Leadership & Organizations

The recent outrage against the NKF led me to reflect upon these 2 concepts: leadership & organizations.

Leadership (the task) --> leaders (the executors) --> to rise to the task, these executors should ideally demonstrate (i)capability & (ii)that they have the mandate to lead.

Item (i) is easier -- relevant qualifications (IQ) + experience (AQ) should be reasonably sufficient to place one in the running for a leadership position in a meritocractic system.  Item (ii) is more difficult -- it boils down to having won the hearts &/minds of those being led and those who support the organization's purpose.

How does one continue to lead when item (ii) is shattered?  Tough.

Then there's the issue of organizations.  Commercial enterprises exist for the primary purpose of revenue-profitability and market survival &/ dominance.  The KPIs are fairly straight-forward.  It's about numbers.

Charity organizations may learn from Best Practices and structure themselves like world-class commercial enterprises but at their core, they should be different.  They exist for charity, not revenue-profit and market dominance.  It should not be narrowly focused on the numbers.  When it does so, the charity organization has lost the soul of its existence.

What is to be expected when 2/3 of the country's population who contribute to the operations of a charity find out that instead of 3 years of reserves, they have 30; that the number of dialysis patients treated have been inflated, and that the CEO receives a 12-month bonus on a $25,000 monthly salary and has lavish fittings in the private restroom of his office?  It's hard to stomach especially since a large number of the contributing population earns $25,000 or less net of CPF deductions annually.  The backlash was fast and furious, especially with the help of the internet.

Even if the matter subsides, the issue remains.  Shattered trust is hard to mend even with the most heartwrenching stories and slick PR for the organization.  Lost credibility of its leadership is hard to earn especially when many are of the opinion that its leader shows no remorse.  Let's just hope that those 30 years of reserves are going to last for a while -- the people have spoken and many will demonstrate by voting with their pockets.