School Vs Career (Mini Forum)

Mini Forum Report

“School vs Career”

         Introduction

            International Business Club has always and already conducted many beneficial activities and events every year since we first emerged. This year we have successfully organized another amazing event on 5^th August 2018 at Cam-Ed Business School with the help of all the members in our club. Under the meaningful topic “School vs Career”, our mini forum aimed to let the audiences understood and comprehended three main topics about the relationship between school and their future career; each topics was presented by our three honorable guest speakers.

Overview

“School vs Career” was led by Ms. Taing Sokleang who was our team leader in this project. This mini forum focused on the distinction and connection between studying and working, the benefit of what we learn in school which relate to our career, the obstacle that we face in our working life, and to share some experiences for people who chose the wrong major for their future career. The purpose of our event is to make sure that all participants gain beneficial information from our guest speakers who have already involved with working life and inspired them to walk toward their future goal without any fear for challenges. Moreover, our event was very attractive for university student, especially those who study accountant and finance, so many participants were willing to join us in order to gain more knowledge about their future work.

This event has great honor to invite 3 potential guest speakers to present under different topics. The first speaker was Mr. Hin Kosla who was the number one worldwide top scorer in FAU, foundation in audit. The second speaker was Ms. Khlot Helene who was the former member in International business club (2^nd generation) and currently work as assurance associate at PWC which is the one of the big fours. The last speaker was Mr. Kong Kirivann who was the former co-president of international business club in terms 2017.

Sharing Session

Firstly, the opening remark was presented by Mr. Luong Kimseng, Co-president of International Business Club. Next, our first honorable guest speaker, Mr. Hin Kosla, who has many achievements in both school and career life had presented to us on the topic “What we learn from school and what we never learn from school that apply in our career.” At the beginning, he introduced himself to us and then told us some experiences that he had faced. He said ‘Everything’ we have learnt will all be applied in our career, but there are also many things we never learn that will be applied to our career, too. Those are the soft skill such as networking, communication skill and more. He also said that every experience in your life has their own potential use, so every single thing you do is always useful, so ‘Let’s go out and do more!’. Then, he also told some subject which related to Audit and doing business. Furthermore, he exposed to those who want to be auditor that they should try to study hard on some course such as financial accounting, cash flow management, IFRS application and compliance. For those people who wanted to be businessman, Mr. Kosla strongly recommended that they had to have strong commitment with some subjects such as management accounting, cost management, inventory management, practical decision, and more. 

On the other hand, Ms. Khlot Helene had demonstrated the topic “Advantages and disadvantages of studying and working at the same time.” To begin with she asked one important question— ‘What is your long term goal?’—the answer was up to us to consider. She had emphasized that there are disadvantages more than advantages to work while you’re still in school. There are two situations that she had brought up for further discussion. The first situation was ‘studying at 2 schools and working at the same time’ which was the worst scenario since what you would get is looking cool and little work experiences and what you would lose was your youthful time during this period when you should enjoy life, but instead put yourself into stressing situation. Alternatively, Social work was highly recommended for this first scenario. The second situation was studying at 1 school and working at the same time. It was said to be a better situation and could be execute as you would gain experience point for you CV, earn some money, build character professionally, explore yourself and also find the right place(occupation) before you seriously start working. There are also some disadvantages to consider. On one hand, you will have sense of responsibility for work and cannot concentrate on school or even skip it; forgetting that school is the main factor not work and earn nothing in your academic life at all. At the end of the day “You will have nothing to recall and to remember”.

Last but not least, after a short afternoon break and satisfy snack our last guest speaker Mr. Kong Kirivann, with his humor and friendliness, had discussed with us on the topic “Experiences of studying accounting yet working as a Service Advisor.” As we might guess Mr. Kirivann had chosen to study accounting and finance at Cam-Ed Business school, but after years of commitment he found himself not interested in the field of work that is relating to accounting. On the other hand, he was very enthusiastic about work that related to cars. So, he decided to pursue what he want. After the hard processes of applying and interview, he got the job at Ford. He revealed that he had met many obstacles as he had never had any experience or knowledge in this field at all. He advised that ‘It’s not important which major you have learned, but how your knowledge can be applied to your work.’ and ‘When you have free time now and know that your goal is not to become an accountant or auditor, you should start to learn.’ He also told us that we can learn from doing volunteer work and have meditation course, to train our mind and soul. ‘Be a vitamin C’—by Mr. Kong Kirivann.

After our last speech had finished. We also have the Question & Answer session to give opportunity to our enthusiastic audiences to ask what they wanted to know related to our three topics today. We also had a lucky draw session which was sponsored by Cam-Ed Business School and Porsche.

Conclusion

As we approached the end of our agenda, Ms. Taing Sokleang gave an emotional closing remark, acknowledging the effort and teamwork that had made this mini forum happened. Lastly, our Co-presidents and Vice president had presented gifts and certificates of appreciation to our honorable guest speakers. After the Photo-taking sessions, we marked the end of the mini forum.

Finally, we would like to sincerely give our appreciation again to our sponsored: Cam-Ed Business school and Porsche, and our thanks to the audiences and all the organizers for this amazing project.