Kevin Ooi grew up in the back room of his family's fire safety business in Jelutong, doing homework between deliveries of extinguishers. When he enrolled in ACCA at Kenward's, he was not sure he would ever work there.
Learning to lead before learning to audit
In his first year Kevin joined the student council, then ran it. "Running a meeting with thirty people who all want different things is good practice for a client meeting," he says. He credits the role with teaching him to prepare, listen and follow up in writing.
He finished his ACCA exams in three years and joined an audit practice in Penang. The first busy season was long, but the mock exams at college had prepared him for working to a deadline under pressure.
Back to Jelutong
Last year his father asked him to look at the family firm's books. Kevin moved the business onto cloud accounting software, set up monthly management accounts and priced the servicing contracts properly for the first time.
"ACCA gave me the language to talk to my father about the business as a business, not just as the family shop."
He now splits his time between audit work and the family firm, and returns to Kenward's each semester to talk to ACCA students about what practice is really like.
