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OUR GEOGRAPHY, OUR HISTORY, AND GIC

On my recent quick trip to the United States, I had the opportunity and privilege to meet Singaporeans in San Francisco and speak about Singapore’s Financial Reserves and GIC. I had given much the same talk in the past to Singaporeans in Shanghai, New York, and London. There is no escaping knowing them to be Singaporeans once they begin to speak: It is the expressions and the welcome of home. All the Singaporeans invariably think of home, not just their memories of their childhood but their hopes for Singapore to be a great place – the best place – for Singaporeans. Singapore is a point of honour for them, an idea to defend, a home to protect, and a future to secure.

To understand why financial reserves are so important to Singapore, we need to understand geography and history. Less than 20 years ago, a foreign leader referred to Singapore as the Little Red Dot, a point Singaporeans should not be forgetting. If we look at a map of the world, Singapore fits into the letter “o” in its name, unlike many countries whose names fit nicely into their geographical boundaries on the map. And unlike some other small states, we have no natural resources. We are a little dot among states with large land areas and large populations. While Singaporeans may not like to be reminded of this, it nonetheless holds true that “no one owes us a living” and “no one else is responsible for our security.”

And to understand more deeply the need for large financial reserves, we need to remember history. Not everyone learnt history in school, and many who did stopped learning Singapore history in Secondary Four, if not earlier in Secondary Two. While there is the annual reminder on National Day of Singapore’s independence and sovereignty, what an adventurous and risky course Singapore took to “leapfrog” the immediate neighbourhood to link up to the whole world as our economic hinterland is often unspoken, perhaps little understood or even unknown by many Singaporeans.

The point about history is not to hold us back and hold us to the past – it is to give us context for what we need to do to make Singapore a great place for Singaporeans. We cannot escape our geography, but we can make good use of history to create a worthy future for ourselves and our families. It is a whole tapestry about Konfrantasi, water, sand, granite, and food.

When we know our history, we can be clearer about requiring our children to grow up with the capacity for thought, enterprise, and self-confidence to make a Singapore for their time. In addition, we will understand why business in Singapore needs to have its unique capacity for competing on the world stage founded on values of integrity, quality, reliability, imagination, responsiveness, and an unending drive for excellence.

I explained GIC as the fund manager for Singapore’s financial reserves, with the task of preserving and enhancing the value of the reserves, and of helping to contribute towards the government budget each year. The government is allowed to use up to 50 percent of the Net Investment Returns, calculated on the basis of expected long-term real returns multiplied by the net assets (that is, after deducting the liabilities like the special government securities that have been issued to the Central Provident Fund Board). For the next Financial Year, the government is taking into the expenditure budget a sum of $8.1 billion from the Net Investment Returns, which amounts to two percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

GIC ranks among the large sovereign wealth funds in the world with well over USD100 billion under the management of GIC. It invests in a whole slew of asset classes – equities, debt, real estate – in both the public and private markets, and in both developed and emerging markets across the world. It is headquartered in Singapore with eight overseas offices in Beijing, London, Mumbai, New York, San Francisco, Seoul, Shanghai, and Tokyo. A ninth office is also about to open in Sao Paolo.

An important question is how much of foreign reserves is enough. Obviously, the greater the needs and the more Singapore buys from the world, the larger the foreign reserves need to be. Thus an appropriate balance needs to be struck between spending on the current generation and keeping resources for future generations. The way this is done at present is the Singapore Constitution allowing the government to use up to 50 percent of the long-term real returns for ongoing expenditure, with the rest retained for continuing investment for the benefit of future generations.

Geography and history dictate the wisdom of Singapore maintaining a significant level of financial reserves in order to assure the peace, security, stability, sovereignty, and independence of Singapore.

For GIC to do its job well, we need a continuing flow of talent to perform the investment functions with skill and competence, and also to support the investment operations with efficiency and effectiveness. To this end, GIC offers about five scholarships each year for undergraduate studies anywhere in the world, and also runs an annual GIC Professionals Programme for up to 20 new who have just graduated from university or who have worked for up to 3 years after graduation.

In addition, GIC offers internships for large numbers of undergraduates each year so that they may get familiar with what GIC is about and can then decide whether they wish to consider a career in GIC.

