What inspires me transforms me

Friska Ruth Sitinjak, ST

Friska Ruth Sitinjak came to Kuala Lumpur in 2013 to start her first job in the fast rising city. Even though she was just a fresh graduate, with the education and degree from ITHB and cum laude honor, she embarked her journey with confidence. Her senior alumni from ITHB who have previously started working in the company she was joining – Accenture, world’s largest IT consultant – have proven to be more than qualified to fulfill the demand of IT consulting job for high profile clients. Driven by the positive track records of the campus’s graduates, Accenture office in Malaysia has repeatedly come to its neighbouring country Indonesia, especially to ITHB in Bandung, for highly potential recruits such as Sitinjak.

In her new job, the newbie was assigned to an Enterprise Resource Planning system development and migration for an important client, Malaysia’s largest telecommunication company that at the time had more than 10 million subscribers. As a typical big project, the engagement required skills from many areas of the world. And that meant she has to quickly adapt to work in an international setting.

“My work colleagues came from many countries worldwide such as France, India, Thailand, Philippines and Malaysia. The competition is very stiff and there are targets and deadlines to be met. I just can’t afford losing focus at the expense of the responsibilities that I have been assigned to. Needless to say, performance is everything when you are sitting among the best. Being innovative is another challenge that continually needs to be addressed by each consultant, to maintain our company’s reputation as world’s best IT consulting firm.”

I didn’t dare to dream this far when I completed my high school in Bandung. Neither going to a private college, nor studying overseas was on the table. But then the door swung open for me when a full scholarship was offered by ITHB. It just changed my life.

I knew it was never going to be easy for a scholarship student like me. Aside from studying, I also needed to spend some time working in the campus. The pressure was always on. So in the beginning, I was a bit worried, cautious and perhaps reserved. But over the time the people that I met in the campus – the leaders, faculty members, lecturers, fellow students, the guest speakers, and alumni – all have contributed to transform how I see myself, work, and opportunities. The inspiration and guidance they gave helped me master the competences in my major Industrial Engineering, but more importantly changed my view of what I can achieve in life. They have encouraged and transformed me not only to become more confident in my qualification and competence in my profession, but also to make me want to bring out the best in me.

When the final year came, there was plenty of competition among the graduating students. Their eyes were all focused on opportunities, as the career center in our campus has prepared us since the first year for this career defining moment. Frankly speaking, I believe all of my classmates were prepared for a good career, and they did give their best shots during company interviews. But, life has its own way to direct each of us to different courses, and for me it turns out to be better than my expectation. I was so grateful when I was finally hired by a world class company such as Accenture along with some other ITHB graduates. I can still remember the day, long before my graduation, that I was given the offer by Accenture.

I believe that there are not that many universities in the country that can achieve the international recognition that ITHB already has. I am so proud and thankful of being a part of this university. Competence, character and integrity. Those are the important values that I have learned and proven to be very important in career. And, I can’t be thankful enough for that.”

The seasons have been satisfying for Sitinjak, particularly when she and the team she is working with earn a full credit they much deserve from Sam Liew, one of the company’s managers,“I am personally grateful for all the hard work put in by this team across the past 15 months. We have had our ups and downs. Regardless, this Release has helped to cement our track record inCelcom. I look forward to our final lap for R2 and possibly R3. Special thanks to the Migration Team (Wei Tse, Jiet Mao, Paul, Michael, Joe, Ruth and Mira) and the Apps & TA teams who pushed through the Wave 3 migration (technically the past few weeks). It was arguably our largest migration block in recent memory – standing at 4.8 million prepaid subscribers.”