Anthony Lock, 49, is managing director of karaoke company California Red. Since starting the business in 1992, he has created a chain of karaoke venues, with 14 outlets in Hong Kong, 14 in Malaysia, two in the Philippines and one on the mainland. He will graduate from Chinese University's Executive MBA programme this year. He tells us what he has gained from the course.
You have a successful career; why did you think it necessary to embark on an EMBA?
I had been thinking about continuing my education for some time. I didn't do much studying after school and only graduated from my degree course two years ago. The main reason was that I needed to develop some of my skills. The macroeconomic situation changes so rapidly nowadays and I thought I needed to have more exposure to some new ideas and concepts for my business. Business is very competitive now, and we need to look all over the world to expand, and this can require further education.
As my business offers quite a trendy product, I felt we needed more information and concepts to make the business grow.
Why did you choose the Chinese University EMBA?
It is a bilingual course, and I felt that as my English is not that great - since school I have not had to communicate much in English - this course would make it easier for me.
It also has many professors from all over Asia, the mainland and Taiwan. Also, the alumni network is fantastic, with many famous people on it. In the past 18 months I have been able to meet them and share their experiences as many of them come to present talks at the university.
How important are your fellow students to your learning on the course?
In this programme, even though the students come from different levels of career development and different industries, we can really communicate well and share our experiences with one another. It is very useful for me to learn from different generations and industries.
Can you give me any specific examples of how the course has helped you to grow or improve your business?
One very good example is when we were taught about the service supply chain. It is a very simple idea but extremely useful. Most local businessmen are simply thinking about how to make a profit.
The service supply chains show us that profits come from pleasing customers, and in order to please them we have to motivate our staff - it's a chain that links satisfying customers and satisfying staff.
I have made use of this model inside my company - to make my staff innovators and to help them motivate themselves.
I really input many of these ideas into our strategy and it has helped us sort out many problems. Most of my staff are in Generation Y and I learned how to motivate them well.
Aside from this, the programme has really given me the ability to look at the wider business environment I work in, as opposed to the narrow view of my own business I used to have.
Have you found the course content up-to-date and relevant?
Yes. On the course we have looked in detail at how the economic crisis has affected business. We have looked at how it started, how the banking and financial systems have been influenced by it and how this has impacted our business.
We looked at how this affected spending habits in my own business, and how it affected my customers' behaviour. It helped us to rethink our business.
Was it hard to study and manage your business at the same time?
It has been tough. I often have to study and attend courses during the week and then sometimes on weekends I have to meet with my classmates to work on and discuss assignments.
But spending time on the course and with classmates is very valuable and worthwhile.
What advice can you offer to anyone thinking of taking an EMBA?
We need to continually improve ourselves. The world is changing very fast and we need to be able to adapt to these changes, so I would definitely suggest an EMBA for anyone in a similar position to me.
Many Hong Kong people are primarily looking at how to make money, but CUHK's EMBA gives you wisdom in how to make money but also how to deal with changes and how to do so responsibly.
Throughout the programme we have guest speakers and many of them focus on responsible business. This is a really important factor that taking an EMBA can really help you to understand.