Policy Statement & Submission

Our Ref : 51/WKC/057
22 February 2000


Mr Francis Ho
Director General of Industry
Industry Department
14/F Ocean Centre
5 Canton Road
Kowloon


Dear

Pilot Mentoring Programme for SMEs

Thank you for the opportunity of being consulted on the Pilot Mentorship Programme. We have discussed it with our members, particular our SME Committee, and our comments on the Programme are as follows.

1. In principle the Chamber supports the concept of business mentorship. Indeed, one of the key objectives of the Chamber is precisely to provide a medium for business mentorship among our members, through bringing together and encouraging interaction among businesses, whether large or small, established or new.

2. From our experience, there are broadly two types of mentoring which benefit businesses in the Hong Kong context. The first is of a general nature such as through knowledge enhancement and experience sharing, while the second is more directed towards coaching and problem solving.

3. Much of the Chamber's SME-related activities are aimed at achieving the mentoring function of the first type. We certainly support an increased level of mentoring activities of this nature; this is why we have strengthened our own SME unit which is having a busy programme for our member SMEs. We would be happy to explore with the government on how our own SME programme and that of the government SME Office can best complement each other so as to reinforce the effectiveness of both.

4. As to the second, problem-solving type of mentoring activity, we believe there is a growing demand within the business community for such efforts, and many SMEs will benefit from advice on specific, technical aspects of business. In these cases the mentoring activity will have to be much more specific and professional. Our view is that in the business context of Hong Kong, this is best achieved through creating and reinforcing a mutual benefit between the two parties.

5. As an example, often the most effective mentoring takes place between two entities which are business partners to each other. In this situation, the more established company will become a mentor to its "junior" counterpart. The mentorship will be highly effective because of the mutual benefits involved. Another obvious example is the situation of a business consultancy, where a mutual interest is created through establishing a professional-client relationship. Thus consultants offering advice on specific legal, accounting, management or environmental aspects of business will in some way be "mentoring" their clients in the respective areas.

6. Whilst the programme suggested by Industry Department has been based on similar schemes implemented elsewhere, our view is that it does not seem to have addressed adequately the issue of mutual benefit in the Hong Kong context. Instead some of our members have expressed concern over possible liability of the mentors.

7. Having said that, in view of the experimental nature of the programme and the Chamber's support of the business mentorship concept, we would be happy to nominate the following individuals as mentors from the Chamber:

- Mr Denis Lee, Chairman of the Chamber's SME Committee
- Mr Tony Au, Chairman of the Chamber's Information Services Committee

As you know, Both Mr Lee and Mr Au are members of the Government SME Committee.

8. In addition, our SME members would like to put forward two concrete proposals for your consideration which will foster effective mentoring among businesses:

I. The first is to enable more SMEs to take part in programmes of the "general mentoring" nature, by encouraging them to attend suitable conferences and seminars. This could be achieved by lowering the cost of attendance for SMEs through a simple subsidy scheme whereby SMEs attending relevant conferences or workshops can apply for their fee to be reimbursed by the government.

II. The second proposal is to establish a specific advisory programme, in the manner of the legal aid service for individuals, to help SMEs in problem-solving on specific issues. This could be in the form of a subsidised programme for consultancy in legal, accounting, management or environmental matters, perhaps funded and administered by the government SME Office. In our view, such one-to-one consultation between clients and professionals will be much more effective in helping SMEs resolve concrete problems.

9. We are conscious of possible abuse for any programme involving government subsidy, and we would indeed urge the government to exercise extreme prudence in designing any such programme. However, we believe there is a strong case for examining an "enabling programmes" for SMEs and we would be happy to continue discussion with the SME Office on possibly establishing a pilot scheme for the two proposals above.


I hope you will find our views useful.




Yours sincerely



Dr Eden Woon
Director