A I S E H M A N . O R G

Why am I not surprised?

After leaving the twin towers some time ago and catching up with some of the old pals, it seems that it has become from bad to worse.

If you want to see how red tape hinders a organisation - its a glaring example,hypocrisy, asskissing, kickbacks and office politics? - top of the league. Lofty and expensive management initatives with no tangible results? - its a dream client for bloodsucking consultants. And the fact that it is predominantly one race....well you know the outcome. Put them in one group and they think they're invincible. Oh, I'm also a malay BTW.

The problem is that you only see how screwed up it is once you leave and see it from the outside.

Been there, seen that and hated that.

our government believes it owes no one anything!
we the citizens are its servants. fullstop.

no appologies for wrong-doings,
no explanations for wrong decisions
no eye see for the consequences of wrong policies
no sympathy for sufferings of its people

yes?

Not anything surprising, really. I've been servicing the O&G industry for the past 15 years, and deal with Petronas every now and again. And what Tron commented is all true, sadly. There are some really bright sparks in the organization, in fairness. But the beaureaucracy and politics frustrates many.

Reports like this can be taken one of two ways. Petronas can either use the findings positively and improve themselves based on best-in-class. Being recognized as the world's top 15 does make you realize how deficient you really are in real-world best of class terms.

OR get the Government to step in and lambast the report as being Western-biased, this that and the other, and maintain the status quo. The cynical side of me thinks the latter. OR better yet - ensure it doesn't get reported in the mainstream media.

When it comes to ethics, however, this is where Malaysian companies in general fail miserably, and I don't think any large corporation in this country has a structured corporate ethics program. But then again, what good is having an ethically sound organization when successfully doing business in this country neccessitates one to push the ethics aside? I left an MNC (with which I was in for over 10 years) for a homegrown Malaysia-based company, and the difference is glaringly obvious especially when it comes to business ethics. But it's a vicious cycle, really. To be comepletely ethical in business here in Malaysia is tantamount to commercial suicide; like it or not one has to play the game, especially when dealing with GLC's.

What it takes is for our CEO (i.e. Pak Lah) to live up to his rhetoric of irradicating graft and pumishing those found guilty, without fear or favor. He started it initially, but his efforts have somehow kinda fizzled. Almost as if he realized, all of a sudden, that doing so would be political suicide.

The buck's gotta stop somewhere...

Before we let off steam and head toward the slippery slope ala Screenshots, let's analyse the result in a more balanced manner.

My intention is not to defend Petronas but to challenge the Malaysian habit of accepting anything coming from the West as bibical truth.

Firstly we need to take these results with a pinch of salt.I have seen hundreds of surveys done by highly regarded research companies and organisations that never even came close to reflect reality.

In this case, at least to me the measurements are not real apple-to-apple comparison. You cannot compare government owned oil companies with listed firms like Shell, BP,etc. Obviously the govt owned companies are not required to disclose their operational and financial results by law unlike their listed counterparts. Secondly the national oil companies have different sets of objectives (managing the national oil resources,etc).As such this survey is rather meaningless exercise.

Furthermore it appears that the survey was done based on the numbers picked up from public sources rather than actual analysis or in depth research.

I wonder how Shell made it to the top of the list considering their track record in putting profit before ethics and conscience (remember what they did during the apartheid era ?).

I work for a Fortune 200 company and I can share a dirty little secret. Most of the big companies have tons of written ethical and environmental policies and guidelines. But most of the time, these policies are only implemented on the paper. Try reporting an unethical practice in a big company. At the best you will be ignored but more often than not you will be either harassed to drop it, blacklisted or hounded out of the job.

Generally the Europeans do not let ethical considerations to stop them from winning business deals. However the Taiwanese, the Koreans and the Chinese use unethical practices as business strategies. To be fair, the Americans do at least try to look ethical. But that doesn't mean that they are as ethical as they claim to be. Some of the biggest companies are still cooking their books and we will be seeing more scandals in the coming months and years...

In my view, the real problem with Petronas is that it suffers from the same ills that plaguing almost every Malaysian govt dept or GLC, ie, lack of accountability and performance culture.

