ASIAN LEADERSHIP  CCL ASIA

Asia - In tough economic times, are Asian leaders able to cope with the challenges posed by the downturn?

While it is difficult to generalise the way Asian leaders are coping with the recession, the type of economies in which companies operate in will dictate the steps leaders take to manage the crisis, says Sureish Nathan, Asia Pacific vice president and managing director of Center for Creative Leadership Asia.

With some Asian societies with strong roots of Confucianism that stress obedience and the collective good, Nathan says "such precepts may allow difficult but necessary solutions to be implemented more readily".

There is also a growing recognition of the emergence of global leadership, says Nathan, with a clear move towards collaboration and cooperation that illustrates an interconnectedness of a global era. 

"Whether Asian or Western, leaders who understand and exhibit collaboration, communication and learning agility are able to lead effectively and hopefully succeed in bringing their organisations through the crisis," comments Nathan.

In addition, some Asian economies take on strong cooperations between the government and and private sector. For example, there is collaboration between the public and private sectors in countries such as Singapore and Thailand. Collective efforts are also epitomised in the ASEAN governments coming together to find a response to the crisis.

From previous crises like the SARS epidemic, leaders in Singapore have demonstrated an enormous capacity to learn from each situation that they encountered, says Nathan. He adds that Singapore leaders have now returned to the key resource that has made Singapore successful - its people - which is evident through the amount of investment spent in retraining the workforce.