Women leadership beyond Covid-19 crisis

Emeritus Professor Tan Sri Dato' Dzulkifli Abdul Razak
Opinion - New Straits Times
March 9, 2021

HAIL to mothers, aunts, sisters and all women (and girls) of the world. We salute all of them in conjunction with International Women's Day yesterday.

It acknowledges the tremendous efforts of women and girls around the world in shaping a future that is more just and resilient from the Covid-19 pandemic, while highlighting what remains to be done in the days ahead. It reminds me of Patricia Aburdene and John Naisbitt's Megatrends for Women, describing how the world will change for the better in the hands of women.

Like "disruptions", "megatrends" was popularised in the book of the same name in 1982. The term conjectures "a major restructuring, a larger pattern of broad trends that is reshaping and transforming our lives". It is also defined as "large social, economic, political, and technological changes [that are] slowly formed and once in place, they influence us for some time — between seven and 10 years, or longer".

They are about concerns and patterns of concern that persist over time which must be attended to. Some of the "earliest" trends discussed then were a change from an industrial society to an information society; forced technology to high-tech/high-touch; national economy to a world economy; short term to long term; centralisation to decentralisation; institutional help to self help; representative democracy to participatory democracy; hierarchies to networking; north to south; and either/or to multiple option.

Many of these are now familiar to us. In another book, Megatrends 2000 (1990), "The Decade of Women in Leadership" was predicted, documenting the importance of women in leadership roles. The rest is history.

It can be read with another perceived trend, where individuals are becoming "free of institutional constraints to become more in charge of one's own destiny" and unleashing new impetus in breaking through to top positions, bringing with it more "feminine-like values" of compassion, caring and collaboration into systems, much like family values at home.

Women's natural and organic leadership style as a progressive model is gradually gaining acceptance from several (male) leadership gurus, slowly transforming the dominant white male ways of leading an organisation, with intrinsic human values playing a crucial part.

Megatrends for Women describes one such state of women leadership, offering a prescient look at the future as more women assume leadership in the 21st century pre-pandemic.

This is not all. Recent evidence seems to show that countries led by women have managed to flatten the curve of the Covid-19 pandemic better, like Erna Solberg in Norway, Angela Merkel in Germany, Jacinda Ardern in New Zealand and Tsai Ing Wen in Taiwan.

This is now backed by research by University of Reading, under Uma Kambhampati, professor of economics, that said: "The infection rates in female-led countries were lower. But the significance of that difference was smaller than in the case of deaths. In the case of deaths, the significance was much more obvious."

While the study was based on the first three months of the pandemic, one point worth noting is that "women leaders appeared to approach the crisis with a singular vision: to save lives". On the other hand, their male counterparts, according to the research, set the fatality rate and the state of the economy as their key priorities.

The impact left the latter in a bind trying to precariously balance the nation's health against the state of the economy. The juggling may both cost time and lives, says Kambhampati. Another point worth noting is the fact that many more women are frontliners, sacrificing their lives in the fight against the pandemic. This is no less a leadership role too.

The best way to summarise this is to quote a report by the Harvard Business Review saying leaders are expected, among other things, to "display honesty and integrity; and are sensitive and understanding of the stress, anxiety, and frustration that people are feeling".

The analysis suggests that these are traits that are more often displayed by women, meaning that as the crisis continues and intensifies in many places, male leaders must learn to embrace those traits as well.

At the end of it all, it is the culture instilled by such traits that is more important in sustaining an egalitarian society with respectable power distance to ensure the best outcome possible beyond the current crisis. For this, we must pay tribute to our fellow women and their exemplary (crisis) leadership styles.

The writer, an NST columnist for more than 20 years, is International Islamic University Malaysia rector