Making Globalization Work

I'm currently halfway through Joseph Stiglitz's latest book titled "Making Globalization Work". It is a very interesting account of both sides of the globalisation debate and provides a more balanced view than another interesting book I read recently called "The World is Flat" by Thomas Friedman. Globalization is a topic that affects everyone on a basic level and yet it is very complex. One of the big issues we face today is the increasing gap between the haves and have-nots. This is not only the case for individuals, it is happening to nations as well. Stiglitz does a good job of explaining how this is perpetuated by institutions such as the IMF and WTO. Another interesting fact is that developing countries such as China are effectively providing low interest loans to rich countries such as the United States by buying Treasury bills which enables the US to continue to live beyond its means. This situation is unsustainable and the only question is whether it unwinds slowly or whether it culminates in a massive global financial and economic crisis.

As I read this book I recalled reading books as a teenager such as "Future Shock" by Alvin Toffler where (if I remember correctly) it was predicted that within one or two generations we would not have to work (unless we wanted to) because everything would be automated, life expectancy would exceed 100 years as there would be cures for all terminal illnesses, etc. These wonders (and more) have actually occured as predicted by Toffler, although unfortunately the beneficiaries are but a small percentage of the worlds population. The fact is that there are more people living a stone age existence today, without access to clean water, electricity, education and healthcare, than at any other era in the past. This is probably the most shocking future that hardly any futurists would have imagined without nuclear armageddon taking place, and sadly it is our reality.

"Making Globalisation Work" tries to address the big questions, such as how to break the vicious cycle of poverty and indebtedness, how to align the interests of the developed and developing nations, and how to address global issues such as climate change. These are the true challenges of our generation - challenges that if not successfully tackled will herald a new "dark age" for the world, with lower life expectancy, massive starvation, displacement of entire populations, the inundation of coastal cities, the list goes on.

I hope that in 30 years we will be able to look back and say we were able to rise to the challenge, realising today that the challenge is more difficult than it ever was (back in the good old days when two old men had the fate of the world in their hand in deciding whether or not to press the Big Red Button) and that paradoxically everyone holds the key to what the world will be like in the future through their individual actions.

Progress?

Being away for a few months, one becomes acutely aware of the pace of change we experience in KL. Even the view of the KL skyline from our apartment balcony has changed noticeably since we left in May. I got myself a new camera (Sony Alpha 100 DSLR) and have been playing with it, trying to take shots of Lucas (difficult) and the view from the balcony (much easier). I've managed to take decent pictures of Formula 1 cars whizzing by, but Lucas moves faster and less predictably! So I'll have to practice a little more. The shot here is a typical "just before the deluge" shot - the sky turns almost black as night, but the sun is still shining from behind (and 5 minutes later, the view is completely wiped out as the rain completely obscures the city). The twin towers stand out especially under these conditions.

I'm already experiencing a little buyer's remorse with the camera, but not because it's not good enough (it'll probably take me several months to even utilise it to 50% of what it can do). A couple of days after I bought it, Sony came out with a very attractive promotional offer that includes a lot more accessories (e.g. 2GB memory stick, free photo workshop, etc.) for less than what I paid. Also, I heard the new and better model (the Alpha 700) is being launched in November. Anyway, that's the pace of change thing again - one really should not fall for it. My 12 year old car and 15 year old TV set are still working just fine. Actually when I was buying it, the salesperson was trying to convince me to buy the Canon EOS 400D instead. So not only do we have "improved" models every year, we also have more and more choices of equally improved models.

Is this a good thing? Well - in my case probably not. I hardly use any of the features of all the new and improved models of phones, cameras etc. (I think I actually took my best pictures with my 20 year old Minolta manual compact). Unfortunately, you can't buy a 5 (or even 2) year old phone or camera anymore. It's actually quite difficult to buy a phone that just does calls and sms (and doesn't need to be "rebooted" every now and then!). Soon it'll be difficult to buy a camera that is not capable of inadvertently uploading your private pics to the internet!

That brings me to one unique thing about Malaysia that makes this such a great place - thanks to Proton (our very own car manufacturer), we can actually buy a 20 year old car factory new if we want to. None of the stuff that just causes trouble like computerised ignition, digital displays, ABS, airbags, traction control etc. Just a car that gets you from A to B, and it actually withstands floods quite well (except when parked in a basement car park)! Unfortunately, there are not enough people like me who just want simple, single function products and that's why Proton is probably doomed (and why people like me have a job)! Still, one would think that someone should be able to find a market for such "obsolete" stuff, given that 90+ % of the world's population does not own a phone, camera or car...

Back home again

Well it's been over a week since we got back and the time has passed in a blur of meeting up with family and friends, catching up at work and having all the great local food that we've missed (although I'm already missing those steaks and burgers after a week!). Malaysia celebrated her 50th year of Independence on August 31st, so there is a festive atmosphere and the city is beautifully lit up every night.

