Leadership lessons from my 40s (Part 1 of 2)
- HO Seng Chee
- Mar 15
- 5 min read
Updated: 3 days ago
The presentation was difficult to comprehend. GFA, NPI, PATMI, IRR, EVA, … these acronyms formed an alphabet soup which tasted unfamiliar. My senses were provoked.
Sitting in that management meeting a week after I joined Singapore real estate group Mapletree, I saw a steep learning curve ahead. It was November 2008. I had just moved 10,000 miles back to Singapore and switched from the public to the private sector. After over a decade in the United States, my native Singapore felt novel.
The real estate business is a world unto its own. It is both macro and micro, very technical but also operational. The best real estate professionals ably blend macroeconomics, regulation, finance, design/construction, marketing, operations and more. My boss was (and remains) a legend in the industry. He had assembled a team of veterans to build Mapletree. It was a privilege to be part of that.
Being the apprentice among the pros, I tried to keep up with my colleagues. There was a lot to catch up on. I took courses. I read books. I searched the internet. I consulted co-workers. As a member of the senior executive team, I also participated in the weekly Monday Management Meeting, where we discussed every deal, every project, every investment. It was the forum for all critical business decisions, and also where my greatest learning occured. I learnt by observing leaders in action.
I was the head of corporate services, tasked to oversee four teams – Legal, HR, Communications, and Admin. I knew a little about each function, but hardly enough to profess domain expertise. And while I had trained as a lawyer, I had not done much legal work for some time. All this meant I had to rely on, and trust, other people.
I made some new appointments in my teams and gave them significant empowerment. Delegating signalled my respect for the dignity and professionalism of these new leaders. I resolved to focus on being coach and co-ordinator, helping to link their work with management’s objectives and strategy.
Being born and bred in Singapore, I had assumed that it would be easy for me to get things done. My colleagues were a homogenous bunch, comprising mostly Singaporeans and Malaysians. They looked and spoke like me. I foresaw no difficulty getting quick results.
Yet, by the second month back in Singapore, it dawned on me that I was wrong. Unused to being addressed as “Mr. Ho,” the power distance between leaders and teams chafed. Words used in everyday speech that seemed to me disrespectful did not faze anyone else. My ideas and proposals, drawn from years of international experience, ran up against established ways of doing things. Looking back now, I can see that, in my eagerness and pride, I had wanted my “differentness” to make a difference. But my being different had become an obstacle to making friends instead. I felt like a foreigner in my own country, except I was anything but.
Nostalgic for the international friends that I had left behind in Washington, I decided to volunteer on the Board of the United World College of Southeast Asia (UWC), Singapore’s largest international school. While I was lucky to make some good friends in that community, I did not feel completely at ease there either. As a Singaporean in Singapore, I was an oddity in that expatriate reservation.
So there I was, feeling like flotsam in the sea. At work, I had little industry knowledge, few friends, and was not sure what to say or do. Socially, I found myself constantly adjusting for differences in mindsets and styles across the different communities in which I moved. From business norms to common courtesies, I was toggling between options and code-switching based on what I thought would work best.
There were adjustments at home too. Daily life saw my family adopting new practices, from altered grocery habits to changed childcare arrangements. Singapore’s lack of seasons also seemed to slow time down, for we now had no weather changes to mark time’s passing. I would say, though, that moving home delivered a precious gift – the children got to be closer to grandparents and extended family.
Amid the trials, the new leaders I hired gradually made their mark. I was mostly happy to see them assert themselves, for I equated their success with my success. Some were more ambitious than others, and there was the inevitable jostling. Sharp elbows were felt, including by me. You can never take politics out of leadership. We are human after all.
Indeed, the demands of leadership can make one overlook being kind to others. Fortunately for me, that was not the case with my CEO. A focused man who read widely, my boss was not one who flattered with platitudes. Rather, his was the style of fair rewards and honest rebukes. With gratitude, I have received both. At his direction, Mapletree also sponsored my MBA programme in 2012. It was a generous gift for which I remain thankful.
Not long after my MBA, I was posted to Ho Chi Minh City in 2014 as the company’s Vietnam CEO. It was at this time, after assuming full P&L responsibility for a business, that I finally felt comfortable thinking of myself as a real estate professional. It had taken me almost six years to transition from the public sector career of my 30s back to the private sector.
What my 40s taught me about leadership (Part 1 of 2):
Successful job transitions require time. If you are also changing industries, moving to a new function, or relocating to a different country, prepare for a three to five-year adjustment. Even if returning to the familiar, ready yourself for reverse culture shock – it will happen.
Show young leaders how management makes decisions. Place those whom you want to groom in management meetings or key appointments (e.g., Chief of Staff, CEO’s Aide, etc.). That’s a great way for them to learn.
Being different can be a good thing, for new things are never invented through sameness. However, be wise about the tensions between your individuality and the collective’s consensus. Use your specialness to serve others.
Leadership can never be divorced from interpersonal politics. You will have to find your way like everyone else. Be guided by your values and cherish those who are kind and generous.
What did your 40s teach you about leadership?
The next article in my mid-career retrospective series, covering the second part of my 40s, will drop in April 2025. Subscribe to my blog to be notified.
(This article is part of a mid-career retrospective series on my professional life. Each article in the series recounts events in one decade of my career. At the end of each piece, I summarise what those events taught me about leadership. All articles in this series are hosted on my blog.)
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I am a Board director and leadership advisor to CEOs and teams. I help organisations and individuals use good leadership practices to succeed. Email me to discuss how we can work together.