More information is available on the GIC website: www.gic.com.sg. Enquiries from students and parents on the GIC Undergraduate Scholarships, GIC Professional Programme and GIC internships are always welcome: http://www.gic.com.sg/en/contact-us

19th March 2014 by Joanne

GET ENOUGH OXYGEN!

I just read a book “Loving Our Kids on Purpose – Making a heart-to-heart connection” by Danny Silk. The book makes many good points about raising children. I thought it would be useful, particularly for those with children of any age or those hoping to have children, to quote just a small selection from its pages.

“Taking good care of our children begins with learning to take care of ourselves. This is what we learn every time we get on an airplane. When flight attendants go through their spiel, they are explaining what to do if there’s a drop in cabin pressure: Put your oxygen mask on first and then help your kids and neighbours get theirs on. If you don’t take care of yourself, you won’t last long trying to take care of another person. You have to have a high value for taking good care of you! Somewhere along the road, somebody taught us that a worn-out, burnt-out, frustrated, bitter parent is a good one. Somehow that’s holy and noble. Actually, it’s a sign that you’re not getting enough oxygen.

“In order to take care of ourselves, we need to learn how to set up healthy boundaries with our children. We need to put a fence around our yard, complete with a gate.

“Passive parents have no fence around their gardens because the passive relational style says, ‘Your needs matter; mine don’t.’ Often, these parents struggle to get a respectful response form their children because they’ve done a good job communicating to their kids that they do not respect themselves. Their own needs are not important to them, so why would the children value what their parents need in the relationship?

“There are also parents who are more aggressive and teach their kids that it’s the children’s job to keep a safe distance from them. They have an electric fence around their garden. Get too close and you’ll get zapped.Their aggressive style says, ‘My needs matter; yours don’t.’

“But neither of these styles is what we want to teach our children because in both cases, someone is being disrespectful. We want them to learn that in a healthy, respectful relationship, the needs of both of us matter.

“Another key to setting healthy boundaries is telling those around you what you will be doing instead of trying to get others to do something for you. As parents, it is easy to get into the routine of barking out commands. ‘Pick that up! Come here. Stop being so noisy. Be nice to your brother!’ Our homes are filled with the illusionary practice of controlling each other. But since we no longer believe in that hocus pocus, what then shall we do? Begin telling others what you will do instead. Practise being powerful by controlling something you do control, namely, yourself. Say things like, ‘I will listen to you when your voice is as soft as mine. Take your time.’ Or, ‘I will manage your fight with your brother, just like a referee. Only I charge ten dollars each for each fight I referee. Ready? Go!’ When we make these statements, we have the ability to enforce what we say is important to us, and it doesn’t require other people to give us control over them. We simply control what we can control.”

It seems to me the idea of simply controlling what we can control can be applied to many more situations at work and at home than how to deal with quarrelling children. Other-centredness does not mean simply giving in to others. Other-centredness is fundamentally about mutual respect.

7th March 2014 by Joanne

WHAT IS CHEWING GUM?

My 5-year old granddaughter asked me, “What is chewing gum?” She had picked up the word “chewing gum” from a book.

How am I to answer the question? I could show her pictures. I could describe to her what it is like. But the most basic point is that chewing gum is the experience? How could I adequately teach her what chewing gum is without including the most important point, which is the experience of chewing gum? But chewing gum has been banned in Singapore for more than a decade because of the public nuisance it was causing with irresponsible people putting the gum on seats, throwing them on the floor, and even disrupting train services when the doors could not shut properly when gum was inconsiderately placed between the train doors.

Thinking about this made me think about trying to bring about change in organisations. Often there is resistance to the change because people consider it unnecessary, inappropriate, or impossible to achieve. Most often it is due to an inability to visualize the benefits of the change. We can imagine what we would lose much better than we can imagine what we would gain. The benefit of change is about a new better experience. But how do we explain the experience when the change has not been done? Much too much energy is wasted arguing about the unsuitability or impossibility of a change, instead of getting on with the change, and then evaluating the worthiness of the change through actual experience. Companies that entertain such argument for too long can never be winners or leaders.

