EDUCATION

Weekender

Driven by a desire to learn

Derrick Reuben at his graduation feast on Saturday, Nov 14.

HE grew up mostly in a single-parent home but rather than let that stand his way to success, it fed a thirst for knowledge.
Derrick Kii Reuben had been fortunate that his dad who single-handedly took care of him and his young brother when they were still very young was a primary school teacher. So being in school every year was not going to be a problem as dad took them to wherever he was posted to teach.
After secondary education Derrick set out to be a journalist but his desire to learn and better his knowledge and understanding of the world around him meant that he was not going to be content with a media job for long. That pursuit of new ideas resulted in him gaining a prestigious qualification from the University of PNG this year, an MBA or Master of Business Administration.
Derrick came out of an unstable family background. His father was a primary school teacher and the first in his Wambil tribe in Wabag, Enga. His mother had left his father when he was quite small.

Haoda Kii and six-month-old son Shadrach. Family was Derrick’s main source of inspiration.

Dad Reuben Kii has obviously done a good job as a single parent because his two boys are now well educated and holding down paid jobs. Derrick is secretary to the permanent Parliamentary Committee on Plans and Estimates and his younger brother Robert is a solder at the Goldie River Barracks in NCD.
Derrick’s father took them to different schools during his career. Some of those schools were more than a day’s walk from main roads in the province.
It was indeed a painful journey of struggles but their father never gave up supporting them in their education. After grade six Derrick attended Laiagam High School then moved to St Paul’s Lutheran High School in Wapenamanda district. After grade 10 he was sent to the all-boys Emmanuel College in Queensland, Australia. He returned home to complete years 11 and 12 Passam National High School in East Sepik.
At Passam, his leadership qualities were realised and he was elected the student representative council (SRC) president.

Receiving the MBA from UPNG Chancellor Robert Igara on graduation day, Nov 9, 2020.

From Passam, he applied to UPNG to do a diploma course in media studies. After that he stayed on to completed a degree in journalism and a honours programme. He worked for a while in the mainstream media before joining the Parliamentary reporting services, editing the Hansard.
He was later appointed secretary to the permanent Parliamentary Committee on Plans and Estimates. This is the committee responsible for checking and scrutinising public expenditure plans, especially budget documentation.
He also worked with the parliamentary Emergency Committee and travelled with five MPs on that committee to areas worst hit by the 2018 earthquake in the highlands of PNG.
Derrick joined the Parliamentary services in 2005 and having seeing the need to gain management skills, he applied for the MBA programme at UPNG.
He is grateful to his employer for the sponsoring him for the two-year course.
Derrick’s graduation was a huge achievement for his family and clan as he is the first from there who has achieved this level in formal education.
To celebrate this achievement, he slaughtered four pigs for a typical Enga feast enjoyed by his clan and family.
“It has been two years of hard work,” Reuben reflected.
“Classes ran from 5pm to 8pm and sometimes my car broke down and I had to rely on friends to assist. We shared resources as well.
“There were a lot of sleepless nights and through all of those trying moments my wife Haoda and three children have been very supportive and understanding.”
The MBA course is basically for those in managerial positions and includes units on strategic planning, human resource, administration, finance and marketing among others.
“I’ve always wanted to learn and enjoy doing research work and writing,” Derrick said.
Obviously with an MBA there are now more opportunities open to him for now, he wants to continue working in government and later consider a private sector job or even become an entrepreneur one day.
“I want to give back to the nation through Parliament first.
“I wish to state how grateful I am to Parliament Clerk Kala Aufa who saw my potential and invested in my education. It was an investment in the overall human resources of not only the National Parliament but the public service at large.”
Derrick believes his leadership skills learned from when he was but a young lad in high school, and the management skills he has recently acquired place him in good stead to stand for Wabag Open some day. He has political ambitions, that is.


Changing times need learned leaders

Professor Lekshmi Pillai

By PETER ESILA
THE University of Papua New Guinea School of Business and Public Policy through its Master of Business Administration (MBA) has produced many chief executive officers since 2004.
Some of the notable graduates of the school include Prime Minister James Marape who got his MBA in 2014, Nasfund CEO Ian Tarutia, Comrade Trustee Services Ltd CEO Charlie Gilichibi and many other corporate and government department executives.
But due to the growing demand every year, the school’s executive dean Professor Lekshmi Pillai said the focus for next year would also be on a doctoral programme, leading to a PhD in Business and Public Policy Management.
The MBA programme was introduced in 2003 with the first batched graduated in 2004. There are more than 300 Papua New Guineans with MBAs.
This month, 18 more graduated.One of them was Warren Marape who got his second masters degree; his first was a Masters in Philosophy from the Pacific Adventist University in 2015. Warren, the younger brother of Prime Minister James Marape, is currently employed by the Department for Community Development and Religion (DFCDR) as first assistant secretary for Informal Economy, Community Learning and Community Environment Branch.
A common story shared by many of these graduates is that hey may have degrees and qualifications in other fields but to manage an organisation, an MBA is required.
Civil Aviation Safety Authority (Casa) acting chief executive officer and director Wilson Sagati is one such graduate who can vouch for that.
Sagati had all the requisite aviation technical knowledge of being an air traffic controller and a private and commercial pilot license. What was missing was management skills. He started off taking part time courses towards a business degree.
“I thought what are you going to do if you have the technical knowledge but do not have management skills? So I decided to tell the CAA at that time in the 90s that I wanted to do university training in business management.”
Getting an MBA or generally investing in education and higher qualification takes a lot of time and resources.
At UPNG, there are 15 MBA units and the fee for each unit is K2,091 which means the total fee is K31,365.
Prof Pillai said the school has six masters programmes; Master of Business Administration, MBA-CPA, Master of Human Resources and Management, Master of Economic and Public Policy, Master of Strategic Management and Graduate Diploma in Corporate Governance.
The school has a number of partnerships with international institutions.
Notably, there is an arrangement with the Development Policy Center of Crawford School of Public Policy of Australian National University (ANU). Through the partnership UPNG gets five lecturers on full-time basis and two lecturers on part-time basis, supporting both the economics and public policy divisions. They deliver face to face lectures to students of our undergraduate programmes and masters programmes.
There is also the Graduate Diploma in Corporate Governance with the support of Bank of Papua New Guinea – to develop qualified people to sit on various boards of both private and public sector bodies.
The school also has agreements with the Department of Finance, Department of Personnel Development, the Pacific Institute of Leadership and Governance, the PNG Tourism Promotion Authority and Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) of UK.
The corporate board room is always changing with the trends in society.
Prof Pillai said Covid-19 has had a huge impact and caused a shift in the corporate board room.
“In the short run, lots of changes have taken place due to Covid-19, it has had a huge impact on the way we are running our operations. This has exposed a vulnerability to various sectors of businesses, especially the tourism and hospitality industry, education sector and others. In a positive sense we must accept the reality and be creative in our approach to mitigate the effects,” Pillai said.
“While we talk about the new developments, we cannot ignore the basics, such as good leadership which is mindful of participative management, teamwork, communication within and outside an organisation, creativity, adapt to changes and many other corporate values,” Pillai said.
Education and learning never end.