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A discussion on leadership at AI Summit 2020

Are there differences in the leadership DNA of female and male leaders?
“Women leaders have handled the Covid-19 crisis better than their male counterparts.”
“Regardless of gender, there are 4 fundamental traits of a leader – higher level of self-awareness, learning agility, skills to influence and communication skills.”
“Be gender blind even with yourself and you’ll find out more often than not they will treat you equally.”
“Its crucial to have an open mindset and be receptive.”
These were some of the views discussed at the recent AI Summit 2020, where 30% Club Malaysia was a supporting partner. The panel discussion was moderated by Raj Kumar Paramanathan, Managing Partner of CnetG Asia and a 30% Club Advocate.
Five eminent panelists, CEO and Country Head of Sun Life Rizalina Mantaring, Board Director Ayla Majid, HSBC Malaysia Head of Commercial Banking Karel Avni Doshi, Executive Search & Board Advisor for African Markets Debbie Goodman-Bhyat, and Center for Creative Leadership Senior Director and Head of Asia Research Sunil Puri, shared their views on what leadership traits are and their relevance for a sustainable and inclusive new world.
Celebration of Cohort 5

The 30% Club Malaysia would like to congratulate the Cohort Five – a total of ten women- on successfully completing the nine-month mentoring journey to become board-ready.
The Cohort 5 are participants of the Board Mentoring Scheme, which aims to accelerate the appointment of more women into board positions as well as enhancing diversity and inclusion in public-listed companies.
Since the launch in 2017, more than 40 women has gone through the 9-month mentoring scheme and 27% are on boards of listed/non-listed companies. The 30% Club Malaysia would also like to welcome the on-boarding of the sixth cohort – a total of 20 participants – to start their nine-month mentoring journey.
A total of 53 distinguished members of the corporate community have also participated as mentors in the scheme. The mentors have volunteered their time to help our next generation of female directors to reach their potential.
Are you Board Ready?

“Our mission for the next 12 months will be to continue mobilising the collective Chairs and CEOs to achieve the 30% pivotal point among the top 100 PLCS while we start engaging with the next 100 PLCs and also the fast movers on Bursa Malaysia,” said Datin Ami Moris, Chair, 30% Club Malaysia.
“We will also create awareness amongst startups and LEAP market listed companies, so they can get started on the right foot by leveraging the “30% business case” to ensure they set the best foundation for future success,” she said.
Ami Moris was delivering her first opening address as the chair of 30% Club Malaysia at a panel session on Conversations with Mentors: Boardroom Realities: Are you ready? The panelists of the session were Johan Raslan and Tunku Alina Alias while the moderators were Nikki Gee and, Tengku Marina Badlishah (who is also the host). The event was an initiative by Mentee Circle through its Board Mentoring Scheme.
Ami shared three key messages – The 30% Club Malaysia is committed to broaden the pipeline of aspiring board-ready candidates, which in turn can support and supply to the Talent pipeline of women candidates.
“In September, we launched the 7th cohort of the Board Mentoring Scheme. Since 2017, a total of 68 mentees have completed the Board Mentoring Scheme, with 53 mentors supporting us. I am happy to note that to date 33% of the mentees from cohorts #1 to #6 have been placed on company boards,” she said.
She added that is to continue raising the awareness that it is not always the case that only a former CEO or CFO makes the best board member. Other domain experts, who may be women, in various specialisations such as risk, data science and sustainability are increasingly pivotal in navigating board room stewardship and strategic foresight,” she added.
This second message is the HOW will be a matter of bringing awareness and understanding of the 30% Business Case amongst listed companies and then providing a steady stream of the right talent.
With #ESG being a measurable benchmark across organisations, diversified, inclusive and strong scoring ESG companies are likely to be more attractive to today’s lenders, investors and consumers who have become more purpose-driven and sustainability-conscious.
The final message was there are 3 key data points that will continue to drive our agenda. Boards with at least one-third women representation correlates with 38% higher median ROE than boards with no women representation.
Companies that have directors from more than three different ethnic backgrounds show stronger correlation with higher valuations. Companies in the top quartile for gender diversity on executive teams were 25% more likely to have above-average profitability than companies in the fourth quartile.
Clearly, we have a packed agenda with much work to do.
Women are the most likely changemakers for climate action

