Reporting
On the 1st March 2020, Persatuan Mahasiswa Sains Komputer (PERSAKA) organized Sukan Sekolah Komputeran (SUSKOM). This event took place for a whole 1 week. The event is for the students of school of computing UTM, where they will all compete in a series of sports and represent each course. There were a total of roughly 300 students who joined the event and a total of 13 sports being competed. The event is an annual event that PERSAKA organizes.
For this SUSKOM’20, I was one of the crew members organizing the event. I held the position of the head of activity unit. My role was very crucial to the success of the event. Under my unit there were a total of 13 people. The activity unit was in charge of handling all the sports being competed. However our workload started way before the event day itself because we had to create the rules and regulations for each sport. This is crucial to create a fair play competition and to protect the referees and the person in charge of the sport if anything happened. As the head of the unit, i also had to sort the schedule of the sports taking place and the duty roster of each sport so that the correct people will be where they should be during the event.
Reasoning
For me the most significant aspect for this position is communication. I was the bridge between my unit and the technical unit. The technical unit was the ones who was in charge of preparing the equipment and venues needed. I had to make decisions and discussion with each person in charge of the games to comprise the venue’s time and date. It was quite difficult considering we had to take in to count the participants. There are lots of communication inter units just to complete the event. During the programs we had to communicate with the food unit and the safety unit so that everyone who needed to be there was there. All these communications really made the program run smoother.
In addition, I feel that another key aspect would be critical thinking. During the process of preparing for the event there were so many problems that required a lot of thinking. Problems occurred most when I wanted to sort the schedule for the whole one week. A lot of resitting with the vice director of activity and I to sort the most suitable timetable.
Last, a significant aspect I realised was my leadership. A total of 13 people in my unit and all I had to give tasks evenly and help lead. I was there to help them out if they needed any help and I was available to sit down and talk to discuss matters. All the instructions were given by me with a specific dateline. I had to lead my unit so because I had to regularly update my status to the director and vice director of the program.
Responding
Once I was asked to be the head of the activity unity I felt really excited. I have not yet been the head of the activity unit in any program, so this was a first for me. As SUSKOM was all about sports, whether it was esports, outdoor sports or the traditional game, I knew that my responsibilities were big. Seeing the number of crew under my unit made me a little bit scared since this unit was the biggest one.
During the program, I felt very messed up. Everyone was asking about problems with some events and the schedule. The schedule for the games was no big problem but this was the duty roster for the crew to be at each site where the games were being held. I had to run around from each location to make sure everything was running smoothly. I was glad that the crew under my unit could handle themselves well when they were dealing with the participants and the crew.
Furthermore, there were times when I felt annoyed with some of the participants. The person in charge of each game being competed has already stated all the rules and regulation in a doc, they were also some participants who wanted to change them and were not happy with them. I personally have checked each rule and regulation and most of them were similar to the same rules with international competitions.
Lastly, there was this one situation where I found out that some participants were cheating when they entered an esports sport and had some else from another school playing the game for them. I could not trace it but I knew because many of the players saw it. I felt really angry but I could not have done anything since there was no hard evidence.
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Relating
During the preparation work before the actual event, I had to check all the rules and regulation documents. This is important because all these documents are to ensure that a fair game will be created and so that the referees and person in charge of the game will be the one calling the shots, not the participants. It is also documentation needed by UTM Sports Division since we wanted to rent out their space for the venue. There were a few problems with these rules and regulations. We could not copy it out of any tournament since our SUSKOM was just a minor tournament and for games like badminton we could not afford to play a full best of 3 sets match since it is very time consuming and lots of manpower needed which we do not have. Therefore, I used my past experience where I joined sports events like this to have discussions and give ideas to change the international rules and regulation for each sport, into something that would suit the needs for SUSKOM. I had to keep in mind that the games should not take much time but have to give a fair amount of game play for each participant.
Reconstructing
In conclusion, SUSKOM has been a great experience for me. It has taught me a lot and gave me so many life lessons. I have learned that communication is absolutely key in any project or program. You have to communicate with your own team or unit. If there is good communication, it will prevent any miscommunications. We also have to make sure to have good communication with other units or our superior. I had a really great vice director for SUSKOM who had helped me a lot. The communication between my unit and I and the communication between me and the vice director really helped. We could solve problems that occurred at an early stage to avoid making a rash and messed up decision at a later stage of the program. I also had great communication with the technical unit and the registration unit. All these units had to be very cooperative with each other to make everything run smoothly. In fact, every unit in a program needs to be on the same page as every other unit so that miscommunication could be avoided.
Secondly, SUSKOM really enhanced my leadership skills. I was unsure at first if I could successfully lead my unit. But at the end it could be considered a success. It taught me a whole lot on how to work as a team. I divided the task accordingly to everyone and everyone did their responsibilities. Before this, I was not that good at dividing tasks since I do not have faith in other people as much as myself. But SUSKOM has truly made me a better leader. It helped show me how to delegate tasks to people under my leadership and to have faith in them. I can now be better at teamwork and working in a team as compared to before who i would love to do everything myself. Furthermore, with this learning experience, it can be a benefit to the people around me who I will work with in the future. In an organization, everyone will work as a team. Each and everyone will have a responsibility that they will carry out. If a member of our team is not performing well, we should ask them why and not jump to conclusions and just scold them.
Lastly, my communication skills have most significantly improved. I am more confident in talking in front of people at a large or small scale audience. I am now able to communicate with roughly anyone. I am not afraid anymore to approach someone who is in an organization or has to be formally said. Communication is key not just outside of the organization but also in the organization. A simple miscommunication can have bad consequences or create lots of problems. Having good communication skills also represents us or who we are and can really ease every transaction with whomever. Therefore, this extracurricular learning experience has taught me so much that no formal education system can ever give. I am truly grateful I joined this extra curricular activity and will not regret anything I did wrong or right as it was a learning curve to me.