As pointed out in the book THE LEADER, THE TEACHER & YOU, Change is a matter of Leadership and the role of Leadership is Change. Leadership us about making (good) things happen that on their own would not happen. Organizations should adopt a “learning by doing” approach. Make progress by trying rather than arguing.

Of course change is a challenge. Machiavelli said about change and innovation: “And let it be noted that there is no more delicate matter to take in hand, nor more dangerous to conduct, nor more doubtful of success, than to set up as a leader in the introduction of changes. For he who innovates will have as his enemies all those who are well off under the existing order of things, and only lukewarm supporters in those who might be better off under the new. This lukewarm temper arises partly from the fear of adversaries who have the laws on their side and partly from the incredulity of mankind, who will never admit the merit of anything new until they have seen it proved by the event.”

On the other hand, the late Dr Goh Keng Swee, once First Deputy Prime Minister of Singapore, has said, “The only way to avoid making mistakes is not to do anything. And that, in the final analysis, will be the ultimate mistake.”

The only way to really know what chewing gum is all about is to chew gum, just like the only way to really know what change is all about is to change!

3rd March 2014 by Joanne

STARS

have been speaking on global leadership at the stars Singapore Symposium. I had spoken three times previously on leadership at stars Symposiums, twice at the quaint medieval city of Stein am Rhein in Switzerland, and once in the seaside Chinese city of Penglai in Shandong province. The Symposium was held for the first time in Singapore over the period 16 to 19 February 2014.

The stars Symposium is positioned as the leadership development “Symposium for Leaders of the Next Generation.” I was attracted to it because I think it is an extremely smart idea, and since it is managed by a Swiss foundation – the stars Foundation – I expect it to be of high quality and reliability.

Many programmes around the world are run for people who have already reached senior levels in companies and organisations; but stars Symposiums are organised for participants who are up-and-coming – they are nominated by chairmen and CEOs of their organisations because of their superior performance and high potential.

I find the stars not only exciting for its content, but also for its very extensive global network of alumni comprising participants and speakers of the nine Symposiums that have been held thus far. Because I believe in the mission of the stars Foundation, I have agreed to serve on its International Board.

The Symposiums help to prepare the “Leaders of the Next Generation” by:

• Enhancing a better understanding of the economic, scientific, political, cultural, and social challenges that will impact businesses and organisations in the next 5-10 years,

• Broadening their horizons through interdisciplinary and intercultural dialogue with peers and global leaders from all fields, and

• Contributing to their personal development to drive responsible choices and sustainable actions.

The stars Symposiums have some very distinctive features. Each Symposium has about 100 international participants, aged 35-45 years old, mainly from Business but also from Science, Politics, Culture, NGOs, and Media. The programme is highly interactive, with an inspiring slate of speakers addressing the issues that would shape the evolving future, issues like demographics, technology, economics and politics. Its alumni of participants and speakers now total close to a 1000 from more than 75 countries. The annual Symposium at Stein am Rhein focuses on global challenges and trends, the one in Singapore focuses on global and Asia-specific developments and challenges, and the programme in China focuses on global and China-specific developments and challenges.

I believe the stars Symposiums represent an excellent opportunity for companies and organisations all over the world to expose their next generation leaders to big ideas for the future, as well as build up their global network of contacts. And Singapore with 37,400 international companies, including 3,200 from China, 4,400 from India, 7,900 from ASEAN (ex-Singapore) and more than 7,000 MNCs from developed countries (60% with HQ functions) would be a wonderful place for international companies to expand the horizons, perspectives, knowledge, and networks of their key staff through the stars Singapore Symposium.

You can find more information about stars here: http://www.the-stars.ch/

22nd February 2014 by Joanne

The Swiss Pilot

Davos, where I attended the World Economic Forum (WEF) at the end of January, is, of course in Switzerland. Switzerland is a beautiful country of snow and mountains, though I do not like the cold much. Driving me around was a wonderful Swiss who flies Lufthansa cargo planes but makes a point of taking leave every year during the WEF season to drive WEF participants around. So for a week he stops flying to New York and Atlanta, and instead drives between hotels and meeting places, because he finds it interesting to meet people and soak to some extent the excitement and busyness of Davos. I wonder if any Singaporean would see life in a similarly open, curious, and venturesome manner!

