"I KNEW that was going to happen!" How many times have you heard those words come out of your own mouth? Probably plenty, if you're like most people.We all possess something called "intuition". It's an inner "knowing' which, when paid attention to, will help us make decisions and even prevent us from making mistakes!Do you remember when you were in school and you had to take those dreaded multiple choice tests? How many times did you get an answer wrong because you had changed it from your original answer?
I'll bet it didn't take long before you figured out you should always go with your FIRST instinct. That's because you really did know the correct answer, and your intuition provided it for you. Then, perhaps you doubted your insight and changed the answer.Did you know that your brain, like a giant computer, stores all the data that is ever put into it? The problem is that most of us can only RECALL about 10% of that data at any given time. But, on occasion, your intuition kicks in and digs deep into the file cabinet of your mind to pull out a stored-away answer.I'm sure you've experienced having a piece of information "right on the tip of your tongue". The data is in your head somewhere but you can't quite get it out. Sometimes it just takes a while and the answer will come to you a few hours later. It just sort of "pops in" when you're not even trying to remember it anymore.Well, sometimes information will "pop in" as a warning or in answer to an unasked question. You get a "feeling" about something. Maybe it's just a "gut feeling" or maybe it's more like a premonition. Do you listen to it or ignore it?It's very easy, in hindsight, to see where you could have prevented a problem or mistake by listening to your hunches. But how can you learn to use your intuition to give you answers or even evoke warnings BEFORE it's too late to do something about them?
1. Learn to listen to your own intuition. The voice within you speaks to you constantly, and you are usually just too busy to listen to it. When making major decisions, make a conscious effort to take some quiet time alone to hear what your inner voice is saying.
2. Never doubt your own intelligence and common sense. When your inner voice says, "watch out", learn to take heed.
3. Never feel (because you don't have a PhD or other fancy degree), that you are less capable than the next guy. The so-called gurus and experts don't have all the answers and don't always know what they're talking about. Just remember how many stock EXPERTS told people to buy Yahoo at $150 a share.
4. Remember that nobody knows you like YOU do. Your intuition is YOU talking to you.5. Keep your own counsel. There's a reason your intuition gives you advice. Don't ignore it. You are your own best advisor.Some people intentionally ignore their intuition. They doubt their own inner wisdom. They do things even though their intuition tells them otherwise. They make the same mistakes over and over again. Then they find themselves always saying, "I KNEW that was going to happen!"
ENDp.s How many wrong decisions you've made because you over analyse things when you should have trust your own intuition?
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Myth of Tanah Melayu
We are sustained by myths only as long as they are empowering, inspiring, instrumental, and serve our interests; yet when those very same myths provide us with little else than the false comfort of an unreconstructed nostalgia for a past that never existed, then they turn into cages that imprison us for life. The myth of a unique European ‘civilizational genius’ has only helped to parochialize Europe even more; the staid discourse of ‘Asian values’ merely denies the fact that Asian civilizations would not have developed as they did without contact with the outside world; and the myth of a pure and uninterrupted development of Indo-Aryan culture has only opened the way for the rise of right-wing Hindutva Fascists in the Indian subcontinent.
Notwithstanding their claims to standing proud and tall, the demagogues who utter such pedestrian nonsense remain stunted, as their logic, on the stage of global history: testimony to the claim that those whose confidence is founded in stilts can only remain handicapped for life.
A nation that is grown up is one that is mature enough to realize that it can dispense with such myths, particularly when the honeyed nectar of mythology reveals itself as nothing more than poison. Yet poison has become our draught, and this nation of ours is ailing to the core by now.
The symptoms of the malady are all around us these days and we see them readily enough: As the asinine debate over a rap rendition of the national anthem turns bilious and takes on an increasingly racialized mien, forcing all sides to retreat to the hallowed sanctuary of communal and racial identity, the nation’s attention has been diverted from truly pressing issues concerning the economy and the spate of potentially explosive legal cases currently being fought out in the courts of the land.
