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</TD><TD vAlign=top width=200 align=left><TABLE><TBODY><TR><TD class=content_subtitle>Mak Mun San</TD></TR><TR><TD class=content_subtitle align=left>Mon, Apr 21, 2008
The Straits Times </TD></TR><TR><TD height=15>
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</TD></TR><!-- Story With Image End --><TR><TD class=bodytext colSpan=3><!-- CONTENT : start -->THE first thing one notices when meeting Saw Phaik Hwa is the explosion of colours on her head.
The president and chief executive officer of SMRT Corporation has her cut fashionably short and her fringe is dyed green and orangey-red.
'If you have to dye your hair, why dye it black? So boring,' says Saw, 53, who has sported red and purple hair in the past.
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'You might as well take the opportunity to do what you want. If it's not nice, just change colour, no big deal.'
With a laugh, she tells you no one has said anything bad about her hair so far.
'When I meet the more traditional, gentlemen type of business associates, their eyes keep going back to my hair and they have that look on their face but they are not rude enough to make any comments,' she says.
Every woman whom she has met loves her hair. In fact, a few of her female staff workers have asked her if they can dye their hair.
'I said: 'Why do you have to ask me?' They said that when they were in Tibs, they dyed their hair and were told by the manager to go home and change their colour,' she relates.
SMRT, which operates Singapore's biggest rail network, took over bus company Tibs in 2001.
'I told them, if anyone tells you to change your hair colour, you tell him to ask the CEO to change first,' she says, delivering the punchline with perfect timing.
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=2 cellPadding=2 bgColor=white align=right><TBODY><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=200>
</TD></TR><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=200>HORSING AROUND: Saw when she was about one or two years old (above).</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>While her unconventional choice of hair colour has inspired at least one female colleague to follow suit, it is undoubtedly her devil-may-care attitude that has left a deep impression on the 5,500 people she leads.
'I've never conformed in my life. One has to break barriers,' says the Malaysian-born woman.
'I've never taken drugs and I don't intend to, ever, but within the parameters of right and wrong, I think you should break all rules.'
With an infectious laugh, Saw, who is single, is the kind of person whom you can warm up to within five minutes of talking to her.
Chatting in the balcony of her condominium apartment near Holland Village, which she shares with a maid and three Shih Tzus, she is looking relaxed in a red polo T-shirt and beige pants.
But beneath the flamboyant appearance and easygoing manner lies a tough cookie. The long-time taiji practitioner can throw a grown man across the room with an effortless wave of her hands, she says.
Despite her heavy workload, she teaches three times a week at the Singapore Jian Chuan Tai Chi Chuan Physical Culture Association in Hong Kong Street.
The Singapore permanent resident knows exactly what she wants in life and admits that there is nothing she hates more than people who 'talk more than they do'.
'I don't understand the word 'bored'. There are so many things to do in this world.'
Same show, different cast
IT TAKES a go-getter like her to join SMRT in December 2002.
Her appointment raised eyebrows then as her background was mainly in retail and marketing, and she had no experience whatsoever in running a public transport business.
Prior to that, she had worked 19 years in duty-free retail chain DFS Venture Singapore and was a regional president who oversaw 1,000 staff in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia.
In early 2002, she was retrenched when the global airport retailer consolidated its businesses. She then started her own consultancy business in international retail before applying for the SMRT job.
'I didn't have to learn to be a CEO, all I needed was to learn a new trade,' she says matter of factly.
'It's like running the same show, just that you have a different cast, a different storyline, and they fall in love and seek revenge at different times. But basically, it's the same.'
She may make the career switch sound deceptively simple, but those who know her say that she is a born leader.
Freelance designer Goon Ark Leau, who has known Saw since the 1970s, says she has not changed much over the years.
'Her leadership qualities have always been apparent and she's always the one who will lead in a group,' he says.
'What I like about her is she has no airs and anybody can relate to her, no matter whether they are educated or not.'