As we were driving to Zurich airport, I contemplated the inspiring scenery of the Alps and remarked that people have said “Switzerland is God’s country.” “How,” I asked, “could anyone see such rugged, powerful beauty, and yet believe there is no god?”

“Yes,” my driver said, “And he did a good job!”

We laughed, but how true: God does a good job!

I recall a meeting in Davos with a Swedish company. We observed how Sweden and Finland were so good in design and engineering: both countries are the home of SAAB, Ericsson, Ikea and Nokia, among other well-known international names. How did this come to be? Our Swedish friend said, simply, “Because we are Lutherans: we work hard.”

The reference to Lutherans is a reference to what is often called the “Protestant work ethic” that states: “work hard, save well, do a good job.” To me, it is a very interesting point, that the capacity and willingness to work hard defines the culture of a nation and paves the way for success.

Perhaps there is something about small countries, whether it be small land mass or small populations, that the sense of vulnerability and need for sovereign independence leads to enterprise and the spirit of drawing together, studying hard, and working hard.

Some closing observations on Switzerland. Almost every three months they have a referendum on something or other, where every Swiss citizen gets to vote on some national issue. Every so often they vote on whether to stop having national service: each time they have chosen to keep national service. And those who fail to perform their annual in-camp training of 21 days a year have to pay an extra tax amounting to three percent of their annual income – not a small sum! Such is the Swiss conviction that they themselves have to defend their land and their independence.

Even more interestingly, recently they had referendums on whether to lower the number of working hours a week to the mid-30s, and to increase the number of public holidays a year. Perhaps unsurprisingly for the Swiss but surprisingly for the rest of the world, they voted against both the changes! My Swiss pilot explained that both measures meant less work hours, so who is going to pay the extra taxes to make up for the loss in productivity?

The mentality of the Swiss is one that we would all do well to espouse…for ourselves, for our families, for our communities, and for our country’s sovereignty.

10th February 2014 by Joanne

The “Digical” Revolution: Sharings from the World Economic Forum

I was in Davos recently attending the World Economic Forum.

One session I attended addressed the “digical” revolution, as meaning changes taking place in the digital and physical worlds, and how they interact with each other.

A speaker said that to get a sense of tomorrow, he recently took his family to Disneyworld, where electronics and robots have been cleverly brought together for surprising entertainment. Yet the longest queue was not for the rides, but the kids lining up for a hug by a princess. The point is that human beings live in the dimension of the physical and emotional.

As a signboard at Davos prominently said, technology does not change the world – people do. What and how to use technology is our choice.

Another speaker spoke very thoughtfully about how innovation comes into our lives. He remarked that looking back at history, innovations that take root are where they replace “non-consumption” rather than “consumption“.

Take the example of the transistor. For a long time, engineers tried to re-engineer radios by trying to use transistors in place of valves. This did not succeed, whether it be for reason of novelty or reliability in the early days of the transistor. The transistor took hold as an innovation good for life when Sony introduced the transistor radio. Suddenly the teenagers could each carry around their own music, even though the sound quality was not that great in the early transistor radios – the important thing was it gave the youngsters mobility and independence. Improvements came later, and today valves hardly play a role in the life of any ordinary home. It was a case of a new innovation gaining acceptance by establishing a foothold in “non-consumption”, namely, consumers who never had radios, rather than by replacing valves for those who already had radios.

Another observation concerned electric cars. Huge efforts have been going into trying to directly replace the petrol-driven cars. Yet the most successful introduction had been with hybrid cars. No doubt, as the technology improved (especially with battery technology), newer models of cars would come about. On the other hand, like the transistor radio, if a consumer market could be found that required only short distance travelling and did not require cars to go at very high speeds, electric cars could be expected to “take off”. Is there such a potential market? Perhaps there is, if we think in terms of simply driving around in the immediate neighbourhoods rather than long distances with their demands of endurance and speed. Think about what is the most popular development in China today: motorised bicycles! Could we imagine the future as evolving from today’s motorised two-wheelers to three-wheelers and then the four-wheelers we call cars?

