Standard Chartered Bank and the Malaysian Global Innovation and
Creativity Centre announce financial education partnership
Standard Chartered Bank Malaysia (the Bank) and the Malaysian Global Innovation & Creativity Centre (MaGIC) today announced a strategic partnership for the offering of financial education programmes to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in Malaysia. The announcement was made during an International Women’s Day forum themed, “Be Bold for Change”, that saw participation by 200 women from diverse backgrounds.
Titled Education for Entrepreneurs (E4E), the programme will be delivered by the Bank’s certified E4E trainers and is designed to build the financial capability of SMEs in order to grow their businesses. The partnership combines Standard Chartered’s financial services expertise with MaGIC’s vast network of Malaysian start-ups and entrepreneurs.
Jennifer Kang, Country Head of Corporate Affairs,Standard Chartered Bank Malaysia believes entrepreneurs are becoming increasingly important drivers of growth.
"Entrepreneurs rarely have access to advice that has been tailored to their particular needs. Our E4E programme offers practical information as well as tools that have been specifically designed for them, around topics such as cash flow, budgeting, reviewing of accounts, and the right reasons for scaling up one's business" Jennifer said.
Very few resources are targeted specifically at entrepreneurs and therefore fail to address the specific challenges they face. These include a lack of role models, access to financial education and confidence to start or grow their own businesses. The modules within the E4E programme directly addresses these challenges as they are adaptable to different skills, knowledge levels and cultural needs.
Ashran Dato’ Ghazi, Chief Executive Officer of MaGIC, said: ““Educating entrepreneurs on financial literacy is very important, especially for their success in the future. With improved financial literacy, entrepreneurs can better manage their financial resources and operations – one of the crucial ways to run their business smoothly and expand their reach. There are still relatively few resources available and accessible for entrepreneurs to learn more about finance which is why we are very excited to partner with Standard Chartered Malaysia and support delivery of the E4E programme as one of their longstanding global commitments to educate entrepreneurs. This is also a great example of our Corporate Entrepreneurship Responsibility (CER) programme in action, helping fulfill our pledge to support value innovation and connect key players in the ecosystem, as well as equip entrepreneurs with the necessary capabilities and skills to grow.”
The Education for Entrepreneurship programme is one of the ways that Standard Chartered Bank is supporting its Clinton Global Initiative commitment to educate at least 5,000 micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) by the end of 2018. Of those 5,000 MSMEs, at least 20 per cent needs to be owned or led by women.
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