165 C-level executives across nine Asian markets reveal key attributes of leadership success in their regions
A study by The Human Capital Leadership Institute (HCLI), Singapore’s national centre of excellence, in partnership with Tata Communications, a leading provider of A New World of Communications™, reveals interesting nuances of Asian leadership on the back of in-depth conversation with 165 C-level executives across nine countries in Asia. ‘Leadership Mosaics Across Asia’ is an in-depth study that surfaces insights into the similarities and differences in leadership characteristics across the continent giving a detailed orientation into its organizational cultures and providing leadership lessons.
Singapore’s business leaders are forward planners, driven by data and processes while their Indian counterparts succeed on quick improvisations and emotional connections with their people. Confucianism forms the cultural core of many Chinese senior business leaders. As a result, they lean towards a hierarchical leadership style. Yet, similar to trends across many markets in Asia, there must be a turn towards participative decision-making and empowerment.
Such unique insights give global businesses an in-depth understanding of succeeding in the region. Aside from Singapore, India and China, the other markets researched are Japan, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam.
Su-Yen Wong, CEO of HCLI, shares that the study has uncovered different ways of leadership in the Asian countries with honest insights that will advance the leadership development in the region said, “Succession planning and the challenge of finding the ‘right’ Asian talent to step into senior roles for Asian operations has always been one of the top issues that keeps CEOs awake at night, for both Asian conglomerates and multinational corporations (MNC’s) operating in Asia. The question then is: what kind of senior leaders are these MNCs seeking and expecting? What leadership qualities or competencies do they deem necessary for their top roles? And, why are Asian emerging leaders perceived to fall short? The HCLI’s Leadership Mosaics study delivers the very answers to these perpetual questions.”
Speaking on the occasion of the research launch, Vinod Kumar, Managing Director and CEO of Tata Communications Group, says “At Tata Communications – a multi-billion dollar enterprise with employees across 40 countries and operations in over 200 geographies – we appreciate the nuances of different styles of leadership, just as we value the diversity and colour that this brings. We are honoured therefore to be associated with the HCLI’s Leadership Mosaics Across Asia study.”
Each country’s report dwells into its unique leadership style, and how this may have to change in an evolving global order. It also focuses on the country’s next-gen leaders and suggests how they can make the next leap to become global leaders. This enables global businesses to build their Asian leadership pipeline for sustainable success in the region.
It is no surprise that Asia is an incredibly diverse region with no one particular way of doing business across these countries. However, the reports reveal some common patterns of leadership styles. For instance, leaders in several Asian markets covered tend to highlight relationships as a way of ‘getting things done’, with many leaders attributing much of their success to connections in both business and political circles. This can largely be linked to the cultural values that emphasize familial ties and social strata, or distrust in the rule of the law.
In drawing out the portrait of business leadership for Asia, one also inevitably runs into a discourse on power. While ‘respecting the order’ comes out as a strong trait in China and Japan, a ‘hierarchy-conscious society where older employees address the person before the issue’, and not the issue at large, is a key trend noticed in India. Across Southeast Asia, words such as “paternalistic”, “hierarchical”, “autocratic” and “feudalistic” resound when leaders, both native and foreign, were asked to describe the ways of leadership in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines and Vietnam.
