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Tan Sri Dato Lim Kok Wing is no stranger to Malaysians, yet not many know what this man has accomplished or continues to propagate. Cheryl Ambrose and Jacqueline Toyad are floored by this passion, brilliance and radical methods, which are destined to put Malaysia on the world map.

There’s a reason creative types have gained a reputation for being difficult. It’s called speaking their minds. In a country where expressing oneself is a sure-fire method of being labelled arrogant, rebellious and downright rude, creative types have been forced to fight just to get their ideas, thoughts and opinions across. It’s an ongoing battle between the establishment and those who dare to question anything, thanks mainly to our shut-up-and-listen education system.

Although many have attempted to change this method of madness, only one man seems to have made a big enough dent in order to produce thinking adults capable of surviving in this age of EQ over IQ. That man is none other than Tan Sri Dr Lim Kok Wing, the founder of, among other things, Lim Kok Wing University College of Creative Technology.

But are his radical (everything is radical compared to our education system) methods working? Is he making enough of an impact to ensure that something will be done so that the millennium generation will stand a better chance of elevating the standards of this country?

We head downtown one evening to meet this man who has devoted his entire lifetime to creativity and innovation, at the recently opened International Student Centre on Jalan Sultan Ismail. We have no clue what to expect of the joint except that it’s a cafe that also sells clothes. We certainly didn’t expect to be greeted by an all-black interior (and we mean ALL black, including floor tiles, sofas and walls), nor a student band that was busy preparing to play to the few tables occupied by students. Neither did we expect to find a hair salon on a lower level, designed for students to train at and for the public to make use of, placed right next to the area where fashion students have the opportunity to showcase and sell some of their couture designs.

Just as the centre proved unpredictable, so did the man, who was waiting for us in a sectioned-off area of Wings Cafe dressed in (surprise, surprise) black.

Within minutes of speaking to Lim, we realise that all that positive press about him is absolutely authentic. He is a genuinely creative personality, complete with all the expected eccentricities; a genius who has managed to work towards improving what he thinks needs improving instead of griping about it; a man so humble that we end up listening intently, at times forgetting that we are not sitting around having a chat with an old friend.

Although we are dying to get right to his life story, we soon discover that getting Lim to talk about himself is quite a task. Right now, it’s the centre he wants to talk about, a centre he dreamt up based on the main Lim Kok Wing campus in Cyberjaya.

“This is an international student centre designed for kids who don’t have the money to go clubbing,” he begins, immediately proving that the focus of his university isn’t purely about by-the-book education. The cafe we’re at is called Wings Café and the hair salon, called Making Headlines, is a collaboration between L’Oreal Professional and Shu Uemura. Both concepts were developed at the Cyberjaya campus and exist there as well.

That campus itself was designed as a “gigantic cafe” Basically, it was built for fun first, and only then serious studying. The campus also has a gym on the grounds called Fit to Fly.

“We put a lot of emphasis on personalising development and talent. It’s not just about getting a degree,” he explains. “Malaysians are slowly changing. We promote freedom of expression on campus. People should be the way they are and not the way we want them to be. They must be happy and expressive. It is for [the student] to become the person he or she wants to be. That is my focus. It’s very lifestyle. I wanted to build a place where young people would be happy going to every day. Education mustn’t be dull and boring. Studying must be fun.”

Ironically, this man who has established one of the best private universities in this country never finished school, mainly because the system didn’t challenge him enough.

“Those days were boring. It’s not like it is today. The school was strict,” he says, quite seriously. That school was first the Methodist Boys School, KL, and later Cochrane Road School, also in KL.

Suddenly he smiles. “We used to wait for the Convent girls,” he says, offering a glimpse of that mischievous streak in him. “Their teachers would come and protest to our headmaster, saying that these were Convent girls.” Who should therefore be left alone.

But life wasn’t all that monotonous back then.

“When I was in Form Five, I was teaching art,” he says, throwing us off for a bit. Apparently, the designated art teacher at his school was perpetually absent and his headmaster had noticed young Lim’s talent in the subject. And so, he took over the class.

He says this not with pride but almost with shame. It’s difficult to understand his reluctance to speak more on the subject until he admits that his mother discouraged his penchant for art.

“My mother would say that artists only become famous after they die,” he smiles. But that didn’t stop him from pursuing his passion, even if he didn’t realise that he had a passion.

“I used to win trophies in competitions but I had to hide them or my mother would get upset. Then one day, I designed an album cover and won a guitar. I didn’t know how to hide it, so I got into trouble.” The image of a teenage Lim attempting to hide a guitar in shame makes us laugh out loud, while he chides us for forcing him to take this trip down memory lane.

Clearly, he didn’t enjoy school one bit and he dropped out in Form Six. What he didn’t tell us that night was that he never told his parents about his decision to quit school until two years later!

