Since 1998, Group President and CEO of CapitaLand Limited, Liew Mun Leong, has taken up the “hobby” of writing e-mails to his colleagues on Sunday afternoons. The topics vary from interesting thoughts, work encounters, travel anecdotes, and musings drawn from books, news articles and even TV shows!
Using a conversational style of writing, Liew Mun Leong takes this opportunity to reinforce the company’s core values, morals, ethics and ethos to his more than 11, 000 colleagues in 113 cities across over 20 countries.
These Sunday e-mails were eventually compiled into a book entitled, Building People: Sunday E-mails from a CEO, which was launched in November 2007. Since then, Mun Leong has written enough e-mails for a second volume.
The company launched the second volume in November 2010 in time for their 10th anniversary. Like the first book, all royalties from the second book will be donated to the CapitaLand Hope Foundation, CapitaLand’s philanthropic arm which supports programmes for the
shelter, education and medical needs of underprivileged children.
The chapters of this book are cleverly organised into themes rather than following the timeline of the e-mails. It covers topics such as business management, work-life integration, and a whole chapter on doing business in China, among others.
In the first chapter, Mun Leong shares with his colleagues insights on how to manage during turbulent times. He goes on to elaborate why share prices were so badly affected, to in-depth discussion that tells the story of the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008.
The e-mails are filled with in-depth and insightful knowledge based on Mun Leong’s experiences, thoughts and inspirations that will definitely open your eyes to the true secret of success, the impor- tance of values in a company and upholding to them with dignity and utmost integrity.
Useful and impactful – Mun Leong’s advice is one that will stay with you for a long time. With the right morals, success will be yours to keep. No doubt, this is the part of the book, which I enjoyed and learnt the most.
Mun Leong’s passion for “building people” and creating the right corporate culture are the cornerstones of his leadership. No surprise that leadership and enterprise are topics further addressed in a number of e-mails to his colleagues. Mun Leong shares his thoughts on what leadership means to him and what true leaders are. He goes on to explain the importance of inculcating a sense of leadership and responsibility in future leaders.
Mun Leong’s sentiment on filial piety is another topic of interest that I found to be true and fondly admirable. His intuitive thoughts on this matter make it comforting to know that filial piety is still and should be on high priority, which again reiterates the significance of values in an individual which is often taken for granted.
Drawing from the success of the first volume, the second serving of the book did not disappoint in effectively communicating CapitaLand’s core values and corporate culture not only to its staff but to readers as well.
Mun Leong’s anecdotes, delivered in a frank and engaging manner, will surely keep readers intrigued and hoping to receive more of his candid Sunday E-mails.
