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ASKING WHY
Asking Why is a collection of eclectic speeches and writings by prominent entrepreneur Ho Kwon Ping during his life so far, from schooldays through to a career in journalism and as a public intellectual, over a period of over 40 years. Included are speeches to various audiences and articles commissioned by The Straits Times for its op-ed pages, as well as excerpts from his lecture series as the inaugural Institute of Policy Studies’ S. R. Nathan Fellow for the Study of Singapore. Curated into clusters with their own prefaces to provide context to the pieces, plus a separate chapter relating the chronology of his life so far, Asking Why is Ho’s take on various issues around him, to which he asked why frequently — and which were often without clear answers.
Paperback
Published August 8, 2018
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
April 25, 2021
As a great admirer of Mr Ho's work, it is a pity that this book was simply a collection of his past speeches. Would have definitely enjoyed a deeper look into his fascinating life, briefly touched upon in the first chapter. Nevertheless, his ideas are profound and definitely something to discuss and ponder on.
December 2, 2019
A somewhat self-congratulatory tome by someone who admittedly has much to be self-congratulatory about.
Asking Why is, to a small extent, a sort of pseudo-biography of Ho Kwon Ping, founder of Banyan Tree, frequent circuit-speaker, and Chairman of about half a dozen state-owned enterprises and universities over the years. Ho tells a brief account of his eventful life - and it was quite eventful, filled with Egyptian adventure, college expulsion, and political detention, before a strange twist of fate propelled him from left-wing intellectual aspirant to successful businessman and establishment figure (albeit retaining a modicum of rebelliousness), making him suddenly a figure whose words people wanted to hear.
And these words, a collection of past writings and speeches, are what make up the meat of the book. These range from fragments of teenage poetry to anti-establishment FEER editorials in his early life, and later on, after he had established his reputation of wise elder public figure, ruminations on everything from Banyan's brand philosophy, to Asian geopolitics, to the meaning of leadership. And it is this latter obsession that gives the book its title - for Ho's magic sauce for great leadership is having the audacity to relentlessly ask why, to be a ceaseless seeker after truth.
To publish a book full of his own words, no matter how modestly caveated, is an act of sheer confidence in the worth of one's opinion, edging towards self-satisfaction at the achievements of one's own life. Indeed, at some parts, one wonders if a more robust stroke of the editorial pen could have bettered this book, by perhaps paring down some of the repetitive speeches with only slight deviations in substance, or perhaps questioned the very purpose of having one's sappy, teenaged poetry published together with a compendium of wise words.
To that end, one wonders if, in the service of rendering his wisdom to younger generations, if Ho might not have done better by writing a book instead of curating it. As it stands, Asking Why is a motley collection of loosely-themed expository nuggets (may of which are no longer really all that relevant), interspersed with far more compelling autobiographical details. It might have been a more challenging, but ultimately more rewarding, task, to show, not tell, readers how elements of Ho's life and experiences of asking why can be translated into generalisable life lessons that might be followed by successive generations. It might have been more topical to write prognostications about the future, both local and regional, using up-to-date information and insights, instead of invoking outdated speeches that will serve no one other than historiographers.
As it is, Asking Why exudes the kind of self-satisfaction of someone (albeit deservedly) confident in the self-evident wisdom of his extant words, to the degree that he can slap together a lightly-curated collection of old speeches and present it as a topical whole to prospective readers, who will have to wade through multiple speeches saying the same things to get the point.
Although I do appreciate his support for Pink Dot.
I give this: 3 out of 5 banyan trees
Asking Why is, to a small extent, a sort of pseudo-biography of Ho Kwon Ping, founder of Banyan Tree, frequent circuit-speaker, and Chairman of about half a dozen state-owned enterprises and universities over the years. Ho tells a brief account of his eventful life - and it was quite eventful, filled with Egyptian adventure, college expulsion, and political detention, before a strange twist of fate propelled him from left-wing intellectual aspirant to successful businessman and establishment figure (albeit retaining a modicum of rebelliousness), making him suddenly a figure whose words people wanted to hear.
And these words, a collection of past writings and speeches, are what make up the meat of the book. These range from fragments of teenage poetry to anti-establishment FEER editorials in his early life, and later on, after he had established his reputation of wise elder public figure, ruminations on everything from Banyan's brand philosophy, to Asian geopolitics, to the meaning of leadership. And it is this latter obsession that gives the book its title - for Ho's magic sauce for great leadership is having the audacity to relentlessly ask why, to be a ceaseless seeker after truth.