When a Petronas overturned and went into a ravine in Sabah's Penampang District polluting the water catchment area, the response was poor until a report was made to the press and only one local newspaper highlighted the issue because the local politicians were silent about it too. Then it blamed its transportation subcontractor and reassure the public affected by the bad water supply that its depot response team were in action etc but it PR kept mute all about how it contained the situation. After a letter to the editor of a local newspaper, its PR top brass in KL had the cheek to call up the editor and enquire whether the adverse publicity was the handiwork of its competitors in Sabah. I was at the Kota Kinabalu Petronas office once and all its staff made a beeline for some Petronas jackets with the souvenir value of its Sudan operations. I wonder whether its PR people will put this as a case of jealousy by the western oil companies to tarnish its reputation or a plot by westerners to punish all who aids Sudan.

Its not my intent to lepas steam to the twin tower folks but that is what I had seen, experienced and like my fellow comrades who left to cleaner pastures felt very sad and frustrated about.

Only, Its such a shame to see that a company which has so many resources and cash at its hands is unable to utilise it to be a world class organisation. To thump ones chest mightly in an enclosed and controlled environment does not make you the king of the jungle. How do you create a high performance culture when your employees feel that either way, their jobs are secure and the fat bonuses will keep rolling in and that there is enough dinosaurs fossils to support the kitty for at least until they retire?

Yes, Im working in a top American MNC now and I can tell you that the standard of transparency, culture and accountability is miles and miles ahead of them. None of it was ever initiated with ridiculous amounts of money and it worked.

But the difference is that we cannot afford not to be competitive as we are competing globally. Some will always try to eat our lunch and even dinner if we blink. So they must be competitive before anything else.

Like my top management always, say : We are moving forward fast. Either you get on the bus or get off the bus. If you are on the bus and hesitate and be complacent, we wont wait till we reach the next bus stop to ask you to leave - we'll just push you off.

Can we expect to see new self praise billboards soon?

The report confirm what we have always known. Its UMNO/BN propaganda machinery that keep saying other wise. The only problem is they don't care so long as there is money to spend and threaten people with. The thing with these people is that so long as they can gaya, gaya, they think they are OK.

errr.. i work in petronas and the claims is only 25-75% true , grrrrr

Where else can you find a "speciliast engineer" without engineering degree? Petronas.

Anonimos,

Really? A "speciliast engineer" in Petronas does not have an engineering degree? Quite a surprise. How did Petronas get all those oil out from the oil field into the motor vehicle that we are driving on the road, or into the aeroplane especially those from MAS that flies people from one part of Malaysia to another part of Malaysia or the rest of the world?

BTW, what is a "speciliast engineer"?

Folks, just to share..my brother used to work for Petronas once but left dit ue to unhappiness over the inefficiency, nepotism and lack of performance culture and opaque promotion process.

We all know this and it is no great earth shattering revealation.Petronas can be a lot more efficient and more profitable if these weaknesses can be eliminated.

But let's view things in perspective. We cannot compare Petronas with Shell or BP as it is like comparing apple with orage. Shell and BP are publicly-owned companies and operate under a very different condition from Petronas. What I am saying here is that this report is typical of a Western company which doesn't know what it is talking about. What would be a better comparison would be one set of measurement for private and another for govt-owned ones.

I think Malaysians need to be more questioning especially about ideas or concepts coming from the West. We tend to take these as the gospel truth while being over critical with our own kind.

Petronas still got lots of things to improve but nevertheless for a fully owned GLC it compares very favorably with its peers. Politics and GLCs are intertwined, having said that political intervention is not necessarily a bad thing and it does have its good points provided the politicians themselves are above board.
I hate to admit it but the Singaporean GLCs are doing a much better job at managing themselves.Unfortunately, over here 'harap pagar, pagar makan padi' mentality a is systematic malaise and since local politicians/officials act like 'raja', change by domestic pressure will be slow and painful. Therefore, it might be more efficient to open up GLCs to 'active' foreign investors to encourage more transparency, ie. those with a big stake.