GE13: How to choose our Leader using the C.A.P.I. method

This GE 13 we the rakyat will be choosing our leaders; MPs and ADUNs. These Malaysians will eventually steer our nation the next 5 years. Our votes are crucial and enormously important. We must be guided with reason, know-how and conscience.

I would like to share with you a method I designed for the corporate leaders in choosing Top Talents for their organization. This one is free, because Malaysia is worth it.  We call it C.A.P.I., making it easy for recall. I hope it will help you choose the best for Malaysia.

Capacity

A person’s capacity is the basic foundation of his or her ability to deliver. No amount of training or exposure can bring out what is expected from a talent if he or she lacks the capacity. Like a car engine, capacity determines the ability to perform under different circumstances. The larger the capacity, the greater the propensity to deliver. We cannot ask a car with a 4 cylinder engine of 1500CC to perform like a 12 cylinder with 6000CC one no matter how much we try to modify it. That would be sending the person to failure. When the leader fails, our country suffers.

Achievement

True achievement is about results; not efforts, not promises, not words. Top talents focus their energies on where the results are, they make things happen, they deliver. They spend more time doing and delivering. They don’t talk as much as they do. When they talk, it is to engage people to perform. They want to get things done, make things right. They lead people to actions that are based on clear goals. We must choose leaders that deliver.

People Skills

Top talents deliver through working with and through people. They harness and focus the energy of others toward common goals. They are team leaders. Talent who prefers working alone are specialists and they are great support for top talents. Remember that we must choose talents that work with others in their effort to move up in an organization, not rise up by stepping on them. The latter will cause future disunity to the team.

In the Malaysian context we must also choose leaders who are willing to listen and work with not just a particular race, but every ethnic group. Not just with those in the Peninsular but also Sabah and Sarawak and vice versa. Care for those in urban as well as the rural areas plus willing to engage not just the old, but the middle aged and the young. In short, we must choose a leader that is with the rakyat, one that will work with us and care much about our well-being.

Integrity

Leadership must come with integrity - there is no compromise. Without integrity talent is a liability. No matter how brilliant, knowledgeable or successful, lack of integrity disqualifies any and all talent for any leadership position. We must check their track record like their propensity to lie, practice double standards, say one thing and do the other. In short in choosing our leaders, integrity is the final sift that must not be put aside no matter what.

Anas Zubedy

Kuala Lumpur