Westports Management Development Lecture Series

Bismillahirrahmanirrahim

Assalamualaikum wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh

Salam Sejahtera

dan Salam 1Malaysia

YBhg Tan Sri Datuk G. Gnanalingam, Chairman of Westports,

Members of Westports Management Team,

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Last week, there was a bombing in the Indian city of Hyderabad. It killed 17 and wounded about 70 people. Within hours, it emerged, that some knowledge on the potential for this blast to happen was already known in some intelligence circles! Rightly, many were enraged. It was reported, that there was an increasing amount of chatter on the imminent attack, that Hyderabad was identified as one of the potential cities in these chatters, and that the specific area called Dilsukh Nagar was previously mentioned in one interrogation of a captured militant. Despite all these, the bombing happened. The debate now is not necessarily about whether it could have been prevented. But, could more have been done? Could a better leadership ensured more active and timely intelligence sharing, a better coordination between various agencies? A higher level of trust between leaders of the various departments would have cascaded down and encouraged a more free-flowing intelligence culture. But that was not the case. To add salt to the injury, authorities discovered that wires of the CCTV cameras installed in and around Dilsukh Nagar had been disconnected four days before the bombing and no action was taken. Valuable footages of the blast have been lost. Was someone responsible for monitoring the CCTVs? There must be. Did he not report it? If he did, why was no action taken? A key lesson here is: never underestimate the weight of our roles. A seemingly inconsequential role like fixing a CCTV could in fact have saved lives. At the least, help catch the perpetrators. Leadership is not defined by the position we occupy, but in the consequences of the actions we take. If someone had actively sought complaints from public for faulty lights and CCTVs and quickly ensured the faults are fixed, he would have demonstrated true leadership. His actions could have become instrumental in catching the perpetrators. Some food for thought!

Ladies and Gentlemen,

2.      It gives me great pleasure to be with you this morning, in an organisation that stands tall among its peers as a world class service provider, and a proud Malaysian flag bearer in this highly competitive industry. I must thank Tan Sri G and the Management team for inviting me to speak in this Management Development Lecture Series.

3.      I was asked to speak about leadership from the context of my experience in the Civil Service for over 38 years. I wonder what can I, who only knows Public Service and nothing else, say to the Private Sector. After all, it is said that the Public Sector has no competition and the public has no choice but to be served, or not be served, as Public Service is imposed upon them! I strongly believe that Public and Private sectors play a complementing role towards one higher calling for our Nation. Both work towards increasing Malaysia’s economic and social well-being by elevating our country’s competitiveness in the global economy. The way to achieve that is to provide the highest level of customer satisfaction. I put it to you that the performance expectations are the same, be it Public or Corporate sector. The Public sector has competition.

4.      Internally, there is performance based system with KPIs and the works. If one doesn’t perform, he or she will be replaced by someone else who can perform. There is a ‘Lembaga Naik Pangkat DAN Turun Pangkat’. At least that is what I like to believe. Externally, there are many countries, developing and developed, both at our doorstep and everywhere else. They are competing for the same FDI and talent that we target. If our public service doesn’t live up to the expectation, doesn’t make doing business in Malaysia easier, faster, more efficient and more cost effective, the FDI and talent will go to our competitors. To reiterate, the public sector and the public servants must deliver the highest level of service to stay ahead of their competition.

5.      I would like, in the remaining time, to discuss about qualities of a leader, qualities of the work a leader must produce for a world-class outcome.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Ten Commandments

6.      Much has been researched and written on the topic of leadership. Countless books. Even more articles. And not all of them necessarily describe leadership the same way. Or how to recognise an excellent leader. A list of great leaders will include names as diverse as prophets, dictators, elected presidents, philanthropist and even artists. Any discourse on leadership should not be about defining leadership or having a consistent list of characteristics. Today’s session is definitely not about defining leadership. What I will share is my observation of what worked, and what I believe will work for others too. The application and context might be different, but the principles are universal. It is not to be memorised or documented. It is meant to stimulate. More than that, I trust it has to be acculturated by the organisation. By our country.

7.      There are 10 qualities which I hold dearly. These are about responding to our basic expectations. Hence, they are expected by our customers, our colleagues, our superiors. Call it the Ten Commandments if you like.

Integrity

8.      First and foremost, is integrity.  Integrity is not just about avoiding corruption. That is but one small aspect. It’s beyond that. It is about honesty and trust. The position we hold in the company is a trust, an amanah entrusted upon us. We must be honest with how we spend our time at work. Objective in making our decisions. Fair and firm in managing our teams. Integrity must be the core of our being. It must be the foundational value of our personality, from where our thoughts, words and actions originate.  And it is absolute, there are no degrees of integrity. A CBT is a CBT.  Be it five Ringgit or five million Ringgit. A CBT is a CBT.

