Media statement by Dr Ong Kian Ming, a former Member of Parliament for Bangi, on Jan 9, 2023:
The brain drain issue in Malaysia recently hit the headlines, when the former dean of Universiti Malaya’s medical faculty, Dr Adeeba Kamarulzaman, tweeted that UM regularly loses 30 of its best and brightest medical graduates to Singapore on an annual basis. This tweet, and the news articles which reported it, provoked a number of public reactions. One such reaction was an opinion piece that was widely shared asking for TalentCorp to be shut down, due to its inability to stem the brain drain problem. I brought up the issue of Malaysians giving up their citizenship back in 2016, when I was the MP for Serdang. But rather than putting all of the blame on TalentCorp, we should instead empower TalentCorp, so that it can achieve better results moving forward. Shutting down TalentCorp is akin to throwing out the baby with the bathwater, and ignores the productive work which this agency has done carried out since its creation in 2011.
Before we discuss how TalentCorp can be empowered, it is necessary to point out what TalentCorp is not responsible for. Firstly, it is not responsible for the human resources policies within the civil service, including among the medical fraternity. Issues such as long delays in applying for houseman positions among medical graduates and insufficient opportunities for specialist training for government doctors are under the purview of the Ministry of Health and the Public Service Department. Secondly, it is not responsible for the creation of high-paying jobs, or to raise the minimum wage to attract Malaysians abroad to come back home to work. Thirdly, it is not a recruitment or a job search agency, although it carries out limited facilitation meetings between employers and employees to better understand the job market dynamics in the country.
What TalentCorp is responsible for is increasing the availability of highly skilled human capital in Malaysia. This includes bringing back overseas Malaysians, who have accumulated skills and experience in certain critical occupation sectors, under the Returning Expert Programme (REP). Catherine Lian was a beneficiary of the REP, returning home from Indonesia to take over the position of the country manager of IBM Malaysia. She is one of many thousands of Malaysians who have benefited from the REP. While the number of successful applicants under this program is small relative to the estimated number of Malaysians who have left our shores, the quality of these returnees and their overall impact in their respective workplaces should not be overlooked. The Ministry of Human Resources should push for the REP to be given a fresh mandate with enhanced incentives, especially with the increase in foreign direct investment (FDI) flows into Malaysia, and the opportunity to bring home highly experienced Malaysians from different parts of the globe in different industries. These incentives may not necessarily be financial, but come in the form of other low-hanging fruit, such as expediting permanent residency applications for spouses and children of returning experts.
TalentCorp also brings in highly skilled non-Malaysians into the country through the processing of expatriate work visas via the one-stop Malaysia Expatriate Services Centre. The efficient processing of these work visas is one of the reasons why Malaysia is an attractive FDI location not just in Southeast Asia, but globally, in the manufacturing industry and increasingly global business service sectors. One of the current challenges facing many multinational corporations (MNCs) is the requirement that they must advertise positions for 30 days on the Perkeso job portal before such a position can be offered to an expatriate worker. Not only is this policy ineffective in “protecting” jobs for Malaysians, it fails to recognise that the hiring of expatriates for such positions will often result in the hiring of Malaysians in complementary roles as operations of the MNC in question expand and grow. Over time, many of these expatriates will also be replaced by home-grown talent. Getting rid of such requirements, especially since we are well into post-Covid-19 recovery, would enable TalentCorp to bring in highly skilled expatriates (some of whom may be ex-Malaysians) more efficiently, as part of the process to grow the talent base.
At a time when every country in the world is facing labour shortages post pandemic, one of solutions proposed by TalentCorp is to allow companies in Malaysia to hire foreign graduates of Malaysian universities in selected sectors via special visas. This is a commonplace practice in developed countries in sectors such as information technology, higher education, and STEM-related occupations. This is also an effective way to reverse the brain drain in the country.
TalentCorp also has the responsibility of upgrading the quality of human capital currently existing in Malaysia. It has strategically chosen to focus on internships, so that it doesn’t overlap with Human Resource Development Corp in training and upskilling of workers who are currently in the workforce. It has advised many private companies on how best to put in place structured internship programmes as a way to provide a value-added experience to interns, and to identify suitable candidates for their future workforce. TalentCorp has also leveraged its experience in internship programmes to come up with an internship matching service called mynext for potential interns and employers, based on carefully collected data from qualified candidates. Companies with TalentCorp approved for structured internship programmes were eligible for various tax deductions that were slowly expanded over time. These deductions should be continued, and perhaps even enhanced.
One of TalentCorp’s key goals from its inception was to increase the female labour participation rate in Malaysia by introducing family-friendly work-life practices in the workplace. Partly as a result of its focus on this objective, TalentCorp has been at the forefront of encouraging innovation and flexibility in the workplace by advising companies on work-life best practices. During the pandemic, it pushed for tax deductions for companies practicing flexible work arrangements, such as the option of working from home a certain number of days a week. Even though we are in the post-pandemic stage of recovery, such flexible work arrangements should continue to be encouraged, including through tax deductions.
I have only briefly outlined some of the programmes under TalentCorp. These programmes can only be effective if TalentCorp receives the cooperation and buy-in from other government ministries and agencies, including the Immigration Department, the Ministry of Home Affairs, the Inland Revenue Board, and the Ministry of Higher Education, just to name a few. Since TalentCorp was not created by an Act of Parliament, it does not have the same kind of leverage with government ministries in the same way as the Malaysian Investment Development Authority (MIDA) or Malaysia External Trade Development Corp (Matrade). This means that the Ministry of Human Resources needs to support the work of TalentCorp through Cabinet decisions and ministerial circulars to the relevant stakeholders, which include other ministries and government agencies.
Moving forward, there is a need to have a more dynamic view of the brain drain phenomenon. Malaysians who work abroad are human capital assets, who can be called upon when the Malaysian economy is able to provide attractive job opportunities for some of them to return home. This was the case for Penang-born Soon Kuek, who was appointed in 2021 as the general manager of the Malaysian operations of Lam Research, a cutting-edge semiconductor company that is headquartered in Silicon Valley. Malaysians abroad who are working for MNCs can also act as advocates to bring FDI to a place where they are familiar with. The Malaysian overseas network can also be utilised to help Malaysian companies venture out to attractive markets in China, Vietnam and Indonesia, just to name a few. Singapore’s Economic Development Board established the Singapore Global Network in recognition of the untapped potential of Singaporeans outside their borders. This network also includes those who have worked, lived, or studied in Singapore. With enough support, TalentCorp could also coordinate such efforts, perhaps together with MIDA and Matrade, both of which have an international network of offices and people.
The work carried out by government agencies such as TalentCorp do not “grab” the headlines in the same manner as negative news about Malaysian talent leaving for greener pastures abroad. But this kind of work brings about incremental changes that contribute positively to the current and future talent landscape in Malaysia. Rather than entertain thoughts of shutting down TalentCorp, this agency should be empowered to do more, so that its objectives can be better achieved for the betterment of the nation.
Dr Ong Kian Ming
Former MP for Bangi
Jan 9, 2023