Never Stop Learning
CityU alumni and current Pricerite Executive Director and Chief Operating Officer Ben LAM extols the benefits of the University’s courses and advises young students on what they need to do to achieve success
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CityU alumni Ben Lam did not emerge from the traditional academic business stream. Instead, Lam studied East and Southeast Asian Studies (currently the Asian and International Studies programme under CityU’s College of Liberal Arts and Social Sciences, CLASS), pursuing a longstanding interest in the region. Learning Korean and Japanese, however, proved advantageous when it came to business.
Lam helped Japanese casual wear retail giant Uniqlo open its first office in the city. In fact, he was the company’s first Hong Kong employee on the ground, and he headed Uniqlo’s brand awareness campaign as store manager. From there on, his career was set. In 2008, he went on to expand the business for Uniqlo in the rest of Southeast Asia and Taiwan with a focus on training staff and implementing best practice guidelines. Eventually, Lam was given the responsibility to look after Uniqlo’s entire operations in Hong Kong. When he was first appointed, Lam became the first non-Japanese store manager of one of Uniqlo’s 10 flagship stores around the world. As the sole member at Uniqlo to have in-depth understanding of Japanese culture while speaking the language, Lam became the bridge between Japanese management and the local team he led. He perfected the language during his undergraduate years when went on exchange programmes between CityU and a university located in Beppu, Japan. It gave Lam a unique deep dive into Japanese culture, an experience that gave him an edge over his peers. After several years, Lam was tasked to launch the brand’s sister company in the city, GU, another extremely popular brand in Japan.
Coming Home
Despite his success, the young operations manager decided to elevate his professional track further, he would need to upskill. Lam returned to CityU to pursue an EMBA degree to sharpen his business acumen.
He was subsequently brought on board at Pricerite as their new Head of Operations. It only took three months for the company to acknowledge Lam’s value before they promoted him to Chief Operating Officer in Hong Kong, and another six months before, at the start of 2021, Lam also became the Executive Director.