The vernacular press assumes the role of champions of each respective community, and racial overtones are clearly seen and felt in the language of national politics. Yet nobody points to the real issue at stake, even if we need to discuss the rap video rendered by the young Wee Meng Chee, which surely should be this: If a young Malaysian has seen fit to deliver his tirade against all that he sees wrong in the country in terms that are racially-determined, is this not a reflection of the racialised and divisive politics that already reigns in Malaysia, courtesy of the ruling National Front coalition led by UMNO in the first place? The racialised logic that rests in Meng Chee’s rap is only a mirror reflection of the racialised politics already at work in Malaysia already. So are we Malaysians so ashamed of ourselves that we can no longer look at ourselves squarely in the face and accept the monstrosity that stands before us today?
Yet the editorials in the vernacular press are baying for blood and Meng Chee, they insist, must be brought to book. Amidst this furore of chest-thumping theatrics and protestations of communal insult and outrage, we hear the communitarians among us blare out again and again: ‘Jangan tunduk’, ‘Defend our pride’, ‘kurang ajar’ and so forth. No, reason and rational debate are no longer welcomed in Malaysia that is ‘truly Asia’, and this homeland for some will demand its pound of flesh from others. Meng Chee is not the first and certainly will not be the last to suffer from the slighted sensitivities of those whose comfort zones and essentialized identities are sacrosanct and inviolable. Previously others have also been brought to the village tribunal of the mob for allegedly insulting race and religion as well. (Here I write from bitter experience myself.)
Yet the irony of ironies behind this tableau of flaring tempers and heated emotions is the skewered (and now silenced) appeal for us, as one nation, to remain united and to respect the diversity among us. The sonorous voice of the state trembles and falters as it mouths this language of double-speak that fails to convince: On the one hand we maintain the lie – and it is a lie, let us admit that at least – that this is a happy land of multiculturalism and diversity where every shade of colour in the pluralist rainbow is represented and has its place. On the other hand the very same mouth that utters these sweet platitudes tells us that not far beneath the diversity and pluralism that rests on the scratched surface of Malaysia is the understated understanding that some communities – or rather one in particular – deserves a better place in the sun; namely, the Bumiputeras.
Why?
Have we become a schizophrenic nation blissfully unaware of the contradictions that have become so heartbreakingly apparent to others? Meng Chee’s unpardonable ‘offence’ was to have slighted the pride and identity of one community that claims to be part of Malaysia and yet remains strangely aloof from the rest of us. The great act of treason he is accused of committing – offending the dignity of a specific community and its creed – rings hollow when we consider the bile and vitriol that has emanated from the leaders of that community itself, ranging from the drawing of daggers in public to the language of blood and belonging that has been repeated, time and again, by its leaders. The soapbox orators of UMNO and its Youth Wing in particular have demanded that others respect the special rights and privileges of the Malays, while forgetting the fact that for the past five decades we – Malaysians – have had to put up with their own brand of small town politics incessantly.
Yet this discourse of communal pride and identity is sustained by one crucial myth: that this land of ours is a competed and contested territory where two nations are in constant competition: The nation-state called ‘Malaysia’ and the mythical land called ‘Tanah Melayu’.
The skin of the demagogue is ever so sensitive, so fragile, in the face of the sound argument. As soon as the mention of a contrary idea is made, it bristles and reacts; the hand reaches for the keris; the foot steps on the soapbox; the mouth opens to utter the word ‘May’ to be followed by the cryptic number thirteen…
Perhaps the sensitivity we see can be accounted for by the fact that the corpus of postcolonial ethno-nationalist politics in this country is sustained by the singular myth that this patch of God’s earth was and is a land that ‘belongs’ to one community in particular. From that myth issues forth the other related claims to special privileges, special rights, special allocations and entitlements.
The myth is sustained by the idea put forth that prior to the coming-into-being of this nation called ‘Malaysia’ there was once this mythical land called ‘Tanah Melayu’. Yet the historian would be hard pressed indeed to find a source to back this claim, for the embarrassing thing about our epic histories and hikayats of old is that there is scarcely a mention of the word. For years – if not more than a decade by now – I have been looking for this mythical land so loved and cherished by the young bloods and hotspurs of UMNO, yet I have never discovered it. The Hikayat Merong Mahawangsa (written in stages between the late 17th to 18th centuries) does not mention it; nor does the Hikayat Patani, the Taj-us-Salatin (Mahkota Segala Raja-Raja), the Hikayat Shah Mardan, Hikayat Inderaputera, Silsilah Bugis, Hikayat Pasai, Hikayat Siak, etc.