The speaker also mentioned how the steamships for cross-ocean travel came about. When the steam engine was first applied to ship propulsion, they were not found or perceived to be reliable enough for cross-ocean travel. So for many years the sailing ships held sway, while the steam engine became increasingly used for ships moving up and down rivers where issues of reliability were not so severe or life-threatening as land was always nearby. The steam engine was increasingly installed on cross-ocean ships as back-ups and auxiliary power for several decades, until engineering and technology caught up in terms of cost and reliability.

The point in these illustrations is that innovation has most succeeded where applications first induce or replace “non-consumption” rather than directly replace existing consumption.

Perhaps such an understanding also apply to organisational development, where the first changes are in “hybrid” mode rather than full replacement, and people get comfortable with change through an approach of “evolution in execution, revolution in results”…

1st February 2014 by Joanne

THE CONDUCTOR

I attended the Singapore Symphony Orchestra 35th Anniversary Concert recently. Conducting the SSO was Choo Huey, the founding Music Director and Resident Conductor of the SSO, appointments he held until 1996 when he became Conductor Emeritus of the SSO. He started the SSO with 41 musicians in 1979 and laid the foundations for today’s excellent orchestra with just about 100 musicians.

Choo Huey is 80 years old this year. I was amazed at the agility and vibrancy he displayed as he conducted through the evening. Conducting is hard work! We all should wish to be able to retain such energy in our old age.

Two thoughts struck me as I enjoyed the evening’s programme.

One was how the conductor’s “little stick” – his baton – could integrate a hundred musicians into beautiful music. I mentioned this in “The Leader, The Teacher & You”. There is a whole range of instruments in the orchestra. While each instrument makes its own sound, it is silly to say one is more important than the other. By joining the sounds together, we get wonderful music. Take out any of the instruments, and the orchestra loses something in its music.

There is the conductor. He is the one who brings the instruments together so that every musician plays his part well. The orchestra needs him even though he does not play anything during the performance other than wave his baton. Every player is an expert with regards to his instrument. But he has to pay attention to the conductor, to see and hear what other members of the orchestra are doing, and to blend his instrument into the total effort.

In similar fashion, we should see our work in the office as though we are players in an orchestra. Each of us must know what we are doing. We must have the skills, expertise, and knowledge, and we must be prepared to keep learning and improving our abilities. At the same time we must know what others are doing, so that we can blend our work with theirs to produce first-class total results. We must respect others for their abilities

The second thought was recollection of an observation by a Professor of Music from Hong Kong, a relative of mine, who said that it is not necessarily a good idea for children to start learning music on the piano. The piano is a “solo” instrument. He said it would be much better to start children with an orchestral instrument, like the violin. Because the child would not only learn music, but also develop awareness of his surroundings, as he has to integrate his work into that of the rest of his orchestra. And if not the violin, then even starting on the recorder is better than starting on the piano. This sensitivity to others and consciousness of what is happening around us is critical not just to music, but to life. It makes for harmony in diversity, other-consciousness in the midst of individual effort.

27th January 2014 by Joanne

CHEATING THE TAXI DRIVER

My taxi driver friend was lamenting about passengers cheating taxi drivers. He quoted passengers reaching their destination, saying they did not have enough money to pay the fare, and asking the taxi driver to wait while they went on to get the money to pay, but never turning up again. But he was especially grieved about being cheated by a primary school kid, grieved for the boy, not for himself. The boy had hopped into his taxi and asked, so politely, “Uncle, do you take payment by cash card?” as meaning, whether he could accept payment for the fare by use of an electronic bank-issued card.

The taxi driver replied, “Certainly.”

He took the boy to his destination, whereupon the boy offered him his cash card for payment. On swiping the card into the card reader, the taxi driver exclaimed, “There is no cash credit left in the card.”

The boy responded, “I only asked you whether you took payment by cash card; I did not say my card had money.”

Oh my! What are kids coming to these days? They are boldly smart? What happened to honour and honesty?

This incident reminded me of the late Dr Goh Keng Swee, who was once Singapore’s First Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education. Chapter 6 of The book “The Leader, The Teacher & You” (http://www.TheLeaderTheTeacher.com) quotes Dr Goh saying in January 1982 that “when he was in charge of the army, he noticed that one common occurrence in battalion camps (of the Singapore Armed Forces) was that if you left your wallet or watch unattended for more than ten seconds, it disappeared. ‘So,’ he continued, ‘one day I told the Prime Minister that the schools are turning out a nation of thieves and that something must be done about this in our education system.’”

