Tencent shares secret mojo on how to be a global citizen

In a digitally connected world, almost anyone can make their voice heard. Almost anyone can create an inspiring message. Equally, almost anyone can, more often than not, act like a troll. The interesting pickle is that there’s more people on the planet becoming more digitally connected than ever before. In 1990, 24% of the world population was digitally connected. In 2014 it was 39% which is equivalent to 30 trillion souls. 

In a recent keynote by Tencent senior vice president S.Y Lau  where he addressed an enthusiastic crowd of graduates from INTI college along with invited business leaders and INTI alumni earlier this year, he shared his thoughts on globalisation and what it means to be a global citizen in a digitally connected world. The most important thing he said was that global citizens rejected extremism in all forms. In line with that, he also emphasised that with the plethora of differing, often false messages portrayed online, global citizens have to cultivate an open mind as the first line defence against falsehood which meant that they had to question the facts and determine what agenda a message is trying to push before disseminating it.

Another thing he mentioned was that global citizens were masters of technology in all its forms from tweaking your home NEST to using your smartphone. In line with mastering technology, he advocated learning coding as a language. It is increasingly being offered in institutions of higher education now including Harvard, Oxford and Cambridge as subjects.

He also emphasised that the future is about a sharing economy where everyone isn’t fighting to take a piece of the pie. Examples would include demand-sourced businesses like Uber and Grab. According to Lau, he said that a sharing economy is a cooperative effort not to fight for the pie, but to make it larger so that everyone could benefit. In that vein, he encouraged global citizens to collaborate, rather than compete.

Last but not least, he emphasised that the most important thing global citizens needed was integrity: a sound moral compass that would drive them to act for the common good. Pretty sound advice.