And finally one day while trawling through the flea markets and antique bazaars of Europe I came across a dull and worn-out copper coin with the word ‘Tanah Melayu’ stamped on it, dating to the late 19th century.
Having taken it home, I looked it up in the reference books I had only to discover that it was one of those hybrid coins of dubious worth that were used in the trade between European colonial companies then stationed in Singapore and Malacca with Malay traders from the (then weakened) Malay sultanates on the Peninsula. Used as loose coinage in commercial transactions that were at best unequal and at worst exploitative to the Malay traders then, the coins had a decidedly counterfeit feel to them, and while registering the lightness of its weight in the palm of my hand, the thought came to me: That this coin, with the word ‘Tanah Melayu’ stamped on it in Jawi alphabet, sums up the irony of the past and the painful realities of colonialism then. The Malay kingdoms had been colonised, sidelined and diminished, and all that was given back to the Malays was a dull copper coin with the myth of ‘Tanah Melayu’ stamped on it in so casual a manner.
Colonialism had robbed the natives of Asia of their lands, their history and culture; introduced the divisive politics of race and ethnicity as part of the ideology of divide and rule, and had created a plural economy where the colonial masters reigned supreme. In the decades and centuries to come the colonized subjects would be doubly colonized again as they internalized the logic and epistemology of Empire, thereby completing the work of the colonial masters who had colonized their lands, stolen their resources, but not altered their minds.
Today, as race-based ethno-nationalist politics prevails in Malaysia and while our communities remain divided along sectarian race and religion-based lines, we lament the loss of the Malaysian ideal that was perhaps never there in the first place. The hounding of bloggers, activists and students like Meng Chee is a reminder that the frontiers of race, religion and ethnicity remain as permanent scars that have disfigured the landscape of our nation, apparently permanently.
And as the virulent voices in the vernacular editorials of the local press call for vengeance against Meng Chee, perhaps they should ask themselves this simple and honest question: For half a century now the so-called ‘non-Malays’ of Malaysia have been asked to attest their loyalty and commitment to the Malaysian idea and ideal; to relegate their cultural history to the background; to adopt the national language, culture and even dress in an attempt to assimilate to the reality of life in Malaysia.
But tell me, dear reader, how many Malays in Malaysia are truly Malaysian; and how many Malays think of themselves as Malaysian and are committed to that very same ideal of a Malaysian Malaysia? Are the Malays Malaysians who live in Malaysia? Or are the Malays still living in the mythological land of ‘Tanah Melayu’, an idea dreamt of by Orientalist scholars and administrators during the colonial era, as a worthless compensation to a people who had been colonized and whose pride was reduced to the worth of a copper coin?
Under A Shadow of KERAJAAN
We are often told that the Malay word for government is kerajaan. This, for those who are aware of the subtle semantic shifts and differences that are constantly at work in the Malay language, is of course a bad translation.
Kerajaan literally means “to be in a state of having a Raja”. The concept kerajaan harks back to the feudal era where Malay politics was very much centered in and around the court (istana or palace) and where power was concentrated in the office of the Raja himself.
During the feudal era, “politics” as we know it did not, in fact, exist. For there to be politics, there has to be what contemporary political theorists refer to as the moment of the “political” (ie the process of contesting, engagement and negotiation that is characteristic of the political process itself).
“Politics” only comes into being when we have introduced a system of institutions, norms and practices that facilitate and make possible the distribution, negotiation and exercise of power in a society. These institutions did not exist in the feudal setting.
The Raja was, in effect, the executive, legislature and judiciary, all rolled into one. While there was some delegation of power and authority to other actors and agents, no one was deluded enough to believe that power-sharing took place during the feudal era.
Even when the Raja delegated duties and responsibilities to others, it was clear that he was the one who was in charge. Thus when the Sultan of Melaka allowed the building of the great mosque in the city, he made sure that the imam of the mosque was one of his relatives. This was to ensure that there would be no alternative sites of political and discursive activity that would exist unchecked and outside the parameters of his control.
One may wonder what all this has to do with the present state of affairs in Malaysia. The answer is simple, depending on how we frame the question.
