Decisive

A decisive person will show the ability to make decisions quickly but effectively. An entrepreneur needs to have this characteristic in order to become a good leader. In addition, uncertainty in making a decision exist in any organization can be called as a “killer” of the organization. Therefore, when an entrepreneur takes too long to make a decision, either due to lack of knowledge or fear of making mistakes, it creates a period of anxiety in the employees toward the entrepreneur. It can also be stated as an act of procrastination, which means that the entrepreneur puts off or delaying, especially something requiring immediate attention or decision. This is not an admirable virtue for great leaders. An entrepreneur needs to consider all pertinent facts in making a decision. Hence, entrepreneurs need to lead by some examples and being decisive will instil the same level of rapid response in the rest of the organization.

The characteristic of decisive can be seen in the Malaysian’s entrepreneur, Dato’ Azman Hashim. Nowadays, he is the heads of AmBank Group, which he started in 1976 as the Arab-Malaysian Merchant Bank. In October 2014, a statement was released that saying he was not negotiating to sell his stake after rumors that he was looking to cash out. He also holds stakes in investment bank ECM Libra; RCE Capital, which he chairs; and Amcorp Properties, which younger brother Azmi chairs.

There are examples that can be seen that he have the characteristic of decisive. In March 1988, when a number of banks forcing Dato’ Syed Mohamed Syed Kechik to sell Temerloh Rubber Estates Bhd as a way to settle his debt, Dato’ Azman Hashim save the situation by take the firm and the parent company. By making a strong bid and reasonable decision, he applied for a period of one week prior to the Committee on Foreign Investment and won the bid for the firm.

Then, he was easily agitated after four years working in the Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) and then resigned to establish accounting firm Azman and Co. In 1964, accounting is a very new field and does not have a lot of practitioners. Over the past 10 years with Maybank, he successfully opened the largest bank network in Southeast Asia to introduce computing system and eventually founded the largest bank in Malaysia. In the early 1970s, he sits on the board of directors of many companies and has been involved with the establishment of Pernas International Bhd. In 1980, he took the opportunity to give a block of shares of Kwong Yik Bank Bhd but then quit because it would be a minority shareholder of the bank.

Besides that, following with the acquisition and expansion of Taiping Textiles and Arab Malaysian Development Bank at the time, he was carrying a huge debt. At that time, analysts expect the debt to reach between RM350 and RM400 million. He had to make a decision which is to offer as low as RM1.50 per square feet rent than RM5 to attract tenants along with three months free rent to solve the debt problem.

In a nutshell, Tan Sri Dato' Azman Hashim has the ability to identify things and make decision quickly. Due to the banks and business entails a lot of agreement on paper, he will often overlooks piles of paper which may lead him fall into stressful situation, but he was able to overcome it in the end. This characteristic is a need for entrepreneur or even managers in the review of all documents, from corporate loans until the money for charity purposes. Therefore, having a characteristic of decisive is very important for any entrepreneur to ensure the success of its hard work.

(Logo of AmBank Group and Dato’ Azman Hashim)