Yogyakarta, November 26th 2021─The tight competition for fresh graduates of undergraduate college programmes to enter the world of work is an unavoidable problem. Not only hard skills, but this must be addressed by strengthening soft skills in students. To support students in having good soft skills, the Department of Public Policy Management in collaboration with PolDev held a program entitled “Young Professional Training & Development”. Carrying the topic “Personal Branding Management in the Social Networking Era”, the activity was carried out through the Zoom Meeting platform. They presented Heru Sutatyo, a Strategic Management Consulting who also serves as CEO of ACE Team & Strategic Investor, as a speaker.
Heru has dedicated himself as a professional worker for 10 years. He spent a lot of time working for various international companies. Starting from the Director of Sodexo (France); Shell China & Shell Indonesia; Conocophillips (USA); Schlumberger (Middle East and USA). Before finally deciding to become a full time entrepreneur, he has worked in 5 countries and 10 global cities. With various achievements in the course of his career, this year he was awarded as the winner of UGM’s Award of Young Alumni of the Year.
That afternoon, Heru said that students must determine their dreams after graduating from college since they are in the college environment. He conveyed this considering there are many things that students can explore during college, such as organizations, part-time work, volunteering, competitions, internships, and other activities. These experiences outside the classroom can then play a role in supporting competence in the world of work. “Determine where you want to go or what you want to be, then research what things are needed to support this,” Heru explained.
In addition, according to him, it is important to identify personal strengths and weaknesses early on. “Because from there we can market ourselves,” Heru added. This is also in line with personal branding on social media. Heru said that social media can be a self-image in front of prospective companies. Considering that the digital record of social media can be one of the company’s considerations in assessing or seeing prospective employees. Therefore, Heru advised that social media such as Instagram, LinkedIn can be managed properly in line with hopes and dreams in the future. “For example, when we want to be a data analyst, we take advantage of the likes, comments and the like that are relevant to this,” he added.
Heru also talked about the importance of identifying prospective companies or places they want to go after graduation. This is considering the number of employees who sometimes do not know the work environment they are applying for, thus creating uncomfortable working conditions. Therefore, according to Heru, internship is one of the right ways to find out more about the prospective company to be applied for. “So, if you want an internship, don’t do it just for the grades, but really look for an internship that suits you when you work later,” he concluded.