For years, many political analysts, journalists and civil society activists have been asking questions about the Malaysian political system. There have been many attempts to label the political system in Malaysia according to a specific category. Is it an authoritarian democracy? A liberal-capitalist dictatorship? A centralized federation?
The answer is quite straightforward. Malaysia, like many other developing countries in the South today, is a hybrid entity that shares both modern and pre-modern features.
In terms of its institutions and services, it is a highly developed (and some would say over-developed) country where the latest in hi-tech systems and technologies are used to govern the state and carry out the daily task of management. Malaysia’s success in the race for development is beyond doubt. It is one of the most developed and well-managed countries in the region.
But Malaysia is also a state that suffers from the social malaise of uneven development, and nowhere is this more evident than in its political culture that remains rooted in the pre-modern feudal past.
Malaysia therefore has the latest technology that it utilizes in the process of government and management of the state and its economy. But the authorities in the country also use this technology for decidedly un-modern or even anti-modern purposes.
Witness the way that the self-appointed “morality police” have used hi-tech surveillance technology to spy on young couples holding hands in the streets, meeting together in private, etc.
The state media also used the latest hi-tech facilities to spread its message to the national audience, thereby creating a “virtual nation” that is hooked up to a single mainstream culture that exists on television, radio and the Internet.
But the state media has also used this modern technology to build up a personality cult where the rulers of the country have been elevated to the status of modern-day icons, reminiscent of the feudal era where leaders were objects of veneration and worship.
The contradictions, however, do not stop there. The root of the problem lies in the feudal mindset and values that reside among the elite of the most dominant and powerful political party in the country, UMNO.
UMNO was, from the very beginning, a conservative-traditionalist party that was run and governed according to the values and worldview of the feudal era. The leaders of UMNO, from the Tunku onwards, have treated the office of government as if it was a tool for them to use at will.
Successive UMNO leaders have used the office of state and the bureaucracy to further their own political agendas, even when it came to settling scores between themselves in their own race for power within the party.
Attempts have been made to address and reverse this feudalist trend among the UMNO leadership itself, but to no avail. (Ironically, the most stringent and vocal critic of the feudal values and culture of Umno was the present Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad himself, who condemned the style of leadership of the party in his book “The Malay Dilemma” in 1970).
This tendency to see the bureaucratic machinery of the state as an appendage of UMNO and a tool of politics would be completely incomprehensible in the context of a modern liberal-democracy. But then again, a liberal-democracy is precisely what Malaysia is not.
Despite the trappings of modernity that dot the Malaysian landscape – from the tallest building in the world to the biggest dam – the country remains a modern neo-feudal state governed by elites whose values date back to the feudal era of 200 years ago.
This would also explain the developments we have witnessed in the country over the past two years. In the wake of the sacking of the ex-DPM Anwar Ibrahim and the protests that followed, many asked why the state had over-reacted to such an extent.
Was it necessary to arrest so many people? Was it necessary to use such force when dispersing protesters? Again the answer is a simple one if we know what kind of political system we are dealing with.
The devastating campaign to wipe out the supporters of Anwar and the reformasi movement might seem a tad over the top in a modern liberal-democracy, but not so in the context of the neo-feudal politics of UMNO. After all, Malay history is full of examples of palace coups and rebellions against unpopular Rajas.
In all these cases, the reaction has been the same: The ruler has responded to the challenge by wiping out all his opponents and challengers. Mercy has little space or room to flourish in the feudal environment, and the feudal era saw few prisoners being taken by the victors in the internecine struggles that tore apart the Malay world.
When UMNO used all the resources at its disposal to wipe out the challengers from within in 1987 and 1998, it was perfectly normal political behavior from a party whose values are rooted in the feudalist logic of zero-sum confrontation.
This neo-feudal drama has been played out again and again, and among the latest developments include the relatively light sentence meted out to the ex-Inspector General of Police, Rahim Noor and the statement by the Chief Minister of Melaka Ali Rustam who said that in future all doctors, lawyers, architects and professionals who are known to be supporters of the opposition will no longer be favored. He also warned government servants not to support the opposition.
Human rights activists, union members and proponents of civil society may lament these developments as further proof of the erosion of civil society and civil liberties in the country. But few have cared to recognize the simple fact that such a civil society has never really taken root in Malaysia anyway.
