Change is something that scares a lot of people. It also does not make sense when people are comfortable with the present status.

As a country, we are losing our competitive edge quickly and competing in knowledge-driven economy requires different sources of competitiveness and human resource. As the services sector becomes more prominent in driving economic growth, the competition in getting the right brain as source of competitiveness would be more intense.

These are some of the issues highlighted in the presentation made by Nik Mohd Hasyudeen Yusoff, the CEO and Thought Leader of Inovastra, who was the key note speaker at the forum on Innovation and Change for Business Sustainability organised by the Graduate School of Business, Universiti Sains Malaysia at the university in Penang on 10 December 2009.

Other panellists are Professor Chris Patel from the Department of Accounting and Finance, Macquarie University, Australia;Krishna Singh, Director of Strategic Programs, Service Science, IBM Almaden Research Center, Tan Sri Tengku Mahaleel Tengku Ariff, Executive Chairman, Tien Wah Press Holdings Berhad and Dr Zinaida Fadeeva, Director of Strategy, United Nations University Institute of Advanced Studies, Japan.