongkalanon, leader of team 4G, she was also impressed no less than anyone else on the team by the activity and the opportunity that P&G have given to them through the “P&G ASEAN Business Challenge 2010”
“We, team 4G, are very delighted to have the opportunity to be part of this “P&G ASEAN Business Challenge 2010” program. Other than the prizes and the victory from today, the things that impress us the most is the chance to be able to feel how its like to work in a real marketing environment where we can learn how to contact and coordinate with different people from different aspect of work, both internal and outside of P&G, which help us get a sense of fluidity while we are working so that the work come out as good as it can. We were able to learn real marketing information, got to analyzed and plan while solving problems before hand from real situation. We were able to meet highly skilled people from P&G, especially from the executive level, who were full of useful advise for us to use as a “Shortcut” to quick learning from their own past experience in the business. Plus, we were able to experience a real working system of a giant world class consumer organization like P&G too, which the “P&G ASEAN Business Challenge 2010” program acted as a doorway to a career in the field of business marketing that is not just a learning center but also a stage that youth can use to show their capability to the fullest. We would like to thank you everyone from P&G for this great program and I personally wish that this program continues to be held in years to come so that younger generation will have the opportunity to receive this great experience like what we have gotten today.” Korapin said
Lastly, Khun Medhee Jarumaneeroj, a managing executive from P&G, as a senior who have experience the business world in Thailand, left a message for the new generation of executives that “Strategic skills” and “Real experience in working procedure” are important aspects for future youth of Thailand to grow in their career, especially for ones in the sales, marketing and management field. Moreover, youth will need to find an opportunity to further develop their own capability continuously to create a difference for oneself, which is to learn from participating in many different activities. For further development in their skills of strategic thinking will help give them the experience needed to become the next generation of managing executives without much difficulty at all.
(Press information) For further information, please contact: ARC Worldwide Thailand
Siribuddhanadda Dhisanuvongse (Jao-Onn) / email:
[email protected]
Rungrat Chodchoy (Mai) / email:
[email protected]