Reflection 2
On the 3rd of march (2020), Huawei presented a career talk at UTM. The event discussed the factors behind the success of Huawei as a company in the past few years and the many departments that are part of the company. The event also discussed the problems that the company currently faces and how it plans to overcome them. The event was greatly insightful and helped me improve my knowledge about the industry.
The event started by a video showcasing how huawei was first created. A speaker came up on the stage and discussed the video that was just presented. The story highlighted several standards that the company had when it was created and that the employees tried to maintain throughout its history. After describing how the company started, the speaker started talking about how he had first joined the company. He was working in a completely different field before getting the opportunity to join the PR team at Huawei.
The speaker then discussed how competitive the company’s environment is. He stated that anyone could get to any position they desire within the company. The individual just had to put in the hard work and show results. Many of the people who were currently at the top of the company started from simple positions and reached their positions by making great achievements. In other words, the company valued hard work and results and greatly rewarded them.
The employees of the company are also not bound to their initial positions in the company. If one of the employees improved his or her knowledge in a certain field and was capable of performing better in that department, the company will gladly allow them switch their department and work in the new option. The switch would have no negative impacts on the employee and will instead allow him/her to better demonstrate his/her skills.
After the first speaker was done, several managers at Huawei came up on the stage and discussed their specific departments. The managers highlighted how they have managed to greatly boost the company’s performance in their departments and how amazing the company was currently performing. Some of the managers discussed technologies that were currently irrelevant but are likely to be extremely important in the future of their departments. This specific section of the event was extremely insightful and provided many useful pieces of advice.
Most of the managers started by describing how the technologies behind the departments they were managing worked. The managers continued by describing how the different technologies are interconnected to form the designated field that the technologies embody. After the description and explanation of the department was done, the managers discussed some of the problems that the fields faced. The managers then discussed some of the solutions that they have come up with in order to solve the problems. The solutions were innovative and impactful; and, as a result, the managers managed to gain their current positions in the company.
During the next part of the event, a Huawei spokesperson discussed a very important topic that everybody was curious about. Not long before the event’s occurrence, the US government had been targeting Chinese companies and trying to dominate the tech market. As a result of the US government’s actions, Google had barred Huawei from using its services in any new devices that Huawei creates. This decision was greatly damaging to Huawei since all of their phones prior to the event were completely dependent on Google’s services. The Huawei spokesperson on stage was planning on addressing how Huawei plans to deal with the hindrance that the US decisions had caused.
The spokesperson stated that prior to the US government’s decision, Huawei had already been developing its own replacement for the Google play services. The development of the replacement services had great progress, but the company did not give it much focus since the Google play services had been performing its job and did not need replacement yet. With Google play services no longer being an option, the company will completely focus on the development of its replacement services. According to the speaker, the replacement services were already in a usable state and could replace the Google services by the time of the event.
Some students told the spokesperson that they had Huawei phones and asked him about what will happen to their phones with the introduction of the new Huawei services. The students were worried that their phone’s performance might drop with the introduction of the new Huawei services. The spokesperson explained that the existing devices will not be affected by the decision. Only new devices released to the market will have to follow the regulations that were imposed on the company. Therefor, the students should have nothing to worry about. He also reassured everyone that if they plan to buy any new Huawei devices in the future, they should not worry about the lack of Google services. The replacement that has been developed is more than capable of replacing all of Google’s services and the new devices will definitely perform as or even better than expected.
After describing the replacement for Google’s services, the spokesperson discussed a potential replacement for android that the company plans to work on creating. The company’s plan is to separate Huawei devices from android and create a complete Huawei ecosystem that does not depend on any external services or systems. This future Huawei ecosystem will not be simple, and will need a huge workforce to work on developing it. At this point, the spokesperson pointed out that the company will be offering many internship and work opportunities for the students of the university. He stated that the company plans to work hand in hand with us, future developers, to create an interactive ecosystem. He stated that any students who are interested could send their portfolios to the company.
After learning about the technologies that are required by Huawei, many students started wondering if the projects they had on their portfolios were good enough to join the company. Unfortunately, my Porfirio at the time of the event still needed more work before it could be presented. I discussed several technologies that I had some experience in with my friends who had been attending the event with me and came up with a few project ideas to add to our portfolios. One important question that I and my friends had was whether the opportunities were exclusive for local students, or if they included international students as well.
After the event had ended, the director of Huawei Cloud and AI in the south pacific region, Mr. Lim Chee Siong, stayed behind to speak with any students who had questions regarding the event. I went with a few friends of mine to speak with him. We asked him several questions about the company and how we could stand out during our application to it. We also asked him about the question that we had earlier during the talk: whether the opportunities advertised included international students. The opportunities were targeted at local students, but they did not completely exclude international students. The company expects most international students to go for other options in their home country or outside countries. Therefor, the main focus of Huawei in the event was on local students who are likely to stay in Malaysia. If any international students are interested, however, they could still try to apply. If the students had the skills to be accepted, the company would not necessarily turn them down.
Our discussion resulted in us learning many important and useful things that we could use to boost our future job applications. After discussing what we had just learned, my friends and I realized that there were many more questions that we could have asked. We ended up learning many things, but the things we learned caused us to have many more questions. The talk with Mr. Lim Chee Siong was greatly insightful.
Overall, the event was extremely helpful in improving several of my graduate attributes. The knowledge that was provided by the several Huawei managers greatly helped me improve my knowledge about the field. The talk with Mr. Lim Chee Siong at the end of the event helped me improve my communication skills and provided me with even more knowledge about the field that I am currently studying.
The event might have been greatly productive, but my use of this opportunity was definitely not perfect. I believe that an aspect I could improve upon in any future similar events is my preparation. If I had thought about the questions that I plan to ask Mr. Lim Chee Siong prior to the event, the talk might have resulted in even more insightful information which would have been greatly helpful. Having more projects that are presented in an online portfolio would have also been extremely helpful as the many Huawei managers and spokespeople encouraged students to showcase their projects during the event. The event was greatly helpful and useful. I gained a huge amount of knowledge from the event, but upon reflecting on it I have found many areas that I can improve upon in any future similar events.