Submitted by Aswathi Suresh, Co-Chair of the Marketing & Entrepreneurship Club
The EY Entrepreneur of the Year Award is a prestigious business award that is handed out every year in multiple countries across the world to honor enterprising entrepreneurs who have made outstanding contributions to their local economies. Within Singapore, the annual awards gala ceremony has evolved into a tradition and a hallmark event of the business community and this year, the Nanyang MBA was privileged to be a part of it. The only MBA program to be represented at the event, the school was represented by Anggonno Natalnugroho and Aswathi Suresh, co-chairs of the Marketing and Entrepreneurship club.
The 2014 event was held at the Ritz Carlton on the 2nd of December 2014 and the students were at their prettiest best for the black tie event. The actual awards ceremony was preceded by a cocktail networking session where the students got to meet and interact with senior EY executives as well as executives from EY client companies, covering industries as diverse as financial services to construction, healthcare to government. The insights they were able to provide on current trends in their industries, and on doing business in the Singapore environment were invaluable to the students, both of whom are from outside Singapore.
They were also fortunate to be able to have a one-on-one personal session with each of the four finalists – Dr. Kar Wong, CEO of Advanced Group of Companies who was the eventual winner, Mr. Alfred Chua, CEO of The Wok People, Mr. Ong Tze Boon, CEO of Ong&Ong Group and Ms. Susan Chong, CEO of Greenpac Pte Ltd. It turned out that Dr. Kar Wong had quite the personal connection to the Nanyang Business School – a few of his former colleagues and friends are currently undergoing the Executive MBA program, and he said that the program came highly recommended from them and he expressed the desire to visit the school in the future.
During the event, the students were seated along with some representatives from Singapore’s young and dynamic entrepreneurship community. Closer in age to the MBA cohort, these entrepreneurs were able to relate easily to the students and detail the highs and lows of their entrepreneurial journeys.
In conclusion, the event was an exciting eye-opener for the students, who came back from it thoroughly inspired and energized, hoping that the Nanyang MBA will be able to continue this tradition of attending this event for all future batches as well.
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