9.      I would disagree with the notion that, when in place, integrity is at the expense of efficiency. Instilling objectivity and fairness into a process should not make the process any longer. In fact, the longer the process, the more the room for corruption to creep in. If an approval takes too long, there will be people wanting to shorten the process, by inducing corruption. However, if the process is already efficient, no matter how much money is offered no one could possibly make the process any shorter. When there is no room for ‘short-cut’, there will be no opportunity for corruption.

Sense of Urgency

10.   Second is a sense of urgency. It is about managing a critical, finite and the most precious of resources, time. We spend a lot of effort in planning, budgeting and executing financial goals. How about doing the same for time? While a 100 million Ringgit budget is defined down to the last sen, not many of us budget our 24 hours to such detail. It’s ironic that an infinite resource such as money gets so much attention, but not a finite resource like time.

11.   Once we accept and internalise this simple principle of time constraint, a sense of urgency will naturally start to define our daily life. It is not about rushing decisions. Or racing through life to the extent we don’t stop to smell the flowers. It is not that. It is about being responsive.

12.   Every email, letter and query should be treated as urgent. The fact it is in our inbox or in-tray means someone is awaiting our response to move on with their job. Open it up, give due consideration and respond, fast.  If it can be done today, do it today. If it is a request for approval, and if we are not going to approve it, the least we could do is to have the courtesy to let them know that quickly. And why? They can move on with alternative options. As Collin Powell said, “bad news is not wine, it doesn’t improve with age”. And if the request will be approved, why not deliver the good news fast? Any delay in responding means we are delaying someone else’s output. We are delaying them in reaching their goal. We are delaying our organisation in meeting its Vision. Leaders should galvanise the organisation in marching towards the vision, not delay it.

13.   One note on sense of urgency. For action to be taken swiftly, we need a deadline. And the name of the person who is going to act. From experience, I will say this is a cardinal rule. Give an ‘unreasonable’ deadline and have the person responsible for taking action.

Client focus

14.   Third is client focus. By this I do not mean just the customer across the counter. It includes our subordinates, superiors, colleagues. Everyone we deal with. “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you”. We need to always look for opportunities to facilitate all aspects of our client interaction. Make our dealings and processes simple, transparent and fair. We must be able to empathise with our clients, to say, “I understand where you are coming from. Let’s hear how you would like it to be resolved.” Not just say it, but we must mean it. Feel it. If that customer was my father, how would I wish for him to be assisted? If that subordinate was my son, how would I wish for his superior to assist him? Because, that customer is someone’s father. That officer is someone’s son. “Do unto others as you would have others do unto you”. Better still, do better than others do unto you!

Collaboration and Cooperation

15.   The fourth is collaboration and cooperation. This means eliminating silo and promoting a culture of sharing. By sheer structural necessity in an organisation, senior members are blessed with a bigger picture of the organisation than the subordinates. But this bigger picture, and the wealth of information that comes with it, is not for hoarding. The maxim “Information is Power” is only true when the information is acted upon. If it is kept hidden as supposed power, it is useless. Today, knowledge expands at the light of speed. Yesterday’s information is not only history, but in many cases, it is obsolete. So the information we keep is just a repository of obsolete junk. But when shared, information takes a trajectory of its own. At best, someone can act on it to give us competitive edge. At worst, misleading or false information can be debunked and thrown away. The problem is ‘personal glory’. Information hoarding happens because some worry about who will claim credit for the outcome. But this goes back to Integrity. Do we do it for personal glory, or because we are entrusted with the common good of the organisation?

16.   As leaders are blessed with the bigger picture and information, it’s our responsibility to share it with others. Help others to climb the trees, get to the vantage point and see the forest. To see the benefits of collaborating, cooperating and sharing. Not only that. From this vantage point, we must also show others the folly of silo mentality and hoarding. How our competitors are marching forward into our territory, while we are busy dissecting our shrinking pie. Eleven talented players and a coach can’t win a game, we need a Team to win. The message is: disseminate, collaborate, cooperate.