SMRT's vice-president of commercial business Teo Chew Hoon describes her boss as someone who is 'always asking for excellence'.
'She is a dynamic person, with the ability to look into various aspects of the company at the same time and manage them effectively,' she says.
'She has very high expectations and will push people to do things beyond their limits, making us discover abilities we didn't even know we had.'
Under her stewardship, SMRT has grown steadily, and its net profit rose by 31 per cent to $135.8 million for the financial year of 2007, a record since it was listed in 2000.
In comparison, the net profit for 2002 was only $56.8 million.
Rail ridership has also increased from 389.7 million in 2002 to 434.9 million last year and is expected to grow between 5 and 7 per cent every year.
Today, SMRT is ranked among the top five, with one of the lowest densities of passengers on its trains, when benchmarked against 15 of the world's top metro operators from major cities.
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=2 cellPadding=2 bgColor=white align=left><TBODY><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=200>
</TD></TR><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=200>WAY TO GO: Saw (above) teaching taiji at the Singapore Jian Chuan Tai Chi Chuan Physical Culture Association.</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>Earlier this month, the transport operator won its first international award - Best Passenger Experience Award, presented at the inaugural Metro Awards in Copenhagen, Denmark.
It beat Copenhagen Metro, Hong Kong's MTR Corporation and Poland's Warsaw Metro by impressing judges with its service training programme, upgrading of trains and track record of efficiency, among other things.
'I came, I inherited a company that had performed to this level of efficiency,' she says.
'But I feel sad for my staff that, for all the effort that they put in, when something goes wrong, they get so many brickbats.'
Switching to a more subdued tone, she continues: 'It's something which I had to grapple with, running a company where the sense of public service and public responsibility is so huge.'
Using the analogy of a pair of Nike shoes, she says a customer would be very happy if a faulty pair is replaced with a new one.
But that is not the case when the train service breaks down, as it did on Jan 21.
Workers failed to engage the parking brake of one portion of a maintenance train, causing the train to roll back when its primary brakes failed. It slammed into its locomotive at 3.10am, shutting down the track between Tanah Merah and Pasir Ris stations.
This resulted in a seven-hour-long disruption to train service along the East-West line and about 57,000 rush-hour commuters were inconvenienced.
SMRT was fined an unprecedented $387,176 by the Land Transport Authority.
'I was at the scene from 4am and my whole management team was out on the streets, on the rails, on the tracks, as were hundreds of our staff. We were doing everything we could.
'We arranged for 70 buses and ferried people to work for free, and what we get is a lot of blame,' she says.
Shrugging, she adds: 'People don't appreciate what you do. When a train breaks down, you're bad, you're evil. That's not right. Even if you own a Rolls Royce, I guarantee you, it will break down one day.'
Indignant, not sorry
BORN in Kuala Lumpur on Oct 25, 1954, her strong character was honed from a young age.
After she was born, her father sent her away to live with her maternal grandmother and three aunts.
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=2 cellPadding=2 bgColor=white align=right><TBODY><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=240>
</TD></TR><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=240>'I was in the best class in the best school. I didn't have a choice but to do well' - On excelling in school </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>He was an old-fashioned businessman who regarded girls as 'useless'' and was probably disappointed that Saw's mother, a midwife and his second wife, did not bear him a son.
He had five daughters and a son with his first wife, who has died. Saw was the only child who lived apart from him - her younger brother was welcomed into the family when he was born subsequently.
'I wasn't sorry for myself. Rather, I felt indignant,' she says, adding that she was very well-treated by her grandmother and aunts.
Father and daughter were not close when she was growing up and she seldom saw him.
Even when he was around, he ignored her completely and did not respond when she called him 'Pa'.
She attended the prestigious girls' school Convent Bukit Nanas in Kuala Lumpur and remembers taking the bus to school every day.
'When I was walking up the hill to school, sometimes I would see my mother driving my stepsisters, who studied there too. I had questions, but I can imagine my mother's position,' she says matter of factly.