“My mother was the sole breadwinner then. She was a tailor,” he says, explaining one of the other reasons he decided to calls it quits. “I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life, so I went to see my headmaster. He was a fierce man but I always knew he was a good person. I asked him for advice and he said that he thought I was pretty good in art. I told him what my mother had said about artists but he said that I should follow my heart.”

But following his heart had to take a back step while he chased another thing close to the hearts of most teenage boys: a convertible.

“My first job was as a used car salesman because I couldn’t afford to buy a car. Those days, if you had a convertible, everyone would know your name.” Ah, so the desire for fame had already reared its head. “One day, I reversed the car into a bus stop and it ended my career. I wasn’t very good at selling anyway.”

And so he moved on, still unsure of what he wanted to do with his life but realising that he had to tap into his God-given talents. He spent a few years as a book illustrator, freelancing for the publisher of educational books, Longman. During that period, he noticed a niche in the market for study aids and created those books that many of us ended up swotting from before our SRP and SPM exams, those small revision books that the schools didn’t encourage us to use. Already, Lim was showing signs of going against the grain in order to simplify studying and make it more accessible.

But no truly creative person could have stuck out a job of illustrating encyclopaedias and textbooks, so Lim left to try his hand at journalism.

“I went to work for a newspaper, The Eastern Sun, which was owned by Sin Chew [Jit Poh]. It was centuries ago,” Lim says. “The editor was a brilliant writer who put me on the crime beat. So, I used to sit in police stations and courts writing about bad people doing bad things.”

Then his editor noticed that he liked designing and got him to do some revamping of the newspaper.

“And I did a comic strip, Apu, which later became Guli Guli.”

All this and he was only about 21. But juggling these duties left little time for sleep, a habit that has since come in useful, given the scope of his current positions.

“When I used to write my stories about bad people doing bad things,” he continues, “I would write long stories. But my editor would chop them down. He just wanted the facts. Those days, you were paid 40 sen per column inch. My stories were always cut down to four columns. How to survive?”

And that put an end to his career as a journalist. Finally, he gave in and tried his hand at his true calling: advertising. He explains that he worked for a few years with an advertising agency as an art person, glossing over the fact that he became a creative director in his mid-20s, which is unheard of even today. He was also the only Asian to hold the post in an industry that was dominated by foreigners.

But he never mentions this, brushing aside these accomplishments as mere details.

“Those days were fun. I spent a lot of time in New York and London. I used to go to the Waldorf and the Peninsula in New York, and I had no idea why people were so fond of old hotels,” Lim shrugs. This he would rather talk about. Not the fact that by the time he had turned 27, he had enough clout to set up his own advertising agency called Wings, which went on to become a huge success. That was in 1975.

Fifteen years later, he sold the agency to “a company called BBDO”. But why would anyone leave an obviously cushy job?

If there’s one ingredient that makes Lim’s every venture successful, it’s the fact that he would rather focus on the macro than the micro. In the early 1990s, he realised that it was extremely difficult to find good people to hire.

“They were not well trained. I also wanted to do things that would reach many people and not just work for clients. The advertising industry is selfserving. The whole purpose is to sell. It’s not lying,” he adds quickly.

“I was too comfortable. By then, the expats had left the industry. The locals were not well trained. The school system didn’t teach them to think, to take risks or to go beyond the right answer,” Lim explains. But unlike most people, instead of complaining about the fact, he set up Lim Kok Wing Institute (which has since been elevated to university status) with the intent of producing thinking Malaysians capable of making a difference in the corporate world.

“I got into training because we obviously needed training,” he says.

During his days in the ad world, Lim spent much of his time actively working with the government on campaigns, including the Tak Nak campaign designed to discourage teenagers from lighting their first cigarette. That period in his life found him travelling often with the former prime minister, working on promoting Malaysian trade and the free trade zone, as well as serving as a political strategist on behalf of Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress, which helped them win the first free elections in 1994. “I spent a lot of time overseas. ” Tavelling opened my eyes to education designed for developing countries. Everywhere I went, I noticed it wasn’t about not being able to afford education but not being able to afford a good education. Good to them meant a British education,” he explains, a concept which still has him stumped.

“That’s when I thought about putting together a college that’s affordable. One which would encourage going against the grain, breaking the rules to create new rules…”

Anyone who has driven past the campus in Cyberjaya would have guessed that one already. The entire exterior of the humongous building is covered in “the world’s largest composite poster” which embraces the building like a skin. Although the design for the poster was in place, when it came time to print it, Lim discovered that there was no one in the country who could print it for them. “So, we bought a machine to print it,” he shrugs.

“The whole purpose [of the university] is to inspire people. It’s an artist’s environment. Even if you are not an artist, you will become like that. You will become quite discerning. It’s a place where you don’t need to go into classrooms to learn.”