Innovation and Creativity

17.   The fifth is innovation and creativity. Here I would like to share a NASA story. In the mid-1990s, the Mars Pathfinder team at Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California had to respond to the new NASA mandate of “faster, better, cheaper”. The challenge was to create a rover that could efficiently return with new engineering and scientific data on Mars, and do it for less than 10% of a typical space mission cost. It was a seemingly impossible task requiring a “change everything” approach. The results were, of course, spectacular. The entire project, from concept to touchdown, was completed in 44 months – less than half the time of the previous Viking mission to Mars – with significantly fewer team members, and on budget. And it resulted in many innovations, including the use of deployable airbags as the landing method. Innovation and creativity is not necessarily about big budget, grand ideas. Sometimes, it may just require us to challenge the status-quo, discard pre-conceived ideas and ask tough, uncomfortable questions. This of course requires a culture that encourages questioning and of challenging the status-quo. In the Malaysian Civil Service which I had the privilege to serve, I aspired for that culture to be embedded in the service.

18.   Another good example of innovative and creative approach is the Blue Ocean Strategy. I was involved in Malaysia’s National Blue Ocean Strategy as the then Chief Secretary to the Government. One of its biggest achievements is in bringing together two agencies to collaborate more closely. I am talking about the Royal Malaysian Police and the Military. They now train at each other’s facilities, march together at the Merdeka Parade, do joint patrols at KLIA and elsewhere and host joint Open Houses, among others.

19.   Initially, they were seen as two separate entities with their own roles and goals. The change came when some hard questions were asked. “Are we not part of the same big picture, maintaining security of the nation?” “Can’t we jointly optimise our resources?”

20.   Innovation and creativity is risky business. Without innovation, we risk relegating our organisations into the annals of corporate history. Anyone remembers Kodak? Motorola? Unbridled attempts at innovation, on the other hand, also risks burning a hole in our pockets. As leaders, we need to encourage and nurture creativity. Take calculated risk and celebrate the breakthroughs. The likes of Google, Apple and Amazon have a key learning to share –  innovation doesn’t just happen. It has to be actively encouraged. Thinking outside the box is not enough. We need to encourage acting outside the box. Failures happen, but systems should be in place to contain the damage. And when it succeeds; praise, celebrate and share the rewards.

Engagement

21.   The sixth is engagement. Today’s session is an engagement. I am very happy that Westports Management gave me this opportunity to engage with you. It also shows that the company believes in the value of engaging. Not just internally but also externally. To hear alternative views, maybe fresh ideas on old issues. Or a refresher on old ideas. Engagement is a two-way street. Speaking and listening. The days of management-knows-best are over. Now knowledge and intelligence travels in all directions; up, down, everywhere. Leaders need to make these channels flow, keep their ears close to the ground.

22.   Some may ask, “How can we keep our ears close to the ground in large organisations? We can’t be everywhere.” Actually we can be everywhere. By encouraging the channels to keep flowing. Providing opportunity for all to engage. When I made my email address as KSN available to all on the website, I started to get more information than I could ever get if I were to employ 1000 more staff. Our colleagues, our customers out there are bursting with ideas and suggestions. We just need to give them a secure, convenient and reassuring channel to be engaged.

Feedback and feedforward

23.   The seventh is Feedback and Feedforward. We are all familiar with feedback. It is based on the premise that our past behaviour will be ingrained in our memory and therefore this memory needs to be tampered with by reinforcing the good and eliminating the bad. Feedback reminds us what went well and what didn’t  A positive feedback tells us how well we managed a past event. An event that may not be repeated in the future, in which case, the feedback is academic. Similarly, a negative feedback tells us what we did wrong. Again, this could be academic if it was a one-off event. Add to that, as humans, we are averse to negative views of ourselves. Denial and rejection gets in the way of useful learning from a feedback. While feedback may offer some benefits, we can do better. This is where Feedforward comes in, a term coined by Marshall Goldsmith.

24.   Feedforward requires us to choose an area that we want to change, and seek ideas from others on how we could achieve the change. This allows us to learn positive habits of others. What worked for them in managing their own challenges. We need to do it for ourselves. Equally important, we need to do it for our colleagues. As the process becomes embedded in our organisation, there will be collective learning and collective reinforcement of positive behaviours. At the heart of it, feedforward is about helping each other, in a positive environment, to tackle future challenges.  This is not unlike mentoring, but with a very specific improvement goal and a targeted mentor known to excel in the specific area. For it to be of any value, this must be done every time. All the time. Immediate compliments. Immediate guidance and mentoring. Where necessary, immediate reprimand.