Just before she turned 16, she decided to do something about the situation. She wrote to her father and introduced herself and said that she would like to get to know him, as a friend and not as a father.
To her pleasant surprise, he responded and took her out for a meal at an A&W restaurant in Petaling Jaya.
'I told him, I don't understand why we're in this state, but whatever it was, I'm sure it wasn't my fault,' she says.
'I think it must have been quite a shock for him to have this daughter who is not afraid of him.'
They chatted like friends, and a relationship developed over countless meals, hunting excursions and overseas trips, including flying together on the first Boeing 747 commercial flight to Hong Kong in 1970.
Now 90, he lives in Kuala Lumpur with Saw's eldest sister. Her mother has died.
After her O levels, she came to Singapore to continue her studies, first doing a pre-university course at Swiss Cottage Secondary School and then the National University of Singapore, where she studied Science.
=> But die die refuse to take up pink tampon. WHY?
The four years spent living in Eusoff College was a 'life-changing experience' for her.
'Those were the character-forming years. I enjoyed the camaraderie and I made many life-long friends there,' she says.
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=2 cellPadding=2 bgColor=white align=right><TBODY><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=240>
</TD></TR><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=240>'I can't sing to save myself' -On her biggest weakness</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>One of them is Ms Agnes Kua, now a senior manager in pathology at the Singapore General Hospital.
=> Gecko's relative?
'Phaik Hwa stands by what she believes in and speaks her mind. Sometimes, I worry for her as her words might not go down well with some people,' she says.
'She can be impatient but she is also one of the most focused and determined people I know.'
Saw had wanted to pursue a master's degree after completing her Honours year in biochemistry, but her father stopped her as he felt 'girls who study too much will not find a husband'.
'Well, I proved him wrong by not finding a husband despite not doing my master's,' she says, chuckling.
She joined Metro in 1978 as a management trainee and left for DFS in 1981.
After more than five years at SMRT, she says she is still learning.
=> Sounds familiar?
When asked to describe her management style, she quips: 'My dream management style is not having to do anything.'
Taking a sip of water from a mug, she continues: 'I believe in letting people have their own life outside of work. I try not to call my staff after office hours unless absolutely necessary, and I expect them to do the same for me.'
However, she admits to calling people and giving instructions first thing in the morning when she is driving to work in her Mercedes 500.
On what is the biggest challenge facing her as the chief of SMRT, she ponders before replying: 'We are trying very hard, but how do we win the hearts and minds of Singaporeans, to be compassionate to what we do?
'Beyond having free public service: free trains, never break down, come once every two, three minutes. Your boyfriend can promise you the moon too, will you believe him? We're never perfect but we've tried our best and by world standards, we're doing very well.'
=> Typical FAPee-speak to make it look like Sporns are frivolous in their demand. Did Sporns ask for free rides?
She smiles and looks at you, her colourful hair shining in the late afternoon light.
This article was first published in The Straits Times on Apr 21, 2008.
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The president and chief executive officer of SMRT Corporation has her cut fashionably short and her fringe is dyed green and orangey-red.
'If you have to dye your hair, why dye it black? So boring,' says Saw, 53, who has sported red and purple hair in the past.
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'You might as well take the opportunity to do what you want. If it's not nice, just change colour, no big deal.'With a laugh, she tells you no one has said anything bad about her hair so far.
'When I meet the more traditional, gentlemen type of business associates, their eyes keep going back to my hair and they have that look on their face but they are not rude enough to make any comments,' she says.
Every woman whom she has met loves her hair. In fact, a few of her female staff workers have asked her if they can dye their hair.
'I said: 'Why do you have to ask me?' They said that when they were in Tibs, they dyed their hair and were told by the manager to go home and change their colour,' she relates.
SMRT, which operates Singapore's biggest rail network, took over bus company Tibs in 2001.
