Turina Farouk, VP of Corporate Communication, PT XL Axiata

Turina Farouk’s drive, passion and clarity of vision make her admired in marketing and communication world. ‘Ms Turina’ as we usually like to call her is a fun, flexible, and fearless lady. She likes traveling, and whenever someone asks her holiday plan, she beckons by using international code number, such as going to 045 when she plans to go to Denmark, or going to 01 to the United States. On each long week end, you can always assume that she will never be at the same place.

However, indeed not only vacation and travelling that fabricates her productivity, but there is one other factor that assembles her strength as well. “My Job is to worship God, therefore I will push my limit to give the best in every situation, this is how I eliminate sluggish and lethargic that hinder my way to pursue my career”.

Talking about her childhood, who would have ever thought that she had wished to be an art painter when she was a child? This might be because she grew up with her siblings who were good at art and painting. Nevertheless, it seems that her sense of art has grown inside her soul as well.  Because of this skilfull artmanship, she has had numerous of telecommunication products that successfully conquered marketplace.

Sixteen-year wandering in Telecommunication Industries is not short way to go. She has experienced its adventure; ebbs, flows, tears, sweat and blood. She first entered Telco battle field when she joined marketing communication division, then couple years after until now she is in charge to lead corporate communication division. Then a question pops up on our mind, how can she stand on that field that long? She had a quite shocking answer, “The reason behind my decision to hang on in this field is because this industry is changing fast; there is always something new that needs to be developed. The most important thing of my job here is it keeps giving me turbulences, these enable me to fly higher, I learn how to manage the change and be innovative”. It was proven that her tenet has driven her to this prestigious position as the first corporate communication vice president of the second biggest Telco industry (that time).

Her value and passion manifested into one strength which empowers her to be always “on top” to give service of excellence in every call of duty she has to encounter. Cold and friendly faces of customers’ complaints in various media, cynical and critically probing questions of press in terms of policies issued by the company have become her beautiful challenges that produced fruitful achievement. Under her wings of leadership, PT XL Axiata is recently awarded 1st PR Media Relations Award and Summit 2016.

Though she works for a company that mostly men dominate the number, she feels so grateful for always on the position of where she can maximize her capability. “The only hardest struggle for me as corporate communications for XL Axiata instead of gender issue is that I have to learn many telecommunication terminologies”, she claimed.

Speaking about gender issue, curiosity perches on our mind of how her feminist plays big role on her career. Furthermore, Ms Turina who holds a master degree in Communications Management from University of Indonesia then explained that her womanship helps her to broaden her understanding in solving and reaching target. “I always scratch everything from zero, I feel that my feminist allows me to see everything on many frames, I understand more customer by putting myself on their shoes, I am a person with high flexibility, I can mix artistic, ethic, and esthetic in producing something” she said. Of Course, as we can see now, XL Future Leaders Program has run well and molded grandeur by her graceful hands.

Her success story will not end by her many of her achievements now. She is now working on her other dream, her “healthy food” business, and expecting to kick the market harder. Last but not least, she expects that that there will be more appreciation for corporate communications role, that is demonstrated with more companies placing more VPs and even Corporate Communication Directorate.

Words By Cippy R