Stronger together
Diversity and climate are top priorities for CEOs and boards of directors, but almost none have considered how linking the two management priorities could accelerate their transition to net‑zero emissions.
As the Oliver Wyman Forum and the 30% Club prepared for COP26 in Glasgow, we set out to uncover what can be achieved when diversity, and specifically gender representation, is included in companies’ climate change plans.
The question was more difficult to answer than we had anticipated. For example, starting with large data sets, we looked at how corporate diversity and climate outcomes might be correlated. Relationships were positive but statistically weak. However, with so many factors at play, we felt that focusing solely on these high‑level numbers was a red herring.
As our research and interviews with more than 20 companies progressed, it became clear that not only are women often excluded from many high-level government and corporate discussions on climate, their role as climate-action changemakers is largely unrecognized and underestimated.
Yet businesses need to include female colleagues, customers, and investors if they are serious about meeting net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.
We consider this report as just the beginning of research on what can be achieved if a greater mix of people — including women — is more explicitly included in companies’ attempts to reach net-zero emissions.
This report talks about action from corporations deliberately. Clearly, this must be taken together with action from governments, the third sector, civil society, and beyond.


We are grateful for your understanding over this report’s limitations — for example, our focus on women in Western countries and a binary view of gender that is not inclusive of all identities and experiences.
We recognize that we do not cover intersectionality or other dimensions of difference, such as race and ethnicity, primarily due to a lack of data.
Despite this, we felt it important to continue and hope the report will have some impact in driving greater awareness and understanding of the critical linkages between these issues.
We thank and are grateful to the many colleagues who were willing to share their expertise and the companies we interviewed. We hope you find our initial research helpful as you consider your transition plans and look forward to continuing the conversation and research.
Rupal Kantaria
Partner, Oliver Wyman Forum
Ann Cairns
Global Chair, 30% Club and Executive Vice Chair, Mastercard

Where we are
The 30% Club has come a long way from when it was set up in the UK in 2010.We now span six continents and more than 20 countries. We’re actively expanding into more G20 countries

More women in boards: IdDC awards scholarships for the “Effective Directories” program 2020
In order to promote diversity and inclusion on the boards, as well as increase the incorporation of women in the Senior Management of companies, the Institute of Directors of Chile, IdDC, awarded two scholarships for its corporate governance program “Effective Directories” 2020.

Ana María Rabagliati from Antofagasta Minerals and Gabriela Feierabend from Willis Towers Watson were the winners. After receiving the news, Ana María Rabagliati, Vice President of Human Resources at Antofagasta Minerals, said us that she was “very enthusiastic and grateful for the opportunity they have given me to participate in this program. I believe that it will give me effective tools to contribute from my role as director and acquire knowledge that will allow me to strengthen my contribution to the development of good corporate governance of companies. ”
At the same time, Gabriela Feierabend, CFO of Willis Towers Watson Chile, said us she is “very grateful to be able to participate and earn this scholarship for the Directory Efectivos program. I firmly believe in gender equality and that there is no barrier in women if we believe in ourselves. I hope that this program will give us a different perspective as directors and how to act in this ‘new reality’ in a responsible and effective way ”.
The scholarship was focused on women candidates from the companies associated with the Club of 30%, with an experience of at least 15 years, of which the last 5 have been in leadership positions and roles and who are currently aspiring to be board member.
Club Leaders meet up
“There will be no progress if one doesn’t work actively. Looking at each other and wonder why the absence of female leadership in our strategic initiatives, has been important to think about our culture that we must change”, says Hernán Rodríguez, President of Colbún Energía and Member of the 30% Club Chile.

At the same time, Juan Carlos Eichholz told us “How diversity culture and female leadership attributes are very necessary at digital age. In addition, there are experiments that have shown that teams work improves when there is 30% as minimum representation”.

