Donald is an educator, researcher, nature lover, and Malaysian. He has been an educator and a leader in education for over 20 years. Donald has held senior leadership positions at several institutions of higher learning, including Monash University. He has presented at local and international conferences and seminars, as well as conducted training sessions and workshops on institutional and programme accreditation, internal and external audits, course and programme reviews, continuous quality improvement, governance of academic staff and academic programme, educational change and leadership, policy development and management, quality assurance, and anti-bribery and corruption measures.

Donald has made contributions at both national and international levels, including the development and refinement of the SETARA (Malaysian rating system for universities and university colleges) instrument, the second iteration of the Malaysian Qualifications Framework (MQF), the harmonisation of the MQF with the Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF), the alignment of the Malaysian Qualifications Agency (MQA) with the Australian Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA), and the promotion of good practices in higher education quality assurance through MyQAN (Society for Malaysian Higher Educational Institutions Quality Assurance Network). Additionally, he has contributed new policy ideas for education and TVET reforms through the Ayuh Malaysia platform, led by the Honourable Minister of Economy, YB Rafizi Ramli, and YB Nurul Izzah Anwar.

As a proponent of lifelong education, Donald is currently a part-time PhD candidate in Education at HELP University. He is researching the predictive and mediative effects of emotional intelligence and resilience on successful leadership within private universities in the Klang Valley. He earned an MBA with Distinction from Nottingham Trent University in the UK, where his thesis on the determinants of competitive strategy in related diversification companies within a Malaysian conglomerate has become a reference for other MBA candidates. In 2009, he received the NTU Vice Chancellor’s Award for the Best MBA Student.

In 2017, Donald was selected by Monash University to participate in the Premier Business Management programme at Harvard Business School. His tertiary and professional studies have been in marketing and management.