Welcome in English or Ahlan Wasahlan in Arabic or Selamat Datang in Malay.

I have been a Human Resource professional for more than 20 years working in a wide spectrum of areas within Human Resource. I have progressed up the corporate ladder from the very bottom with rapid and multiple promotions, praise to God. My main interests are motivation and child development

If you have any specific queries you would like to post to me, please email to amzzah_naseehah@ymail.com.

Kind regards
hjmalek

Pages

Saturday 23 May 2009

Leg~sercises

Hmmm.... you must be saying "Leg~sercises?", what is that? Well I'm not claiming I'm a body builder nor am I a gym instructor. I just coined the word to share with you one of my routines at the office gym where I got to exercise my leg's front and back muscles. With age catching up on me, I'm experiencing mid-life challenges such as knee and back pains, so the routines are some sort of a physiotherapy for me. As I'm also planning to perform my umrah in two weeks time, these are also my preparation to perform the physical activities at two of the three holy sites of Islam i.e. Madinah and Makkah. However, none of my preparation will be complete without full dependence to Allah swt.



I hope and pray to receive an opportunity to experience His empowerment and absolute strength with abundance of mercy to his creation at the holy sites. Ever since I return from Hajj in 2006, I have gone through several tribulations on my faith and my daily ritual. I hope Allah swt will once again provide me, my family, relatives and friends the opportunity to perform the umrah with ease and calmness. Grace upon us His mercy and grant all of us the return of the forgiven and steadfast servants. Amin.

Saturday 9 May 2009

Listening, expectation and decision

This week I had three feedback sessions with my subordinates. One was a planned monthly session but the other two were impromptu (refer to my earlier posting on types of feedback dated 24 August 2008 Self awareness a key to self improvement and success and 27 October 2008 Resignation and Attrition.)

In the sessions, the common theme we discussed was about listening. The expectation from my subordinates is for me to listen to them and to accept their ideas. However the focus that I brought to the discussion on the real issue was communication, a lot wider than just listening. Communication is a two way process. Signals from the communicator to the listener may mean differently depending on the clarity, intonation and precision of the communication. For example "We lost" is different in interpretation than "We did not win". The former is a general statement on defeat that may mean an acceptance of the outcome. The latter with some intonation may mean that there were a lot more passion in the effort and struggle, but the eventual outcome result in victory that did not materialise. Hence, it is important to choose for the right precision and intonation in carrying out communication process to derive to a clear understanding and desired outcome.

Accepting ideas is a decision process. Decision may be made due to several reasons. Ideally, decision should be made so that the decision is not only popular, but it is the right decision, the latter a lot more important than the former. However decision maybe confined due to sphere of control especially when authorities at higher levels make decision. Accepting a decision in this case shows respect to the level of authority. The ability to adjust a decision is not the most important achievement in most of the situation; instead the ability to arrive together to a successful outcome is one of the elements in a successful teamwork, regardless on who made the decision.

Saturday 2 May 2009

Indoor Games Committee

When I first started working about twenty years ago, I used to spend eight hours working at my desk and the rest of the day at the office sports club. It then took me only a couple of months to know almost everyone at the office regardless of whether they are from my department or not. Nowadays, I notice that people spend less time socialising with their office mates after work. Everybody seems to be rushing to go back. Even if ever they socialise, they will stick to their own cliques.

Realising this, I now lead a small team of 8 committee members that we aptly called "Work Hard Play Hard" team to organise indoor games as part of teambuilding across the different units of the department I work with. We will organise four different indoor games i.e. pool, carom, darts and ping pong to cater to over two hundred employees.

We had our first meeting at Nasi Lemak Tanglin where we strategised our plan and activities (see photo). I shall share more later.