Ricardo Falú, GG of AES Gener told us about his successful experience incorporating 50% of women at work in Colombia and the support to them. Both companies are competition, but they are collaborating and sharing best practices.


30% Club Chile: First business leaders breakfast
Chile: In our first activity, Ann Cairns, Global Chair of the 30% Club and Executive Vice Chair of Mastercard, welcomed us and shared the experience in the UK and other countries and how they have been able to achieve their goals.
Participants could share different best practices, policies and vision of the impact of diversity in their organizations, interest in Club of 30% Chile purpose, in particular for CEOs and Presidents, through the Investor Group and in the redefinition of merit and talent search.
Different key players took part in this event such as Ivan Arriagada, Chief Executive Officer AMSA; Ana Maria Rabagliati, VP of Human Resources AMSA; Rene Aguilar, VP of Corporate Affairs and Sustainability AMSA; Cecilia Arrue, Corporate Technical Manager Processing Minera Zaldivar; Rosario Orchard, VP of Planning and Control Management Minera Centinela; Paula Aguirre, VP of Finance Minera Antucoya and Edgar Rojas, VP of Organizational Development AMSA.

#BalanceForBetter
Held at the Globe and Mail Centre, our 2019 International Women’s Day event gathered investors, not-for-profits, corporations and academia together to recognize this year’s #BalanceforBetter theme, one that provides a unified direction to guide and incite continuous collective action.
Check out our highlight reel here, the event recap and action-oriented takeaways from our distinguished #BalanceforBetter speakers here, and our photo gallery from the event here.
Celebration of Cohort 6

The Cohort Six are participants of the Board Mentoring Scheme, which aims to accelerate the appointment of more women into board positions as well as enhancing DEI in PLCs.
At the opening address by Dato Abdul Aziz Abu Bakar, Executive Co-Founding Chair, 30% Club Malaysia, he said that one of the common feedback from the mentees was the knowledge they have gained through the sharing of experience from their respective mentors on a broad selection of governance topics.
“They have also benefited from attending a range of knowledge sharing sessions, which were mostly online. It is also heartening to hear from our mentors that their mentees have been in the driving seat and have owned their mentoring journey – setting mentoring goals, tracking their development progress and taking away guidance and suggestions from their respective mentors – for their professional and personal development,” he said during the 30% Club Malaysia Mentoring Celebration virtual event.
The event saw the Graduation of Cohort#6 and Onboarding of Cohort#7. A total of 17 women are participating in the Cohort #7.
Since 2017, a total of 68 mentees who went through this Board Mentoring Scheme, with 53 mentors supporting the initiative of the Board Mentoring Scheme.
“We hope, that through the Mentoring Scheme, we now have a broader pipeline of aspiring board-ready candidates, which in turn can support and grow the talent pipeline of women candidates and bring about a sustainable change in DEI into Corporate Malaysia.” he said.
“I am happy to note that to date, more than 30% of our mentees have been placed on company boards, thus also supporting the target of the MCCG 2021 which recommends to all listed companies that boards comprise of at least 30% women directors,” he added.
Although we have made significant progress towards the target of at least 30% by end of 2020, we still have a way to go. The participation of WoB to date stands at 25.5% for the top 100 listed companies, and 17.0% for all PLC boards, in comparison to the 30% recommendation by the SC.
Nevertheless, this updated code sends a clearer signal to all listed companies to encourage diversity in their board composition, encompassing not only gender, but also to take the opportunity to increase diversity in the tenure and age of boards, as well as experiences, skills, background and culture.
The event concluded with a dialogue session (organised by Mentee Circle) by Martin Manen, Chairman of the Board, Hong Leong MSIG Takaful Berhad and Sazlyna Sapiee, a mentee of the Board Mentoring Scheme.
He shared his experiences as a mentor and, explained that “Diversity is to be invited to the party, Inclusion is to be asked to dance”.
Once again, the 30% Club Malaysia would like to congratulate the graduating Cohort#6 and welcome the Cohort#7 on embarking their mentoring journey.