Update 8

Hello dear members

First and foremost we wish to send our deepest condolences to the family of the late Sr Aloysius Choon Kok Sin. He had been a loyal ISM fellow and Past President session 1995 - 1996. May his soul rest in peace.


A day after coming back from an enjoyable ISM organised visit to Japan I had to immediately carry out my duties representing ISM. On 26 Oct 2009, I attended the opening ceremony of the National Asset and Facility Management Convention (NAFAM) 2009 in the morning. I was not able to stay on for long as I had to attend the Malaysian services development council - Focus group on "Busines and Professional services" meeting in the afternoon. The main discussion was with regards to the action plan to take advantage of market opening as a result of liberalisation of the services sector both for construction services and non-construction services. I've forwarded to all the vice presidents of all the four divisions for their comments. I'll request Katherine to also post this in ISM website. Should members have any comments do forward to the secretariat.

On 27 oct I attended the CIDB excellent award to finalise the recipients for the awards that I was appointed to evaluate. This year we underwent a very tough evaluation regime that include courtesy visits and all of us the panel of evaluators were impressed by the quality of the candidates. I was a very tough decision. The next day on the 28 Oct I was interviewed by a reporter for Berita Harian. I'm not used to this so I decided to type her my answer script. I don't know whether this was due to my nervousness or due to being a project manager thus the need to be in control. She may have gone back laughing !!. Of course there are additional impromptu questions and answers. So look out for your president on any thursday of Berita Harian a month from now - if it will ever be printed.

It was again a full day on 29 oct as I attended the revision Act committee of BQSM in the morning. Part of the amendments were required due to the instruction from the government on the liberalisation of the the services. Others include the changing of terms, prefix, consistency in drafting and increasing the amount for breach of the act. As this is still in the draft form I think BQSM consider this as confidential. In the afternoon we held our monthly Council meeting. The council conduct the first visit for the session to the Association of Banks on 30 oct. It was a fruitful meeting as part of the agenda was to discuss on the panel of Surveyors with banks, services of Surveyors that could be rendered to the banks and other pertinent issues. Sec gen Sr Ainon will be finalising the report on the discussion.

I attended a seminar on globalization and liberalisation - its impact on the property held on 4 nov. I was only able to catch the afternoon session that was the panel discussion. I must be either too tired, too old or not savvy enough as I was not able to fully follow the discussion. But I saw PCVS vice-president and Dato Mani there so I'm okay. On 5 nov I attended the Joint Board meeting comprising reps from the Board of QS, Bd of Architect and Bd of Engineers. The meeting was to discuss on recent developments and its on the professions and to inform each other of proposed revisions to the Act. In the afternoon of 5 nov I went to University Malaya to attend a talk on the collaboration of academic and the industry. During the Q&A I gave my two cents worth of thought with regards to ISM's partnering university programme, the list of research areas required of the university, quality of research by university for the industry and the need for research to be giving practical solutions.

On 12 nov, a meeting was held in PSDC to discuss on the Malaysian Services Exhibition to be held in April 2010 in Dubai. It seems that Matrade had agreed with my suggestion for PSDC to be the lead collaborator for the Professional services. So in the meeting I again reiterated the need to showcase a total solution for professional services for construction that include architects, engineers and surveyors. It should not be a showcase of individual services by different institutions. Hopefully ISM would be able to participate for next year's MSE. I also had an informal discussion with the officer of PSDC with regards to inquiries from Australia on the liberalisation of the services. In the afternoon I chaired the ISM monthly management meeting. And in the evening we conduct a discussion with regards to our proposed "Blast in March" i.e. a promotion and publicity blitz for ISM in the month of March.

So that's all for now. Again as I had always mentioned, if you need to see the minutes, paper presentation etc do request from Kat of ISM. If its not in ISM and still with me she will contact me for the copy. Hope to update you later.

Salam
Sr Wan Maimun Wan Abdullah