KARACHI: A book titled “Corporate Pakistan - Insights to Leadership & Governance”, authored by eminent banker Sirajuddin Aziz, was launched at a local hotel on Monday.
Sirajuddin has shared deep insights to corporate governance through a collection of articles segregated into six different sections of the book.
The first section deals with organizational development and the culture of an organization that plays a pivotal role in making an organization or in shattering it.
There is a subtle difference in ‘sharing’ and understanding the feelings of another, as explained in the article “Empathetic Organization”, but sympathy should not translate into becoming a feeling of sympathy for the sufferer.
The article, “Management Maladies” highlights the common ailments in organizations. The leaders’ exhibit human weakness of preferring loyalty to competence and the new leader wants to redraw everything on the canvas of his organization to justify his existence.
The next section of the book: Behavioural Management has twenty-nine articles and some of the recurring themes that exist in the articles resonate with organizations’ work experience. Each article is packed with unusual insights.
This section - a cluster of articles - is very helpful in fixing leadership failures. The leader, who is not willing to do any diagnostics or identification of problems and lets the sleeping dogs lie, has a limited shelf life.
The third section consists of articles on leadership and covering multiple aspects pertaining to organizations like corporate wickedness where over smart professionals dig holes for others and eventually fall into the same hole.
The fourth section is titled Corporate Communication. This section makes us realize that rules of engagement are going through a major metamorphosis of change due to the introduction of technology.
The fifth section of the book shares very useful self-help tools while the sixth and final section of the book shares the importance of human resource management.
Keynote Speaker, former Governor State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), Dr Ishrat Hussain said that the author has demolished the notion that bankers are boring, due to certain nature of their work, by authoring this book. “This book is full of quotes from famous leaders, scholars and literary giants”.
He said this book is a useful addition to the academic literature and it could be taught in the country’s business schools. He suggested disseminating the knowledge accumulated in this book through videos and vlogs and snippets.
Senior journalist Agha Masood said Sirajuddin Aziz is born-writer and a philosopher. “I value this specific book and this can be utilized in educational institutions”, he added.
Zafar A. Khan - former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Engro Chemical Pakistan said Sirajuddin Aziz is not only an eminent banker but also an accomplished writer. He said the author has covered leadership and governance issues very well in this book.
Dr Huma Baqai, professor at Institute of Business Administration (IBA) said the author’s work has brought insights to corporate governance. She said Sirajuddin Aziz is a tremendous writer, contributing to the intellectual cause.
Former Senator Javed Jabber and Chairman Pathfinder Ikram Sehgal also spoke.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022