Syeda Amtul
Saudi Gazette
JEDDAH — Abdallah S. Jum’ah, former CEO of Saudi Aramco, stated that professional competency and business acumen are essential for effective leadership. He made this statement during the ASIS Jeddah Chapter 194 4th conference at Hilton hotel here recently.
Many government officials, security personnel, opinion leaders, and businessmen attended the conference. Mohammed Al-Shammari, vice president of ASIS in the Middle East, was the honorary guest of the event.
The ceremony started with a welcome speech by Jeddah Chapter Chairman Abdullah I. AlIsa. He welcomed the guests and gave a brief description about the chapter, its responsibilities and accomplishments, followed by the speech of the platinum sponsor represented by Abdulelah Alfares, general manager of SABIC Company in the western and northern province.
Jum’ah, in his speech titled “The path of leadership; roses and thorns”, highlighted the important competencies of leaders in the business in particular the security industry. He stated that professional competency and business acumen are essential for effective leadership, but relevant soft skills are more important attribute amongst managers.
“And those leaders who expect surprises and contradictions in the business are the most capable of forming flexibility to deal with different arising issues.” He indicated that based on a Harvard study that soft skills formulates 70% of the skills needed for leaders to excel.
“More so successful leaders should be modest which gives them the opportunity to connect with their employees and lend them the space to freely speak their minds without fear,” he added.
He stated that leadership is an art of acquiring many factors and combining them in a creative form customized to suit specific organization. And that victory shouldn’t be celebrated before the final whistle (meaning before accomplishing the desired goal).
“Successful leaders learn from their failures in order to overcome future obstacles during their pursuit of success,” he said.
Jum’ah affirmed that leaders should feed their minds and hearts with the knowledge of arts, literature, and different cultures in order to become more creative, flexible, and understanding of different personalities and situations.
He concluded with stating that ethics remain the No. 1 factor in any system and without them all efforts crumble. Later a Q&A session was held between the main speaker and guests.
The event was sponsored by SABIC Company as the platinum sponsor and by SAMREF, YASREF, LUBEREF, and Petro-Rabigh as the bronze sponsors, and Saudi Aramco Company as the Strategic sponsor.
