2022
Hello Everyone!
It’s the 24th April, so obviously I’m a procrastinator, but that’s part of what makes me the creative person that I am. Waiting till the last minute has allowed the ideas about my application video to brew in my mind, and ferment into this:
In all the LGS submission videos that I have seen people talk about how much they will learn and how great it would be to meet other LGs from all over the world, how they want to represent the culture of their people/country, and what a dream come true it would be to visit the Googleplex. I AGREE 100% with all of that. It WOULD be a massive learning opportunity. It WOULD be great to meet Local Guides from around the globe. And how awesome would it be to visit the Googleplex? Yes!! YES!
But if you are reviewing application and deciding on who to invite to #LGSummit2017 in October you want to know what I, Aziph, can bring to the table. You will want to know how different I am from all the other thousands and thousands of applicants. Not how much the same I am with the rest.
Typical Family Portrait for Eid 2016
Well what I am most proud of is that I’m a dad of 5, sewn together from three different marriages and now coming together into the Super Family full of love. My kids range from my 9 year old son who goes to a special needs school (but is the smartest person I know) to my 24 year old step-son, who is carving his own positive niche in the world, despite being disadvantaged in many ways. I’ve always been a community organizer, I’m on the board of a couple of NGOs and active if several community associations, including Girls in Tech Malaysia, The Cooperative for Special Needs Students Putrajaya, the Tiara Heights Mosque Committee and Islamic Relief Malaysia, among others. I was also the President of my Alumni Association for 12 years before handing over to the younger generation. As a young high school graduate in 1985, I took the bus for one and a half hours from my parent’s house in Shah Alam to Kuala Lumpur to volunteer at a mentally handicapped school in Brickfields called Wisma Harapan (The House of Hope).
Moderating a Panel Discussion with Malaysia's first ever Paralympic Gold Medalists Latiff Romly and Ziyad Zolfefli.
To be very honest, I only started getting serious about Local Guides after I maxed out the storage limit in my Google Drive, and as a result I couldn’t send or receive emails. Being the loyal Google fan that I am, and totally dependent on Gmail for all these years, I was ready to purchase some additional storage, but discovered that if I made Level 4 within the deadline, I would receive 100Gb FREE! I achieved that distinction with a few days to spare. [I can provide good feedback on how effective or not incentives are in changing behavior :)] After having that under my belt, I became enamored with Local Guides and I couldn’t stop contributing. After having spent a lifetime making local contributions in a small scale, and then graduating to regional and even international oranizations, I see Local Guides as my opportunity to truly reach a global audience and make a real difference. What I share really matters to others, who could be from anywhere in the world. That was irresistible to me.
I’ve organized a couple of Local Guide meetups in my town of Cyberjaya that are different/unique. I curated a food crawl to highlight the diversity of offerings in my city. We sampled everything from streetfood out in the open to a full spread dim-sum buffet dinner in a posh 5 star restaurant within a Resort & Spa. I worked with the owners of the restaurants as well as the local council to get all the food for free plus we were driven around in an air-conditioned 44 seater bus. We introduced the LocalGuide programme to the entire community and got a lot of new LGs to sign up. I supercharged the LocalGuide meetup experience by galvanizing the community, getting buy in from many different stakeholders, and marketing the event to both existing LocalGuides and newbies who had to sign up before they could join in on the fun. Read the Recap Post here: https://www.localguidesconnect.com/t5/Let-s-Meet-Up/Recap-Cyberjaya-Jalan2-Makan2-Food-Crawl/m-p/195...
You can find the recap videos of the two Meetups that I hosted here:
https://goo.gl/photos/CsaqPVHfzHnrbmNg9
and here:
https://www.facebook.com/aziphmustapha/videos/1465882813453894/
I am always looking for new and innovative ways to promote the Local Guide programme, because I believe that it truly is helpful to users the world over. I’ve partnered with the organizer of a treasure hunt from my city Cyberjaya to Jasin, Melaka which was 250kms away. I introduced the LG program to all 200 participants via customized messages with links. Before the flag off, I also conducted an introduction session to Google Maps and Local Guides to all participants. We signed up at least one member from every car, and I provided a small prize the the LG who amassed the most number of points. The winner went from zero to Level 4 during that trip alone!
My last job was as CEO of a national Innovation agency where I reported to the Federal Minister of Innovation and made regular presentations to the Prime Minister of Malaysia on Inclusive Innovation.
Now I’m starting up my own business, and the change from being chauffer driven wherever I went to riding my little scooter around has also tremendously expanded my horizons, to say the least. One of the reasons I pushed for free food to be served during the foodcrawls that I hosted was because I can feel the pain of those who can’t afford to go out for a nice dinner. When I was drawing my CEO’s salary, I never gave a second thought on where we went and what we ate. But now as a struggling entrepreneur, every cent counts.
So, dear Googler who is evaluating this post, if you want a different perspective, and someone who will bring a different cognitive toolkit, I’m your man. I honestly believe that I can add value to the conversations during LGSUmmit2017, and help the programme get better and be relevant to a lot more people.
Let’s go!
Aziph Mustapha
Malaysia
