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Ladies and Gentlemen,

Ladies and Gentlemen, For the last 1 and half days, we have been very fortunate to hear keynote addresses from our international speakers as well as local Malaysian speakers on Women in Leadership roles in Science and Technology.

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Ladies and Gentlemen,

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  1. Ladies and Gentlemen, For the last 1 and half days, we have been very fortunate to hear keynote addresses from our international speakers as well as local Malaysian speakers on Women in Leadership roles in Science and Technology. We just heard the presentations on policies, strategies and mechanisms from the 4 areas namely Academia and Education, Commercialisation Industry, Scientific Research and technology related professions. I am sure you will agree with me that there is a lot of work to be done to achieve our goal of getting to the 30% participation of women in the boardroom. Before I share my own perspectives, allow me to ask you to do one exercise. Now that you have heard so many new ideas I want you to fast forward to 5 years from now and think of a headline you want to read in one of our local newspapers – print or online about the achievements of women in leadership roles in Science and Technology. To do this, I want you to talk to your friends at the table and one of you can write that headline on a piece of paper. When you have done that, pass the slips to our team of rapporteurs who will collect them and share with you later.

  2. For the next few days, we ‘ll upload your slides on the website and if you have comments and remarks I suggest you email to NIEW – feedback@niew.gov.my or if you want to do now – write on a piece of paper and hand them to the team of rapporteurs at the back. Also I want to collect all the recommendations, appoint a Steering and Working Committee to refine the suggestions and formulate them into a comprehensive paper for submission to MOSTI and PM. If nothing happens here we have to keep on knocking on the right doors …don’t give up. My next few slides will focus on what I consider to be some of my own reflections on what I consider to be important on leadership for women in our country. You may have heard some of the things I am going to share so it may not be new but I think they need to be emphasised.

  3. 1. Defining leadership. I believe we need to define leadership from many perspectives. There are many entries into a leadership position. Some of us got into positions of leadership due to affiliations – political, family, expertise. So, leadership in Science and technology could also be developed by our contributions in many areas like being able to champion ground breaking research, new inventions that can be commercialised, becoming a thought leader and being revered for a particular field of expertise. There has to be a dual career ladder and tracking system – managerial and technical. As you know the country wants to move into the high income bracket and this requires women in science and technology to take the lead and become involved in innovations that are technology-based and market driven. This is where women leaders can play a role in ensuring that research conducted in universities can be patented, marketed and sold Those of you who are research based – you may want to look for opportunities to lead SMEs that are science based….

  4. 2. Determining women role models When we talk about leaders who are our point of reference. Do we have good examples of women role models. How do women behave when they are leaders. What are some expectations of society about those who come from an Islamic background? How are women leaders expected to lead from the Islamic perspective that we don’t know. And how do we define women role models ., Perhaps we can look at organizations that are already doing research in the area of leadership from the Islamic perspectives so that our efforts are not derailed by groups that may see the role of women from a different perspective.

  5. 3. Creating a conducive ecosystem to enable women to succeed in their roles A lot has been mentioned on work life balance, having family friendly policies like a creche, teleworking, exit and re entry strategies and a supportive environment that encourage women’s contribution, promote women’s agenda and celebrate women’s achievements. This is where we must know how to manage our priorities in life. We can never achieve a perfect balance but what we can do is to develop an integrated and women friendly environment where we as women can play our multiple roles and enjoy performing them without being too stressed. We have to manage the conflicting demands in our lives and learn to manage our life seamelessly There has to be flexibility, sustainability and mobility Mention your experience….In the Asian context a woman has to be not only a dutiful wife, a caring mother, and good daughter in law who has to take care of the young, the aged and her grandchildren!

  6. 4. Setting up of a Leadership Academy There has a to be a concerted effort to sensitize men on gender related issues. NIEW has embarked on a program to provide training for women leaders in te boardroom. Equally important is to provide gender orientation sessions for men who are leaders in organization to be empathetic towards women’s issues and what women have to do to succeed at the workplace. There are issues related to readiness when women take on roles in the boardroom and we have to do something to help reduce this built in fear in their personal belief system of “ I don’t want” to “I can do it and want to do it” . We can address this through coaching, mentoring and on going training I want to suggest that all of us who are in leadership roles make point to mentor and coach others. This is where MOSTI can be the catalyst to forge women’s leadership issue in S n T…

  7. 5. Capturing tacit knowledge of women I believe there are many women out there who are successful but have not been able to share their tacit knowledge about their success stories. We have to recognise their efforts and initiatives on what they have achieved and share what they have done with others. They are repository of knowledge and wisdom that we need to tap and I believe we have not been able to capture this knowledge because our leaders are not so responsive to being ‘studied” This is were we can persuade universities doing Gender studies to embark on as part of the documentation and publication on women in leadership roles.

  8. Ladies, I have spoken long enough and hope when we meet again we have some good news to share (make reference to the headlines – which we’ll past on the board at the back of the room)

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