I haven't really had a chance to reflect yet on the experiences of the last 3 months, and it looks like I won't be able to in the foreseeable future. In some ways I feel as if I'm on a dysfunctional treadmill that is going so fast that I'll fall and hurt myself if I try to slow down or get off. Despite the "advantages" of jet-lag (being awake when no-one else is) I have gotten less than half of my to-do list done.

One good practice that we've continued over from the US is tracking our daily expenses. It is indeed shocking how much we spend every day, just on the bare necessities. I really wonder how people manage to get by on RM1000 a month (US$10 per day) which is the average wage in KL for unskilled or semi-skilled workers. It does put things in perspective though and I believe most people would have a much better chance of living within their means if only they took the simple step of tracking their expenditure.

Hello Goodbye

It’s our last few hours in LA and soon we’ll be on the plane, making the 10,000 mile journey back to KL. Yesterday we took one last walk around Old Town Pasadena, passing our “old” apartment on the way. I said to Lucas – “look, that’s where we used to stay”, and as I said it, I realised that it feels like a lot longer than 3 months that we’ve been here. Even Lucas was completely silent the whole way, taking the surroundings in like he knew it would be a long time before he returns to Pasadena.

In the Accenture KL office, up on the 66th floor of the Petronas Twin Towers, there’s a quote printed on the window – “Live as though it’s your last day, dream as though you’ll live forever”. I think that’s very good advice and if we are able to experience every 3 months as though it’s a year, we will “live” for several hundred years! My dream is that I will be able to keep involved with the project, maybe even be a part of the team that realises the vision and hopefully I won’t have to live forever to do so…

The reason I was thinking of this quotation is that I received the sad news yesterday that Robert Davies, the CEO of the Prince of Wales International Business Leaders Forum (IBLF) passed away last week. I only knew Robert briefly, having been privileged to spend a week touring India and Sri Lanka with him as part of the IBLF Tsunami Task Force 2 years ago. Robert is a person who embodied this quotation – every day with him was exhausting yet exhilirating and he pushed all of us to look at the world a different way and make a positive difference. Being part of the Tsunami Task Force and meeting Robert I think planted the seed for me to do this ADP project at World Vision.

It was a perfect last day at work – the project team threw me a farewell tea party (US style with bagels and coffee) and we went to lunch at In ‘n Out – this time I got the Double Double with Animal Style fries (living like it’s my last day…). I had been wanting to participate in the World Vision Child Sponsorship program ever since I joined the project and amazingly, today in chapel there was the opportunity to sign up (a timely reminder!) so I did so right away. Lucas now has a big sister in Lebanon, her name is Mary Theresa George and she likes science…hopefully the last part will rub off on Lucas!

To all who have made our short time here such a great experience, thank you for everything you’ve done and I hope we will keep in touch. Taking my cue from the Governator – hasta la vista and we’ll be back!

Road trip - part 3 (San Francisco and back to LA)

I think I am more than a month behind on this blog now, I have not finished our Independence Day road trip report and now it's already coming up to Memorial Day (which we will no longer be here for, but instead we will be back in Malaysia to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Malaysia's independence!).

So let me catch up with San Francisco - we stayed at the Hyatt Embarcadero because they had an Independence Day special deal and somehow the advertising implied that we could view the fireworks directly from the hotel. So it was a bit of a letdown when I checked in and they said that we would have to go to Fisherman's Wharf to see the fireworks. The room itself was nice for the price, and the hotel is very well located just by the Ferry Building and a cable car end station. We checked in around 5pm and started going to Fisherman's Wharf at 7pm. Good as SF's public transport is, it is not baby friendly. Strollers have to be folded up and there is usually standing room only in the trams and cable cars. It was pretty stressful trying to get on and off the trams carrying Lucas in one arm and a folded up stroller plus all his gear in the other arm, trying to find the correct change and having other people push by at the same time. We made it to Pier 39 in one piece, but there was a free rock concert going on right outside the Hard Rock Cafe and the crowd was building up. We had a quick dinner at Hard Rock (went to the front of the queue with my All Access card!) and by the time we came out at 8:45pm the crowd was so packed that it was almost impossible to move. We then decided that it would not make sense to stay for the fireworks with Lucas (everyone must have thought we were out of our minds to bring a baby there!).

Walking back to the hotel was fairly smooth as everyone was already at Fisherman's Wharf. We did in the end catch the fireworks from across a large parking lot near the hotel. I think we probably saw more of it than we would have from Fisherman's Wharf, since there were no crowds at the parking lot!

