Humility in leadership

I’ve been out and about for 2 full days since Monday. It was a mix of client meetings and in-depth interviews (IDIs) with senior management (some project that my company took on, but they needed “help” — “help” to build relationships with these senior management).

In my three IDIs with CEOs and Directors of public hospitals and healthcare providers over the past 2 days, a key takeaway was how down to earth and humble they were. Even in such senior positions, they do not forget to show their humanity, when it is very easy for them to say that, the higher they climb in society, the more they should be able to show their “power”. I thoroughly enjoyed my interviews with the three of them so far, and I have five more to go tomorrow.

(A reminder to self to be the same.)

In the midst of my client meetings, I had to make an interesting trip on cable car yesterday afternoon to Mount Faber, to collect tender documents. I wouldn’t have paid the S$30 required to take such a joyride otherwise, not in my own country (and alone!) — not that I paid a cent for it. :) It was a nice look at how the HarbourFront area had changed over the years though, and the last time I was on a cable car was Fjellheisen in Tromso last year.

It will have been a disaster to do a hike up the hill just to collect the tender documents, in full work wear…:/

I felt bad about not having to pay though, so after that, I did a hike back down the hill in my work clothes (with the stupid tie removed of course…) :/