Khairy Jamaluddin: There is so much more that we need to do

The ‘An Evening with KJ: Dialogue with Student Leaders’ event, jointly organised by TalentCorp, Kementerian Belia dan Sukan (KBS), and Malaysian Students' Global Alliance (MSGA) saw the attendance of 420 student leaders representing 180 universities from over 20 countries. They were eager to hear from the Minister of Youth and Sports YB Khairy Jamaluddin, and took the opportunity to ask the Minister pressing questions on the country's economic position, political climate, and the Malaysian diaspora.

Khairy, dubbed the most ‘hip’ Minister in the Malaysian cabinet thanks to his social media updates and frank opinions on current issues, was more than ready to face the audience. Taking on from his ministerial portfolio, Khairy focused on how youth today can be the next generation of leaders in Malaysia, in their respective industries. Here are some key highlights from the night:

With just 3 years to go till 2020, Khairy emphasised the need for Malaysians to start looking beyond 2020 with the aim to keep Malaysia innovative and progressive.

He further stressed on the need for a ‘bottom-up’ vision, where ideas for national initiatives come from the people.

We have to start asking ourselves tough questions about where this country is going to go over the next 50 years."

With this, he called upon students in the room to consider desired areas for improvement, and how they can respond by taking charge.

With an increasing number of young people joining Malaysia’s workforce, Khairy spoke passionately on the human capital gaps that must be addressed in today's workforce.

The Minister expressed his support for vocational studies, with intent to ensure that career success is not just limited to youth with academic qualification.

Khairy also spoke about the need for diversity in the workforce, touching on workplace gender gaps, as well as opportunities for growth with employees who are differently-abled.

"Currently, we only have 47% women participation in the workforce, and only 2% women holding CEO positions in listed companies," he stated. "This is a big, big resource that we need to move."

"Along the way (of vision 2020) we forgot, that it's not just growth, but distribution that's important."

Malaysia cannot just grow, said the Minister, but must also look into fairly distributing opportunities to as many Malaysians as possible. "Growth, but while still having a big income disparity creates for an uneven society and an unequal society," he stated, stressing that Malaysia needs to pay more attention to the quality and equity of our society.

Growth without equity is meaningless.”