It’s not a method that today’s public schools and universities would advocate but clearly, Lim’s approach has had an impact on the graduates of this university, who have gone on to successful careers in the advertising and communications industries and even business.

“I say to the kids, ‘Before you leave, you should have friends from 50 countries’,” he says. That’s easy at this university, given that 50% of the student population is made up of foreign students. “I think that networking is important. Being upstanding and knowing how to be tolerant is important. Having fun is very important. At our campus, the kids spend more time out of class than in class. They will do well wherever they work. That is the heart and soul of the university. Lots of people who receive their scroll don’t have enough to be happy about,” Lim explains.

He talks about allowing students freedom of expression in every sense of the word, including their dressing, a point which parents of teenagers will readily admit is enough to bring on severe migraines.

“I just feel that you need not be stereotyped,” he says, still commenting on the rigid dress codes these days. “You don’t see me wearing a tie. I am still president of the Malaysian Institute of Directors. I think you should be what you want to be but be respectful. To know what you are all about is important.”

Imagine having such a principal at a local university, a person who expects you to be yourself, to follow your dreams, to try to become a well- rounded person… wouldn’t studying be that much more fun? In fact, it might have even been like studying abroad.

Radical as it sounds, the system obviously works. Currently, Lim Kok Wing University College has students from 85 nations, which translates into a boost for our economy. Imagine if this system were implemented in local universities, drawing in more foreign students and encouraging local students to stay right here instead of spending hundreds of thousands overseas. Parents wouldn’t have to spend their entire careers saving up for their children’s education.

And they wouldn’t even be shortchanged by staying home. Right now, students at the university have the opportunity to spend a semester or a month in any of the associated universities at various locations, including Barcelona, Lisbon, Milan and Paris. Which means that even students who cannot afford to study aboard for a year or three will have the opportunity to experience campus life away from home.

Next year, Lim will take this success story to another level by opening Lim Kok Wing University of Creative Technology in London, which is targeted at British and European students, and which is open to Malaysian students as well. This time round, local students pay less.

“We will be successful there,” Lim says confidently. “We will be able to provide a pathway that will encourage foreign students to come to KL to experience our country and then go back to the London campus. There’s an integration of East and West. The idea is to bring Asia to Europe, to allow students who enrol in London to come to KL,”

Could this actually put Malaysia on the world map? Sure seems like it.

But of course, a man who has 24 designations on his (black) name card would never be satisfied with just one campus out of the country. Next in line is a campus that has already been completed in Botswana (slated to open in February next year). Meanwhile, one each is at the planning stage in New York and Beijing.

We can understand New York and Beijing but why Botswana?

“Botswana is the world’s biggest diamond-producing country and it only has 1.7 million people. It’s one of the richest non-oil countries in Africa,” Lim explains. “Currently, we have about 400 students from Botswana with us.” Clearly, there is a demand for higher education in that country but there is only one public university there. “We will be the first private college there. We could draw students from the neighbouring countries. I think we will be successful.”

His plan for world domination by Malaysia? Delivering the programmes that Lim Kok Wing University offers to 100 countries within the next two years.

“I’m looking at revolutionising education.”

 

After over an hour of chatting, the realisation that we’re not quite sure what he does dawns upon us. What does this man whose name is now equated with creative studies actually do? The 24 designations (actually, it’s president of 24 different bodies) on his name card only add to the confusion. He is the president of the Malaysian World Peace Foundation, the Malaysian Education Promotion Council, the Designers and Animators Guild UK, the Society for the Severely Mentally Handicapped and 20 others. He has been a journalist, a cartoonist, an ad man, heck even a car salesman. But who is the real Lim Kok Wing?

“A lot of people don’t know what I do. Fifty per cent of what I do has nothing to do with education,” he says, which makes our heads spin. But by this time, we’re so taken up by his eloquence, wit, brilliance and sense of humour that we let it slide. “I have been doing a number of things for the past 10 years: branding, furniture design, shoe design…” Before we can stop him with another question, he adds, “As an adviser. I’m even involved in the music industry - well, not much - but I’m trying to put in place the idea that anybody can design music with a computer.”

Okay, but what does he do? He laughs and we leave it at that. Perhaps, this is one of those times when individuals have to sum it all up and decide for themselves. He is an educator, not just of the youth but of society; a visionary who is intent on moving the country forward by taking charge of the younger generation; a man who takes pride in making a difference any which way he can.

This he will continue to do until he is no longer able to. Lim turned 60 a couple of weeks ago but he still has a spring in his step and his mind continues to work overtime. In fact, his mind never seems to take a breather.

“My day starts early and stops late,” he says. During the day, he spends his time at his office on the Cyberjaya campus. When he finally gets home, he stays up to write his papers for the government, for the school or any working paper that needs to get written. “1 only need four hours of sleep. And there’s still not enough time.”