Hunger for Knowledge

25.   The eighth is hunger for knowledge and self-improvement. I have not come across a leader who has stopped seeking knowledge, who doesn’t enjoy the company of a good book. We must keep our network and thinking updated. Our competitive environment is constantly evolving. So do our challenges. Yesterday’s solutions will not necessarily solve today’s challenges. Leadership, in essence, is problem solving. Breaking the problems down to manageable pieces, assigning people and guiding the solution. But how can we guide the solution with 19^th century thinking? We need 22^nd century thinking. I can assure you that Generation Y that is joining the workforce comes pre-installed with 21^st century thinking. Will they come to us for leadership if our knowledge and thinking is lagging them? To lead, we need to stay ahead. As Collin Powell said, “The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership.” The reality is, many leaders have been lulled into believing that when problems stopped coming to them, there were no more problems. The world is too dynamic and the competition is too smart for problems not to exist. The question is, “Are the problems brought to us?” If we keep our hunger for knowledge, keep ourselves updated and relevant, our leadership will be called upon to solve them. If we keep to our Windows 98, we’ll be ignored. Become irrelevant.

Trust

26.   The ninth is Trust. Trust must work both ways. We must have trust in our leaders and followers. Similarly, our actions need to be worthy of earning their trust. But trust doesn’t just happen. It is not a leap of faith. A 2009 survey called ‘Trust in Business’ says there are three factors that will influence our trust in our colleagues; (1) past behaviour, (2) capability and (3) alignment. The first is obvious. If someone has acted as promised in the past, we will trust them to deliver in the future. Second, capability, is linked to the earlier point on hunger for knowledge, skills and capability. We will not trust an optometrist with our heart problems. We will not trust a colleague using Windows 98 to teach us how to use the iPad. The third is an interesting one. It says previously demonstrated performance and paper qualifications are not enough. We must believe that, right now, we have a shared purpose. That there are no ulterior motives and alternate arrangements at play.  How will we know that? If someone constantly engages us and seeks our input in decisions, seeks our collaboration, and shows interest in our improvement by giving feedback and feedforward, there is a very high likelihood that we will feel connected. Aligned.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

27.   We have looked at nine qualities so far. Integrity was the first. It is the basic foundation deep inside us. It is not tangible, but it will manifest itself when others feel our sincerity in acting on the next seven qualities; (2) sense of urgency, (3) client focus, (4) collaboration and cooperation, (5) creativity and innovation, (6) engagement, (7) feedback and feedforward, and (8) hunger for knowledge. The ninth quality, trust, is mostly a consequence of the first eight. It is also the most critical of all.  Without trust, displaying some of the eight other qualities will not make us effective leaders. Good managers, maybe.

Completeness

28.   We now come to the tenth quality, completeness. A list of leadership qualities is never meant for ‘pick-and-choose.’ To be an effective leader, we need complete qualities. We have looked at nine earlier. There may be other qualities we discover over time. We need to emulate that too. As said earlier, the definition of leadership and the number of qualities don’t matter. The outcome does. If we discover a quality that can make a difference, and we lack that quality, we should equip ourselves with that. If leadership is a journey, then ‘completeness’ is the fuel that will keep us going. To actively seek new qualities along the way. It is the desire to be a better leader tomorrow than we were yesterday. By applying every good quality.

29.   The importance of ‘completeness’ should not be underestimated. We are creatures of habit. We get comfortable acting in a certain way. And tend to avoid uncomfortable areas. ‘Completeness’ helps us avoid this trap of retreating to the familiar ground. We may have leaders with impeccable integrity and all other qualities, but uncomfortable with engagement sessions. A safe option will be to delegate the engagement role to someone else. Such actions will not go unnoticed. If others see us side-stepping such a challenge, will we have credibility in asking them to tackle challenges head-on? I doubt it. The message is, we need to actively expand our comfort zone.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Role of Private Sector

30.   At the beginning of this session, I mentioned that Public and Private sectors play a complementing role towards one higher calling. That we work towards increasing Malaysia’s competitiveness in the global economy. This must be the purpose of leadership. The purpose of leadership starts at leading the department. The higher purpose is in achieving the Organisation’s goals and vision. The highest purpose of leadership is beyond an organisation. It’s for the greater good of the nation. At department level, we lead productivity. This will have a chain-reaction. From a productive department to a competitive company to a competitive country. A competitive country, can then improve the well-being of its people. The link between a company’s competitiveness and the country’s cannot be more obvious than in the case of Westports and an export-oriented country like Malaysia. It is this line of sight that gives purpose to leadership. To leaders. To all of us.

31.   On that note, I wish us all the best in becoming a better leader tomorrow than we are today. Every day.

Wabillahitaufiq wal hidayah, wassalamu’alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh.