Personal Reflection
★Cindy Hong
This is the second time I've participated in this after school club. In contrast with the previous topic, the topic this time is slightly more challenging. Throughout the process, I encountered many difficulties, such as disagreements, disputes, and temporary transfers of members. Before I could soothe my emotions and anxiety, I feel panic and I have to solve the problem of facing members transfering. When it happens, you will feel panic or uneasy, but after discussion, it's not bad to think about ways to improve together. Most of the members are school brothers and sisters. In the beginning, I will still be a little worried about whether it will be very embarrassing or everyone will not speak.
Fortunately, I over exaggerated. Everyone is willingly and very actively expressing their ideas. Regardless of whether the final result is praised or not, I still felt everyone’s passion and hardwork, so don't feel depressed. After finishing this project, I believe that teamwork and communication are really important, and don't be afraid to put forward your own ideas and be brave to express! Thanks to "Pen.Mech" for letting us learn a lot.
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★Jenny Lin
After participating in this project, I felt that I witnessed a miracle in which a company went from dominant and prosperity that fell into the sunsetting industry and finally became the hidden champion.
Nowadays, the high technology industry and electronic industry of Taiwan have occupied an important position in the World. I am very proud to be as a Taiwanese. To be so successful, it must have gone through many difficulties and harassment. However, at the back of success, Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) have played an important role that they found the base step by step.
Therefore, we visited a local company, PEN. MECH. To make the dream come true, Owen Huang created the company. He claimed to hold the company by making the best quality products. I have learned a lot from him. When it was time for Mark Huang to manage the company, it was no longer prosperity. However, instead of giving up, he overcame the crisis by transformation, for example, to cooperate with famous pen brands. To sum up, it is hard to say whether it is hard or easy to run a company, but what we know is that to face the declination and keep optimistic to make the substantial development of Taiwan.
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★Henry Lee
I feel really fortunate to be a participant in this cyberfair competition.
The reason why I decided to join this club and the competition is because this project not only requires attendants to do online research and analytical writing, but it also needs us to think deeply about how to design and actually create an informative website that is visually appealing to people. In addition, this project presents a focus on features of participants' motherlands, and in my case, it is Taiwan(R.O.C.). I want to take this opportunity to be more familiar with one specific Taiwan’s specialty, local Businesses and Organizations, and present it to the public.
This time, as mentioned, we chose Businesses and Organizations as our category. We made this choice mainly because we want to know how a business operates. Partially, we want this to be an exploration of our future career. Throughout this project, we went to interview the director of the company, and I not only obtained the experience of interviewing someone but also learned the hardships of operating a business.
Next, I learned about the importance of the spirit of teamwork. In the process of doing this project, several disputes about the information that we want to present, the order of information presented and even about choosing the category happened within our group since we sometimes possess contradicting views, perspectives, and thoughts. However, while we compromise and find a balance or reach an agreement, our project is enhanced into a greater dimension. Every groupmate has his or her own strength, and we make the greatest use of this advantage by distributing different works to different group members. In my opinion, only if this cooperation within group members stands, this project can be done thoroughly, and this is why teamwork is vital for better results.
Moreover, an in-depth understanding of small and medium-sized enterprises in Taiwan can also be considered one of my gains throughout this project. By researching and analyzing data and resources, I acquired the knowledge of our important “small and medium-sized enterprises” in Taiwan. I learned about the importance of those enterprises in Taiwan, and that enriched my competence in knowledge.
Last, I want to link back to the first sentence. I really feel lucky that I joined this competition. Indeed, the satisfaction of completing a big project is one thing that makes me feel delighted. But the other reason is that I do improve throughout this project in terms of knowledge and experience. I hope that more and more people can learn that Taiwan(R.O.C.) is a great island with rich features.
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★Dora Huang
This is my first time to participate in making this kind of work, and it is definitely an eye-opening experience for me. In fact, I was on the fence about registering for the club, for the reason that I am a computer illiterate, I didn’t want to be the drag on the team. But actually, after I started working, I found out that everything about the computer which I was really worried about, was not the most difficult thing of the whole process. Everything started from choosing the topic to analysis, interview, finding the information, and writing down everything by my own way. It was all enough to rack my brains.
I really benefit a lot from this experience. Not only the brand new knowledge of enterprise in Taiwan, and also, I faced my fear of computers. When we were writing the program, I tried to follow the teacher step by step, after that I knew that computers will follow the rule of one command and one action. It isn’t that complicated. Another difficulty is that all the enterprise knowledge is new for us, so I sense my frustration at keeping confusing with all the information. I am glad that I have my full mark teammates, my teachers, and my dad, they help me to solve my problems, and give me full energy to complete this work.
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★James Chou
The medium-sized companies and manufacturers are supporting eight million people in Taiwan. It was so lush, progressive, and full of hope in the 70’s era. But now the South-East Asia has taken our job, the international situation and politics has trapped the companies and economy of our nation. There is no more international finance support; the companies are escaping from Taiwan and switching to South Asia for better and cheaper human resources. How is our nation, our economy going to overcome the disaster? I am honoured to interview a small factory owner and investigate the difficult situation that Taiwan is facing. Pen. Mech is a small manufacturer which produces the pivot and components of writing utensils such as pen, pencil and fountain pen. But people now have the internet, technology which makes people less dependent on physical writing, but online documents. Facing the challenge, the second CEO of Pen. Mech founded to cooperate with international companies, to seize the monopoly of Taiwanese market.
I have a negative vision toward the future of medium-sized companies, and I support that they will finally collapse and engulfed by bigger companies, which is the only way to survive.
This research brought me some surprising results. I believe my nation will rise again like it was 40 years ago, and we shall not disappoint our seniors and generations which gave us such a beautiful environment to develop.
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★Sarita Chou
As a participant in the project, I discovered that the falling trend of pen manufacture is unstoppable for local companies in Taiwan, however, this is not the end of the industry.
Companies like PEN. MECH is now facing a great challenge brought by the modern era, the need for pens is continuing declining.what’s more, Taiwan’s awkward international position and the rising salary make the situation even more severe. Thus, many companies decided to move to MainLand China or Southeast Asia where salary is lower, seeking for more profit, in which I disagree. In this difficult time, moving to another place is only delaying the negative outcome but not solving the problem; salary will rise anyway, it is just a matter of time in different countries. The key to this is transformation. Like the owner of PEN. MECH, who we interviewed, has planned to build reputation and influence in the global market. Therefore I think the current situation is definitely not the end of pen manufacturer, it is a chance for companies like PEN. MECH to restart in a new direction.
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★Ellie Feng
This cyberfair competition has made me know more about small and medium-sized enterprises in Taiwan. Before this activity, I was not familiar with local brands in Taiwan, I only knew a few famous big brands. However, after this competition, I learned that there are many small and medium-sized enterprises that contribute a lot to Taiwan too.
This time, we are focusing on the sunset industries in Taiwan. Although some enterprises were once very flourish in the past, because Taiwan was not supported by the international, and because of the capital transfer in recent years, many of them chose to leave Taiwan for their own profits. However, some enterprises still choose to stay and use various methods to let their brand continue.
PEN MECH, the company we interviewed this time was a good example of it, because of the technology improved in recent years, this once-prosperous company is facing a crisis now. Yet, the company's founder chose to improve his product instead of give up. The way he face problems is the spirit we should learn from him.
Lastly, market needs are different through time past, every industry might declined one day, if the enterprise are willing to try different ways to let the company continue, it can certainly find a way to keep the business going.