He admits to not seeing his two grown children very much, despite the fact that his 19-year-old daughter Tiffanee Marie is studying communications at his university and the fact that his son, Lim Kok Wing Junior, 24, helps him out in the campus. But he does say they are both good thinkers and good writers. “They are nice people. But I seldom see them.”

Another smile and just like that, he switches the subject from him to “the kids”.

“You know, advertising was a piece of cake compared to looking after 6,000 young people who are all argumentative, ” he smiles. Yes, he likes those kids who are confident enough to speak their minds and share their opinions. His belief in these kids is astounding.

“I think the problem with this country is that the kids think that they must do well and pass exams. That’s all. The parents don’t bother to give them confidence to develop. They only care about their children being streamed into Science, and dress a certain way, otherwise the neighbours will talk… So, the children grow up not knowing what to do with their lives. And when they start working, they don’t know how to prove themselves because there are no exams.

“Many parents won’t let their kids take a year’s break because they don’t want them to fall behind,” he continues. Fall behind the race for the best job? Finally, someone has cottoned on to the fact that life isn’t a race at all.

“It’s because of this that there are so many people today who can’t think for themselves. They can’t think so they have nothing to say. They don’t want to be seen to be making mistakes. It’s the passing exams syndrome.

“You’ve heard of the Asian mentality that we don’t question and we must be obedient? These are all excuses not to think. It’s the easy way out. So, they complain a lot and expect to be given a lot. For years, I’ve been pushing innovative thinking. My hair has gone white. It’s like pushing an elephant uphill. It’s another reason I started the school.”

He does have numerous valid points. And in his true style, rather than wait for the proverbial someone else to come along and make that change, he decided to do it himself. Of course, research was important and so he travelled for almost a year, visiting various universities in order to gain an understanding of what higher education is all about. After all, he didn’t go to university.

“This campus is like none I have seen in the world,” Lim says, coming back to what has obviously become his pride and joy. “It’s a learning place. It’s not a place that tells you what to do. It’s a place that encourages you. It’s a place of self-discovery. You have to push yourself as far as you can but not through disciplinary action but encouragement.

“You know, people in the 1960s and 1970s in this country were the pioneering batch. The next generation complains a lot. They have too many options. If they don’t like something, they move abroad. They don’t look further than one generation.”

Lim mentions Volvo as an example. The person who set that company up must have wanted the company to last a few generations, to grow even after his lifetime. That, according to Lim, is what Malaysians today lack. The problem, he continues, is that the public doesn’t have high expectations. As long as society carries on accepting substandard products and services, no company will see the need to improve.

“Society must be discerning. Only when there is awareness of quality and the demand for quality will manufacturers improve. We have a lot of catching up to do,” he says, comparing Malaysia to the rest of the developed world.

“Malaysians should be as good as anyone else. Over the past few years, I’ve spent a great deal of time pushing the various industries forward. And this school shows the results,” Lim says proudly.

Yet for all his efforts, it’s unfortunate that this country still doesn’t appear to be ready to move to the next level. We still won’t be as long as that laid-back, unquestioning mentality persists.

Lim mentions the Tiger Jersey, a project that he undertook with passion and national pride. His idea was to create a product that would whet the appetite of every Malaysian student to strive hard enough to want to wear that jersey, to represent the country. But of course, he slammed right into the mentality that continues to hold us back.

“I kept saying that this isn’t about putting stripes on a shirt but about capturing the spirit of the tiger. We want these tigers to never give up. Even if they lose, they must have tried hard enough,” he explains. But the powers that be “don’t understand the integrity of an idea”. “They can’t understand that every design must be managed. We are still a ceremony person. We launch a product and then we forget about it. I think we need to grow up and become quality people. You know, we cannot even take an argument that is against us. The creative process is to question.

That’s how you find better solutions. If no one is allowed to question, we’ll never grow,” Lim says dejectedly.

He uses the current advertisement promoting tourism in Malaysia as the perfect example.

“What is ‘Truly Asia’?” he asks, clearly puzzled by this definition of our country. “We want tourists and students to come here but what are we doing about it? When you step out of the plane, do you see people with feathers in their hair dancing around? If you think about it, the most popular destinations are very expensive - Paris, London, New York. Here, our hotels have lowered their prices. What does that imply? People want to go to sophisticated places. Why do we still believe that it has to be artificial? I’m not complaining. I’m just attempting to push an elephant up the hill,” Lim says.

As long as that elephant continues to be the white elephant in the room, the one we’re not even supposed to whisper about, the chances are that elephant is never going to move. But at least, Lim has started the ball rolling. Let’s just hope that the next generation, the one that’s currently in college, will continue to uphold his legacy.