Asia Inc Forum Holds Workshop On Local Business Development

Posted on  16/06/2011  |  Media Centre

Written by Liza Mohamad
Thursday, 16 June 2011

Kuala Belait – Representative from 30 Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) attended a workshop titled `Understanding and Attracting Your Target Customers’, Which focussed on local business development in the Belait Dsistrict yesterday.

The second of the three-series workshop was organised by Asia Inc Forum, in partnership with Baiduri Bank and Brunei Shell Petroleum under the 2011 Local Business Development (LBD) Programme themed “Building Your Business to the Next Level”.

The event was held at Panaga Club, Seria. The first workshop started last month on May 12 and will culminate in an LBD Forum in November.

Thirty SMEs, mainly BSP vendors participate interactively in the workshop, which combines role play, group discussions and presentations to stimulate reflection and propel the next action steps.

The workshop participants are mainly from the oil and gas, retail, construction and manufacturing sectors.

General Manager of Asia Inc Forum, Andrew Dy said as a result of these workshops, it hopes to produce more informed and skilled SMEs in terms of management practices, leadership abilities and business planning in addition to having the SMEs apply techniques learned over their medium- to long-term operations.

Furthermore, it aims to equip SMEs with abilities to grow from small to medium, medium to large, to internationalise as well as to enable the creation of tangible business plans to carry their businesses forward.

The workshops are facilitated by Mr Muhammad Azam bin Abdul Jalil, Director & Principal Consultant, ACTion Advisory Services Pte Ltd, a Singapore-based SME consultant for SPRING Singapore (the enterprise development agency responsible for helping Singapore enterprises grows) under the SME Management Action for Results (SMART) Initiative.

During the workshop, participants also interacted with BSP Head of Supply Chain Management Department Mr Martijn Van Leishout who emphasised on the importance of LBD in BSP. He noted the close relations with the government counterparts to elevate the quality and standards of LBD programmes, which BSP supports.

In addition to that, BSP conducted LBD strategies whereby all contracts have specifrc requirements on local business development, which includes employment and financial management in Brunei among others. In the case of international contractors, LBD contents must also serve local businesses.

Furthermore, BSP organised the Coaching Scheme Initiative (CSi) for its vendors and to acknowledge the vendor’s excellent performance, the Vendor Awards is expected to be launch soon at its Vendor Forum 2011. To enable businesses to register their companies as BSP registered vendors, it has developed its online vendor registration through its BSP website.

Asia Inc Forum’s LBD Programme, now on its eight year, aims to cultivate and sustain Brunei SMEs by providing platforms for quality learning, mentoring and relationship-building to facilitate growth.

Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin

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