To publish a book full of his own words, no matter how modestly caveated, is an act of sheer confidence in the worth of one's opinion, edging towards self-satisfaction at the achievements of one's own life. Indeed, at some parts, one wonders if a more robust stroke of the editorial pen could have bettered this book, by perhaps paring down some of the repetitive speeches with only slight deviations in substance, or perhaps questioned the very purpose of having one's sappy, teenaged poetry published together with a compendium of wise words.
To that end, one wonders if, in the service of rendering his wisdom to younger generations, if Ho might not have done better by writing a book instead of curating it. As it stands, Asking Why is a motley collection of loosely-themed expository nuggets (may of which are no longer really all that relevant), interspersed with far more compelling autobiographical details. It might have been a more challenging, but ultimately more rewarding, task, to show, not tell, readers how elements of Ho's life and experiences of asking why can be translated into generalisable life lessons that might be followed by successive generations. It might have been more topical to write prognostications about the future, both local and regional, using up-to-date information and insights, instead of invoking outdated speeches that will serve no one other than historiographers.
As it is, Asking Why exudes the kind of self-satisfaction of someone (albeit deservedly) confident in the self-evident wisdom of his extant words, to the degree that he can slap together a lightly-curated collection of old speeches and present it as a topical whole to prospective readers, who will have to wade through multiple speeches saying the same things to get the point.
Although I do appreciate his support for Pink Dot.
I give this: 3 out of 5 banyan trees
April 18, 2019
Interesting collection of speeches given by Ho Kwon Ping. Some of his writing and thought leadership which resonated with me were:
- Branding (Banyan Tree and SMU): "what emotions, what values do I want my customer to associate with my brand"
- Customer service: "only when we are proud of our work and have the attitude and means to make other people happy can we truly be called service-oriented"
- Cause of downfall of every civilisation: "Hubris - believing that you want to believe of yourself, that singular lack of self-doubt which clouds wisdom, overrides our better judgement, renders us deaf to advice of those who have our best interests at heart"
-Leadership: "1. integrity, character 2. inspirational and aspirational...a person who can inspire others to aspire beyond themselves 3. courage to follow convictions (listening to the voice within)
4. making difficult judgement calls that lead to action
-Parochialism: "a state of mind. We must be less parochial..try to understand and empathise less with the developed and more with the developing world"
- "Never put off seeing your loved ones, because you will never know when it might be the last time."
- Making a difference: "it's not the size of your dreams or how big a difference you make, but that you have made a difference at all."
It's not just the thought leadership but his beautiful way with words that come through in this collection. Being a collection of speeches, there will inevitably be the ones that will be skipped through, but overall, there were really good speeches, the stories of his life and the loving eulogies that he included that made this a good read.
- Branding (Banyan Tree and SMU): "what emotions, what values do I want my customer to associate with my brand"
- Customer service: "only when we are proud of our work and have the attitude and means to make other people happy can we truly be called service-oriented"
- Cause of downfall of every civilisation: "Hubris - believing that you want to believe of yourself, that singular lack of self-doubt which clouds wisdom, overrides our better judgement, renders us deaf to advice of those who have our best interests at heart"
-Leadership: "1. integrity, character 2. inspirational and aspirational...a person who can inspire others to aspire beyond themselves 3. courage to follow convictions (listening to the voice within)
4. making difficult judgement calls that lead to action
-Parochialism: "a state of mind. We must be less parochial..try to understand and empathise less with the developed and more with the developing world"
- "Never put off seeing your loved ones, because you will never know when it might be the last time."
- Making a difference: "it's not the size of your dreams or how big a difference you make, but that you have made a difference at all."
It's not just the thought leadership but his beautiful way with words that come through in this collection. Being a collection of speeches, there will inevitably be the ones that will be skipped through, but overall, there were really good speeches, the stories of his life and the loving eulogies that he included that made this a good read.
November 15, 2018
Collection of his past speeches so there is definitely some repetition of ideas and chunks of statements.
Personally I enjoyed the IPS lecture series the most in the book as it gives a most refreshing take on Singapore and it’s future.
Personally I enjoyed the IPS lecture series the most in the book as it gives a most refreshing take on Singapore and it’s future.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews