Sharing Experience of Wardening
Simon Leung Wuhua Hall Warden
Slightly more than a year has passed since I took up wardenship of Wuhua Hall in July 2002. During the past 15 months, I have benefited a lot from a number of individuals and groups. Let me take this opportunity to share with readers about some of those experiences.
In Wuhua Hall, everybody who knows me calls my first name, Simon. Seldom do people call me Dr. Leung or Mr. Leung. Even when they do call me that way, I will ask them to call me Simon. Being called by my first name makes me feel at home. I have been trying to memorize the names of Wuhuans too – but only with limited success. Even though their names may not be fully or correctly remembered, I can still recognize their faces which are getting more familiar day by day as I am on duty in my warden's office almost every evening.
It has been an experience working with the tutors who have different backgrounds and different personalities. While most tutors are research students, one of them is a teaching staff. As we do have different patterns of workloads during the year, we need to back up one another flexibly. For example, when some tutors work hard to get “confirmation”, we will help them out with less allocated duties. When some tutors go overseas to present papers or just to take a break, we will wish them an enjoyable trip whilst waiting desperately for their souvenirs when they return …
There is a lot to learn, too, when working with the members of Hall Association. The theories that I learnt from my undergraduate courses on Human Resources, Organizational Management really helps. Our Executive Committee members are young and goal-searching seagulls. While they wish to fly high and wide on their own, they do need care and support. They also need our advice and suggestions. Experience tells me time and again that such care and support can be provided at my liberty but advice and suggestions should only be provided when they are asked for. The best thing to do is to communicate more with them showing care and support, and the worst thing to do is to provide advice and suggestions when they are not asked for. One basic thing I do learn from working with Hall Association is that they emphasize the process of doing things while I, in many cases, put more emphasis on results. It would be great if the process is enjoyable and the results are satisfactory!
Thanks to Wilson and his team, it has been a joy working with Hall Management Office. It is amazing how efficient and effective such a small office could manage to meet the diverse needs of such a large number of residents. Alan and his crew at FMO such as cleaners, security guards and the like are nice people to work with too. Despite long working hours, they are polite and positive when responding to the needs of residents.
Looking back, it is so nice to see our Student Halls of Residence going from strength to strength, getting better equipped and accommodating more residents. I would most sincerely hope that through living in hostel, our students would acquire better all-round development by taking advantages of various hall education opportunities!
Simon Leung
Wuhua Hall Warden
19 October 2003