Summing up his views on introducing religious education in schools, Dr Goh said, “The aims of this exercise are modest. We don’t believe we’re going to make all Singaporeans upright. Every society has its black sheep. But at least when they’ve gone through a course on religious knowledge, most of them will leave school believing it’s wrong to lie, cheat, and steal. Many now do not.”

The policy of compulsory religious education in upper secondary school, however, did not last. It was reversed after six years out of concern that “it is essential for Government to be seen to be scrupulously neutral and even-handed in the handling of religious maters in Singapore.”

The responsibility for the teaching of religious beliefs remains that of parents and families. The home has the primary role for teaching children the difference between good and evil, right and wrong. “Train a child in the way he should go,” says the Book of Proverbs in the Bible, “and when he is old he will not turn from it.”

17th January 2014 by Joanne

GROWING IN MUMMY’S HEART

I came across this story of kids in first year of primary school discussing a picture of a family. A little boy in the picture had a different hair colour than the others in the family. One of the kids said that he was probably adopted. His classmate, a little girl, declared, ‘I know all about adoption, I was adopted.’

“What does it mean to be adopted?” asked another child.

“It means”, said the little girl, “that you grew in your mummy’s heart instead of her tummy!”

What a wonderful story! We immediately understand what the little girl was saying. Our hearts define who we are, not our minds. As human beings, each with our own thoughts and feelings, what we seek above all else are relationships of love and trust, where we can feel safe to be ourselves and grow to be what we can be.

I am sure many of us would have heard of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, where Abraham Maslow in his 1943 paper “A Theory of Human Motivation,” hypothesized that the needs of human beings lie in a hierarchy where once one level of needs is met, the next higher level of needs gains prominence. Maslow identified five levels of needs:

Biological and Physiological Needs (e.g. food, air, water, shelter)
Safety Needs (e.g. security, stability, law and order)
Love Needs (e.g. family, friends, a sense of belonging)
Esteem Needs (e.g. status, reputation, achievement)
Self-Actualisation Needs (e.g. the realisation of one’s potential)

Not everyone agrees with Maslow’s thesis, though most of the argument has been about whether the various needs actually fall in a hierarchy, or are in fact present all the time though in varying degrees for people in different circumstances or situations. However, it is interesting to note that further research in this field concludes that human beings also have:

Cognitive Needs (e.g. understanding)
Aesthetic Needs (e.g. beauty, balance)
Transcendence Needs (i.e. helping others realise their potential)

Placed in order, the eight needs then stack up as:

Biological and Physiological Needs
Safety Needs
Love Needs
Esteem Needs
Cognitive Needs
Aesthetic Needs
Self-Actualisation Needs
Transcendence Needs

It is interesting that the highest need of all is the need to contribute good to other people’s lives. May we all experience for ourselves this highest need for our hearts, to do unto others as we would have them do unto us, to love our neighbours as ourselves.

10th January 2014 by Joanne

As we move into a new year…

I hope with these comments to start a weekly blog, sharing my observations on life and leadership.

As we move into a new year, I wish that God will prosper everyone in the desires of their heart, the imaginations of their mind, and the works of their hand. May we live lives of honour, where we seek always to do what is good and right, and where our family, friends and colleagues will know us as people of our word – men and women of integrity – and see us as responsible, trustworthy, committed and reliable.

The year past would have had its ups and downs, times of success and failure, happiness and disappointment. The new year gives us renewed hope, and an opportunity to try new things, enjoy new experiences, build new relationships, and look to the future with hope and a new spirit. In looking for success in our lives, may we also find meaning, purpose and happiness in helping others find success in their lives.,

As we move from 2013 to 2014, I am reminded of a poem by Marie Louise Haskins. The poem is “God Knows”, though it is more popularly known as “The Gate of the Year.” Its most famous extract reads:

“And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year: ‘Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.’

And he replied:

‘Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God. That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way.’”

These have been words of comfort, assurance and inspiration for many people. I hope it will be for you too.

3rd January 2014 by Joanne

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