The relatively light sentence given to the ex-IGP and the blatant show of favoritism and partisanship on the part of the Melaka Chief Minister are all in keeping with how a feudal form of rule operates, where those who are on the winning side are allowed to benefit while those who oppose the status quo will feel the weight of the ruler’s power as it comes crashing down on them.
There is no consideration whatsoever given to ethics or propriety, as the whole purpose of the kerajaan system was to accumulate power and to maintain possession of it. Power, understood in the sense of the right to force and coerce, was in turn expressed publicly and with little reservation. After all, power would be useless and meaningless if the Raja did not use it in the most extravagant manner.
We are therefore back to where we started. Those who continue to wonder aloud about the state of the nation and who ask “what is this country coming to?” may themselves have been deluded all along.
From the day Malaysia became independent in 1957, the country has been living under the rule of a closed circle of political elites whose values and worldview remain firmly rooted in the feudal mentality of the past. It is therefore fitting that the Malay word for government remains kerajaan, for kerajaan is precisely what we have in Malaysia today.
Those who wish to struggle for a different kind of social and political order would do well by understanding what kind of order we have around us in the first place. The mistake of the opposition is that it has tried to introduce radical changes to a society which may not even be ready, able or willing to undertake such changes.
The enduring cult of personality and leadership, the highly personal and idiosyncratic form of government, the conflation of party and government, politicians and the bureaucracy: these are all symptoms of a state of confused and uneven development where material progress has shot ahead of intellectual, social and cultural development and maturation.
In the year 2000, we still live in the shadow of the feudal kerajaan of the past. We ignore this reality at our peril.
Kerajaan literally means “to be in a state of having a Raja”. The concept kerajaan harks back to the feudal era where Malay politics was very much centered in and around the court (istana or palace) and where power was concentrated in the office of the Raja himself.
During the feudal era, “politics” as we know it did not, in fact, exist. For there to be politics, there has to be what contemporary political theorists refer to as the moment of the “political” (ie the process of contesting, engagement and negotiation that is characteristic of the political process itself).
“Politics” only comes into being when we have introduced a system of institutions, norms and practices that facilitate and make possible the distribution, negotiation and exercise of power in a society. These institutions did not exist in the feudal setting.
The Raja was, in effect, the executive, legislature and judiciary, all rolled into one. While there was some delegation of power and authority to other actors and agents, no one was deluded enough to believe that power-sharing took place during the feudal era.
Even when the Raja delegated duties and responsibilities to others, it was clear that he was the one who was in charge. Thus when the Sultan of Melaka allowed the building of the great mosque in the city, he made sure that the imam of the mosque was one of his relatives. This was to ensure that there would be no alternative sites of political and discursive activity that would exist unchecked and outside the parameters of his control.
One may wonder what all this has to do with the present state of affairs in Malaysia. The answer is simple, depending on how we frame the question.
For years, many political analysts, journalists and civil society activists have been asking questions about the Malaysian political system. There have been many attempts to label the political system in Malaysia according to a specific category. Is it an authoritarian democracy? A liberal-capitalist dictatorship? A centralized federation?
The answer is quite straightforward. Malaysia, like many other developing countries in the South today, is a hybrid entity that shares both modern and pre-modern features.
In terms of its institutions and services, it is a highly developed (and some would say over-developed) country where the latest in hi-tech systems and technologies are used to govern the state and carry out the daily task of management. Malaysia’s success in the race for development is beyond doubt. It is one of the most developed and well-managed countries in the region.
But Malaysia is also a state that suffers from the social malaise of uneven development, and nowhere is this more evident than in its political culture that remains rooted in the pre-modern feudal past.
Malaysia therefore has the latest technology that it utilizes in the process of government and management of the state and its economy. But the authorities in the country also use this technology for decidedly un-modern or even anti-modern purposes.
Witness the way that the self-appointed “morality police” have used hi-tech surveillance technology to spy on young couples holding hands in the streets, meeting together in private, etc.
The state media also used the latest hi-tech facilities to spread its message to the national audience, thereby creating a “virtual nation” that is hooked up to a single mainstream culture that exists on television, radio and the Internet.
