Purposeful Leadership is essential for Sustainability paradigm of any organizations to develop and realize any aspirations of their strategic plans and goals. According to the talk series I attended on 31st July 2019 at UTM, by Tan Sri Abdul Wahid Omar had shared about his Journey being a Leader to sustain and improve the organization level, Lesson and Thoughts on organizational sustainability.

Tan Sri is currently the chairman of the board of directors of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM). Formerly the Group Chairman of PNB, Senator and Minister in the Prime Minister’s Dept in charge of Economic Planning, President & CEO of Maybank, etc.

During the talk, in order to sustain the organization, firstly is selecting the right leader. The ability of good integrity with the right competencies and equipped with humility of which the right leader must have a mutual respect, cognisant and teamwork. Second is to have a proper planning and talent review process to cover the key position of which each position, we must identify three potential candidates. In addition is a good planning effort must be taken into place. Third is about balance between internal and external hires. Forth is rejuvenation; the enforcement of not to be at the same position and comparison of work’s performance and to allow others to give ideas or opinions before giving your own decision. Fifth is diversity, such as, skills, genders, ethnicity and be multinational. Next is to be conscious and alert of affinity which could lead to favouritism, or even worst to become cronyism or prejudice. Seventh is about giving opportunity to younger worker to expand talent and nurture future leaders to lead the organization.

On top of that, one must be clear with their purpose or role of the position they hold. Thus, a clear mandate could determine the purpose of each job’s role and to be focus on your task or your job at hand. The lesson learnt by leadership and management is to perform a full diagnosis of the organization (such as to determine the strength, weakness, opportunity and threat) and therefore could match the task. The leader must formulate strategies for a clear and measurable short-term and long-term target with a good communication skill within the organization. One must align interest with mission and vision together with the organization’s strategic plans and goals. Every time the aspiration or goal is achieved, the leader could share the rewards among team and performed employee(s) would increase the competencies among themselves.

The principles are that; one must focus on fundamentals to address the core issues and to have a clear target and objective with identified benefits without over spin. In short, the leader must possess the following attributes of leadership skills; clear purpose and focus on job at hand, do not be a typical person, hands-on, professional, honest and sincere.

In addition, one must be grateful for their job and focus on improving the quality. Being the leader is about comprehend and determine the right strategies to optimize revenue and to reflect quality of product and never sacrifice on the quality. One must identify the constraint to encourage and do not stop learning while work harder and smarter to excel, not as an individual but as an organization. Therefore, each contribution to the organization is the effort one has shown to enhance the organization financial sustainability, excellence and everyone must do and contribute their parts, work harder to achieve the short-term and long-term target.