Frustrations and failures

Frustrations and failures part of life – Iking

by Mariah Doksil. Posted on October 2, 2012, Tuesday

KOTA KINABALU: Frustrations and failures are part of the process in life, and everyone should not be disheartened but instead embrace and learn from them.

Daphne Iking, a Sabahan celebrity using examples from her own experiences related the frustrations and failures she faced during her career in broadcasting, in a talk at the Makeweekend Sabah workshop at Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS) on Sunday.

“We should be willing to fail in our attempts at creating a successful invention because it is part of the process,” she said.

Makeweekend Sabah is a weekend workshop where youths will gather to exchange ideas and build new products and services that attempt to solve industry problems that they have identified.

The young investors will identify the problems and try to prototype their solutions within a period of 48 hours while being closely mentored by industry experts from Multimedia Development Corporation (MDeC) and SATA (Sabah Technopreneur Association).

At Makeweekend, participants learn elements of design thinking and business and also gain team building skills as well as idea generation skills. They then implement what they have learnt into their prototypes, and their final presentations will be a crucial determinant of whether or not they will win the state Innovation Award and represent Sabah at Anugerah Cipta at the end of the year.

Among the 22 projects being carried out over the weekend included a closet that maximized space by compressing clothes, a video game that encouraged kids to eat healthier food by making their pet animal grow when the kids eat vegetables or fruits, and a handbag with an airbag that would explodes when it’s snatched from its owner.

These projects, along with the rest of the projects that are being built, stand a chance of winning the state Innovation Award, where the winning team will be recognised by the Prime Minister for their innovation. Other prizes that they can win include the Best Prototype Award and the people’s Choice Award.

Makeweekend is co-organised by Tandemic and the Centre of Research and Innovation (CRI), UMS. The CRI, headed by their director Prof Dr Felix Tongkol, is a supporter of science and innovation in the state and they champion events that train students in the aforementioned fields.

Tandemic helps build communities and social movements for brands, nonprofit and government organizations in areas of innovation, entrepreneurship and social enterprise. The company works with organizations such as F&N, Firefly Airlines, Microsoft and Kakiseni.

Makeweekend Sabah was held from Sept 20 to Sept 30 at Auditorium, Postgraduate Hall, UMS and is the ninth out of 13 Makeweekends that will be carried out in all states in Malaysia.

The custodian of NIM 2012 is the Ministry of Science and Technology (MoSTI) and is supported by the Ministry if Higher Education (MOHE) as well as the Ministry of Finance (MOF).