But the state media has also used this modern technology to build up a personality cult where the rulers of the country have been elevated to the status of modern-day icons, reminiscent of the feudal era where leaders were objects of veneration and worship.
The contradictions, however, do not stop there. The root of the problem lies in the feudal mindset and values that reside among the elite of the most dominant and powerful political party in the country, UMNO.
UMNO was, from the very beginning, a conservative-traditionalist party that was run and governed according to the values and worldview of the feudal era. The leaders of UMNO, from the Tunku onwards, have treated the office of government as if it was a tool for them to use at will.
Successive UMNO leaders have used the office of state and the bureaucracy to further their own political agendas, even when it came to settling scores between themselves in their own race for power within the party.
Attempts have been made to address and reverse this feudalist trend among the UMNO leadership itself, but to no avail. (Ironically, the most stringent and vocal critic of the feudal values and culture of Umno was the present Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad himself, who condemned the style of leadership of the party in his book “The Malay Dilemma” in 1970).
This tendency to see the bureaucratic machinery of the state as an appendage of UMNO and a tool of politics would be completely incomprehensible in the context of a modern liberal-democracy. But then again, a liberal-democracy is precisely what Malaysia is not.
Despite the trappings of modernity that dot the Malaysian landscape – from the tallest building in the world to the biggest dam – the country remains a modern neo-feudal state governed by elites whose values date back to the feudal era of 200 years ago.
This would also explain the developments we have witnessed in the country over the past two years. In the wake of the sacking of the ex-DPM Anwar Ibrahim and the protests that followed, many asked why the state had over-reacted to such an extent.
Was it necessary to arrest so many people? Was it necessary to use such force when dispersing protesters? Again the answer is a simple one if we know what kind of political system we are dealing with.
The devastating campaign to wipe out the supporters of Anwar and the reformasi movement might seem a tad over the top in a modern liberal-democracy, but not so in the context of the neo-feudal politics of UMNO. After all, Malay history is full of examples of palace coups and rebellions against unpopular Rajas.
In all these cases, the reaction has been the same: The ruler has responded to the challenge by wiping out all his opponents and challengers. Mercy has little space or room to flourish in the feudal environment, and the feudal era saw few prisoners being taken by the victors in the internecine struggles that tore apart the Malay world.
When UMNO used all the resources at its disposal to wipe out the challengers from within in 1987 and 1998, it was perfectly normal political behavior from a party whose values are rooted in the feudalist logic of zero-sum confrontation.
This neo-feudal drama has been played out again and again, and among the latest developments include the relatively light sentence meted out to the ex-Inspector General of Police, Rahim Noor and the statement by the Chief Minister of Melaka Ali Rustam who said that in future all doctors, lawyers, architects and professionals who are known to be supporters of the opposition will no longer be favored. He also warned government servants not to support the opposition.
Human rights activists, union members and proponents of civil society may lament these developments as further proof of the erosion of civil society and civil liberties in the country. But few have cared to recognize the simple fact that such a civil society has never really taken root in Malaysia anyway.
The relatively light sentence given to the ex-IGP and the blatant show of favoritism and partisanship on the part of the Melaka Chief Minister are all in keeping with how a feudal form of rule operates, where those who are on the winning side are allowed to benefit while those who oppose the status quo will feel the weight of the ruler’s power as it comes crashing down on them.
There is no consideration whatsoever given to ethics or propriety, as the whole purpose of the kerajaan system was to accumulate power and to maintain possession of it. Power, understood in the sense of the right to force and coerce, was in turn expressed publicly and with little reservation. After all, power would be useless and meaningless if the Raja did not use it in the most extravagant manner.
We are therefore back to where we started. Those who continue to wonder aloud about the state of the nation and who ask “what is this country coming to?” may themselves have been deluded all along.
From the day Malaysia became independent in 1957, the country has been living under the rule of a closed circle of political elites whose values and worldview remain firmly rooted in the feudal mentality of the past. It is therefore fitting that the Malay word for government remains kerajaan, for kerajaan is precisely what we have in Malaysia today.
Those who wish to struggle for a different kind of social and political order would do well by understanding what kind of order we have around us in the first place. The mistake of the opposition is that it has tried to introduce radical changes to a society which may not even be ready, able or willing to undertake such changes.
