Our semester abroad in Malaysia, which is the last before our final thesis, included three different courses we had to attend for the exchange program between SRH and UiTM.
The first course took place every Tuesday from 8:30pm to 11:30pm and was called “Strategic and Risk Management (BSV705)”.
It was divided in two parts of seven weeks each. It started with Strategic Management which is about how to give organizations an orientation and direction and how to implement the developed strategies. At the end of this part we had to submit in groups of two people maximum a course work about the issues we had to do with during the lessons and we had to present our work to the lecturer and the other students of the class. The assignment is worth 20 percent of the final mark. The second part was about Risk Management and how to deal with risks in organizations. Also here we had to write an academic report with a presentation which is worth 20 percent again. The last 60 percent could be gained in the final exam at the end of the semester. We had to learn a lot about visions and missions, objectives, strategies, risk identification, risk analysis and risk response to pass the exam with good results.
Our second course, “Marketing (MKT750)”, was scheduled every Wednesday morning from 9:00am to 12:00pm. Because it is a master’s lecture all theory of marketing was assumed. The lessons were about case studies we had to analyze and to solve either individually or in groups mixed with the local students. The reports of these case studies are worth 40 percent of the final results. Another 40% could be achieved in a large group assignment where we had to identify the problems, to analyze the company and the product, to analyze the market and its structure and finally to give our recommendations for positioning the product and for how they should promote and advertise their products. Furthermore we had to write a final exam which was an individual case study for the last 20 percent so we had to know how and when to use the analytical tools. We enjoyed the class because the atmosphere was very nice and the lecturer and our fellow students were very friendly. Additionally it was good to be mixed with the local students because we learned a lot from them about their culture and daily life. It was fun to work together with them.
The third course was scheduled on Thursday from 10:00am to 1:00pm and was about “Management of Properties and Environment”. It was also divided into two parts. The first one was mainly about refurbishment which is very uncommon in Malaysia. Also the second part, which was about green buildings, is a new issue here. So we five Germans were the only students who attended this course. Learning about refurbishment meant learning a lot about Malaysia at the same time because the lecturer told us a lot about how Malaysians handle things so we had a good comparison to how we deal with it in Germany. This was very interesting to learn. In addition the Professor took us on two excursions to learn more about facilities management, green buildings and refurbishment cycles from those people who actually have to do with it every day. We went to the Petronas Twin Towers for our first trip and to the Diamond Tower for the second one.
Nevertheless we had to prepare a report and a presentation about a refurbishment project in Germany so that the Malaysians can see how it is done there.
The green building part was also very interesting and informative. We tried to share our experiences with the lecturer and when we had to present our second report about green buildings in Germany this time, the local students, who were invented for this event, shared their experiences with us. It was nice to see, that there are people who want to bring their country forward and that they are aware that someone has to start and make the first step to do the right thing.
All in all it was fun to draw the comparison between Germany and the Malaysian and Asian world consistently. This was not only a big benefit for us but also for our fellow friends from Malaysia. The courses at UiTM brought us forward being a good business engineer in the future. This is not only because of the contents of the lectures but also because of the fact that we lived half a year in a foreign country and we now have experiences of the fast growing Asian market. We enjoyed the semester abroad here in Malaysia very much!
And now try to find the lecturers on the pictures ;-)