The next day we took the cable car to Chinatown - it was a smooth ride as we got on at the first station and it was relatively early in the morning. San Francisco has the largest Chinatown in America, and it was great having authentic Chinese food at reasonable prices again. I took the opportunity to get a haircut with shampoo for $10 ($6 for just the haircut, even cheaper than my haircut in KL!). Lucas also had his first haircut, which he was not impressed with. After Chinatown we tried to take the cable car again but by this time we had to wait about half an hour as all the cars passing by were packed. When we got to the end of the line we saw that there was a massive queue to take the cable car going up Russian hill (the steepest part of the line with a nice view, so very popular with tourists) so we decided to just walk back from Fisherman's Wharf (again) to our hotel. We went to the Ferry Building at about 8pm to try and get a nice dinner but all the shops and most of the restaurants had already closed. So apart from a couple of cable car rides and Chinatown, we did not really do much on this day. We ended up getting a sandwich from Subway for dinner - none of the restaurants near the Ferry Building are open for dinner, I guess they cater only for the office crowd.

Our final day in SF we drove to the Presidio and walked all the way to the Golden Gate bridge. That was very pleasant although it was cold and foggy - 59 Fahrenheit (15 Celsius) at noon! No wonder Mark Twain said that the coldest winter day he ever experienced was a San Francisco July day! However Lucas was very happy - he likes being outdoors and he is more into cold weather than warm. The fog never lifted high enough for us to see the whole bridge, but what we could see of it was very impressive.

We then started on the long drive back to LA - it took us about 7 hours as there was quite a bit of traffic leaving the Bay Area. What was interesting was seeing the outside temperature climb from 59F (15C) to 110F (43C) within a distance of 50 miles! We had to make a stop at a place where it was 105F and I don't think I could last very long in that heat. Las Vegas was over 110F that entire week, hitting 116F on a couple of days so I was glad that we decided to travel to the coast instead of Vegas.

We arrived back in Pasadena at around 10pm (and a very comfortable 71F!) and that was all in all a very enjoyable trip. It gave us confidence that we could have an enjoyable extended trip with Lucas as long as we plan ahead a little and we are flexible when conditions change. So watch out for more family trip reports soon!

Just 3 weeks left...

The time has just flown by - we’ll be flying back to KL less than 3 weeks from now and although it’ll be nice to be back home, it is with a twinge of sadness that we leave LA. Amazingly, this place has grown on us in a short time, much more than I could have imagined possible. Here are some of the things I will miss:

- The cool evenings sitting on the little balcony of our apartment (and Lucas calling out to all the dogs, babies and cars that pass by)
- Going to Lacy park in San Marino for Lucas’ playgroup (and gawking at the $2 million houses around the park)
- All the good stuff we can get at Trader Joe’s and Pavilions ($2 Charles Shaw wine anyone?)
- Ralph’s 10 for $10 deals (and double coupons!)
- Cherries, Strawberries, Rasperries, Blueberries (with or without ice-cream)!
- Decent sized parking lots (and free parking at the mall)
- Weekends at the pool or the beach (and the almost 100% reliable sunshine)
- Wednesday chapel at World Vision (very thought provoking and inspirational)
- Some great friends we’ve made both at work and outside
- Last but not least - In-n-Out Burgers and Baha fish tacos!

But at least we will have our nice memories (and photo evidence for Lucas), which reminds me that I need to finish my trip report of our road trip to San Francisco before it fades too far into distant memory!

Stewardship

One of Accenture's 6 core values is "Stewardship" (the other 5 being One Global Network, Best People, Client Value Creation, Respect for the Individual and Integrity). It so happens there is a library at World Vision and as I passed by last week a book with the same title (Stewardship, by Peter Block) caught my eye. I had not really given much thought to Stewardship and what it really means for an organisation and an individual before, so I thought it would be worth checking out.

First - Accenture's definition of Stewardship on the company website (I admit, I had to check to remind myself of some of the other core values!) is "Building a heritage for future generations, acting with an owner mentality, developing people everywhere we are and meeting our commitments to all internal and external stakeholders". I am sure this is a good definition and was well thought out and consistent with the way the leadership should act, but I always felt something essential was missing from the description. It is the sort of definition which one understands easily enough in a "OK, I can recite this to others" fashion, but what is really at the core of this that will ensure Stewardship is actually practiced?

I think I found an answer in Peter Block's book, which essentially says that Stewardship is acting out of a will to serve rather than out of self-interest. It is giving up control without abdicating responsibility and accountability. It is partnership rather than parenting. This is what would enable individuals, and by extension the organisation to build a heritage for future generations, act with an owner mentality, develop people and meet commitments to all internal and external stakeholders. Now I can see why this definition was not chosen - it would require a total revamp of the organisation (not to mention human nature). It would mean the higher up you go in an organisation, the more people you are serving (not controlling!). It would mean everyone acting in the best interests of other people, not their own best interest. It would mean an end to a sense of entitlement, because stewardship means not being entitled, but still being accountable.

I am wondering how many organisations are ready for this kind of a revolution? By the way, Peter Block's book was published in 1993 and if anything, stewardship and governance have declined in the following years. Maybe it is one of those aspirational concepts that everyone agrees with in principle, but very few are willing to make the necessary sacrifices for.