The enduring cult of personality and leadership, the highly personal and idiosyncratic form of government, the conflation of party and government, politicians and the bureaucracy: these are all symptoms of a state of confused and uneven development where material progress has shot ahead of intellectual, social and cultural development and maturation.
In the year 2000, we still live in the shadow of the feudal kerajaan of the past. We ignore this reality at our peril.
Workers and Coaching
Today’s workers, especially in the developed world, have far superior skills in language, science, and math. Many, especially in high-tech and biotech, are college grads. They are officer material, not raw recruits. The drill sergeants would have to give way to the officer candidate school’s instructors, with different sets of skills and means of motivation. Enter the coaching style of leadership.
Coaches decide which players to keep, and when or if they can play. Coaches bring the best out of their players and ensure that they fit well with the rest of the team. Coaches do not train players in the manner that head mechanics train novice technicians. They do not train but sharpen and develop the talent and ability of their players.
Coaches are themselves former players; however, the best players do not necessarily make the best coaches. The two require different sets of skills and talent. Coaches lead the team, yet in terms of pay and public recognition, they often play second fiddle to their star players. Even the most celebrated coaches are best remembered for their marquee players.
When the players shine, there is a sense of reflected glory on the part of their coaches. This after all is what they are trying to achieve, consequently they do not envy or resent their players’ achievements.
The coaching leadership style attracts many personality types, including authoritarian ones. This leadership style is not exclusive to sports but is seen in not-for-profit organizations, academic and research institutions, and in firms of professionals (lawyers and accountants). In the corporate world, CEOs are increasingly acting more as coaches rather than as military leaders.
Unlike the rigid pyramidal command-and-control structure of the military, with few generals and admirals, few more colonels and majors, and a whole lot of captains and lieutenants, the coaching model has a flattened hierarchy, basically only two or three layers—coaches, assistant coaches, and players; a block with a gentle-sloped roof rather than a pyramid.
Like platoon commanders, coaches exert their control on their followers directly. They are there on the sideline during practice and at games. The communications are direct, and so are the feedbacks.
Arsene Wenger, the winning coach of the Arsenal soccer club, related that the most important part of his coaching job was to recruit new talent, and when he found one, to develop it. A crucial aspect to developing new talent was to ensure that he was not being overshadowed by existing players, the mighty oak stunting new saplings. Wenger had to let go many seasoned players well before their time because he felt that their presence inhibited the development of new talent. It would take an extremely confident coach to do this; it is counterintuitive. The usual tendency is to stick with your proven players rather than to try the new and untried.
Tun Razak increasingly assumed the coaching style of leadership after he settled the 1969 riot. He was unique in that he successfully made the smooth transition from being a military leader in the aftermath of the riot to the coach-like prime minister of a democracy. Many leaders cannot successfully make such transitions.
Tun Razak exhibited other unique qualities. He inherited a tired and less-than-talented cabinet from his predecessor, so he actively sought new talent. The political structure in UMNO then (like today) did not encourage the emergence of new talent, so he bypassed the system. He went outside of politics; from the civil service he recruited such seasoned leaders as Ghazali Shafie and Chong Hon Nam; from the private sector, Tengku Razaleigh. Under his tutelage, they scaled even greater heights. Abdullah Ahmad, Tun’s Special Assistant, went on to complete his studies at Cambridge and later became Mahathir’s Special Ambassador to the United Nations.
Tun Razak demonstrated his coaching style in other ways. When the tradition-bound civil service stymied his ambitious development plans, he did two things. First he hired an American management consultant (Milton Esman) to revamp the service. He could not possibly fire the entire civil service, so he decided to enhance its professionalism through extensive training. He sent young officers who had not quite yet acquired the bad habits of the civil service to graduate schools abroad. He initiated formal in-house training for fresh recruits instead of letting them loose to be trained haphazardly on the job. He realized that the civil service was incapable of executing his policies; yet needless criticism would simply undermine the organization.
His other bold strategy was to bypass completely the civil service. When bureaucrats stalled his policies, he created extra-governmental bodies to effectively bypass obscurantist civil servants. Thus was born the Government-linked companies (GLCs).
Like a good coach, Tun Razak first recruited fresh talent, and then groomed them to be developed fully and not be overshadowed by the old timers, the same strategy that Arsene Wenger used so successfully a decade later with his Arsenal team.
Malaysians were ready for the Tun’s coaching style because they were becoming better educated and more confident. He was also sufficiently flexible to adapt to the changes he saw in his followers. In short, Tun Razak’s leadership style was flexible; it was equipped with the metaphorical adjustable flaps.
Coaches decide which players to keep, and when or if they can play. Coaches bring the best out of their players and ensure that they fit well with the rest of the team. Coaches do not train players in the manner that head mechanics train novice technicians. They do not train but sharpen and develop the talent and ability of their players.
Coaches are themselves former players; however, the best players do not necessarily make the best coaches. The two require different sets of skills and talent. Coaches lead the team, yet in terms of pay and public recognition, they often play second fiddle to their star players. Even the most celebrated coaches are best remembered for their marquee players.
When the players shine, there is a sense of reflected glory on the part of their coaches. This after all is what they are trying to achieve, consequently they do not envy or resent their players’ achievements.
The coaching leadership style attracts many personality types, including authoritarian ones. This leadership style is not exclusive to sports but is seen in not-for-profit organizations, academic and research institutions, and in firms of professionals (lawyers and accountants). In the corporate world, CEOs are increasingly acting more as coaches rather than as military leaders.
Unlike the rigid pyramidal command-and-control structure of the military, with few generals and admirals, few more colonels and majors, and a whole lot of captains and lieutenants, the coaching model has a flattened hierarchy, basically only two or three layers—coaches, assistant coaches, and players; a block with a gentle-sloped roof rather than a pyramid.
Like platoon commanders, coaches exert their control on their followers directly. They are there on the sideline during practice and at games. The communications are direct, and so are the feedbacks.
Arsene Wenger, the winning coach of the Arsenal soccer club, related that the most important part of his coaching job was to recruit new talent, and when he found one, to develop it. A crucial aspect to developing new talent was to ensure that he was not being overshadowed by existing players, the mighty oak stunting new saplings. Wenger had to let go many seasoned players well before their time because he felt that their presence inhibited the development of new talent. It would take an extremely confident coach to do this; it is counterintuitive. The usual tendency is to stick with your proven players rather than to try the new and untried.
Tun Razak increasingly assumed the coaching style of leadership after he settled the 1969 riot. He was unique in that he successfully made the smooth transition from being a military leader in the aftermath of the riot to the coach-like prime minister of a democracy. Many leaders cannot successfully make such transitions.
Tun Razak exhibited other unique qualities. He inherited a tired and less-than-talented cabinet from his predecessor, so he actively sought new talent. The political structure in UMNO then (like today) did not encourage the emergence of new talent, so he bypassed the system. He went outside of politics; from the civil service he recruited such seasoned leaders as Ghazali Shafie and Chong Hon Nam; from the private sector, Tengku Razaleigh. Under his tutelage, they scaled even greater heights. Abdullah Ahmad, Tun’s Special Assistant, went on to complete his studies at Cambridge and later became Mahathir’s Special Ambassador to the United Nations.
Tun Razak demonstrated his coaching style in other ways. When the tradition-bound civil service stymied his ambitious development plans, he did two things. First he hired an American management consultant (Milton Esman) to revamp the service. He could not possibly fire the entire civil service, so he decided to enhance its professionalism through extensive training. He sent young officers who had not quite yet acquired the bad habits of the civil service to graduate schools abroad. He initiated formal in-house training for fresh recruits instead of letting them loose to be trained haphazardly on the job. He realized that the civil service was incapable of executing his policies; yet needless criticism would simply undermine the organization.
His other bold strategy was to bypass completely the civil service. When bureaucrats stalled his policies, he created extra-governmental bodies to effectively bypass obscurantist civil servants. Thus was born the Government-linked companies (GLCs).
Like a good coach, Tun Razak first recruited fresh talent, and then groomed them to be developed fully and not be overshadowed by the old timers, the same strategy that Arsene Wenger used so successfully a decade later with his Arsenal team.
Malaysians were ready for the Tun’s coaching style because they were becoming better educated and more confident. He was also sufficiently flexible to adapt to the changes he saw in his followers. In short, Tun Razak’s leadership style was flexible; it was equipped with the metaphorical adjustable flaps.
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