'I told them, if anyone tells you to change your hair colour, you tell him to ask the CEO to change first,' she says, delivering the punchline with perfect timing.
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=2 cellPadding=2 bgColor=white align=right><TBODY><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=200>
'I've never conformed in my life. One has to break barriers,' says the Malaysian-born woman.
'I've never taken drugs and I don't intend to, ever, but within the parameters of right and wrong, I think you should break all rules.'
With an infectious laugh, Saw, who is single, is the kind of person whom you can warm up to within five minutes of talking to her.
Chatting in the balcony of her condominium apartment near Holland Village, which she shares with a maid and three Shih Tzus, she is looking relaxed in a red polo T-shirt and beige pants.
But beneath the flamboyant appearance and easygoing manner lies a tough cookie. The long-time taiji practitioner can throw a grown man across the room with an effortless wave of her hands, she says.
Despite her heavy workload, she teaches three times a week at the Singapore Jian Chuan Tai Chi Chuan Physical Culture Association in Hong Kong Street.
The Singapore permanent resident knows exactly what she wants in life and admits that there is nothing she hates more than people who 'talk more than they do'.
'I don't understand the word 'bored'. There are so many things to do in this world.'
Same show, different cast
IT TAKES a go-getter like her to join SMRT in December 2002.
Her appointment raised eyebrows then as her background was mainly in retail and marketing, and she had no experience whatsoever in running a public transport business.
Prior to that, she had worked 19 years in duty-free retail chain DFS Venture Singapore and was a regional president who oversaw 1,000 staff in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia.
In early 2002, she was retrenched when the global airport retailer consolidated its businesses. She then started her own consultancy business in international retail before applying for the SMRT job.
'I didn't have to learn to be a CEO, all I needed was to learn a new trade,' she says matter of factly.
'It's like running the same show, just that you have a different cast, a different storyline, and they fall in love and seek revenge at different times. But basically, it's the same.'
She may make the career switch sound deceptively simple, but those who know her say that she is a born leader.
Freelance designer Goon Ark Leau, who has known Saw since the 1970s, says she has not changed much over the years.
'Her leadership qualities have always been apparent and she's always the one who will lead in a group,' he says.
'What I like about her is she has no airs and anybody can relate to her, no matter whether they are educated or not.'
SMRT's vice-president of commercial business Teo Chew Hoon describes her boss as someone who is 'always asking for excellence'.
'She is a dynamic person, with the ability to look into various aspects of the company at the same time and manage them effectively,' she says.
'She has very high expectations and will push people to do things beyond their limits, making us discover abilities we didn't even know we had.'
Under her stewardship, SMRT has grown steadily, and its net profit rose by 31 per cent to $135.8 million for the financial year of 2007, a record since it was listed in 2000.
In comparison, the net profit for 2002 was only $56.8 million.
Rail ridership has also increased from 389.7 million in 2002 to 434.9 million last year and is expected to grow between 5 and 7 per cent every year.
Today, SMRT is ranked among the top five, with one of the lowest densities of passengers on its trains, when benchmarked against 15 of the world's top metro operators from major cities.
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=2 cellPadding=2 bgColor=white align=left><TBODY><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=200>
It beat Copenhagen Metro, Hong Kong's MTR Corporation and Poland's Warsaw Metro by impressing judges with its service training programme, upgrading of trains and track record of efficiency, among other things.
'I came, I inherited a company that had performed to this level of efficiency,' she says.
'But I feel sad for my staff that, for all the effort that they put in, when something goes wrong, they get so many brickbats.'
Switching to a more subdued tone, she continues: 'It's something which I had to grapple with, running a company where the sense of public service and public responsibility is so huge.'
Using the analogy of a pair of Nike shoes, she says a customer would be very happy if a faulty pair is replaced with a new one.
But that is not the case when the train service breaks down, as it did on Jan 21.
Workers failed to engage the parking brake of one portion of a maintenance train, causing the train to roll back when its primary brakes failed. It slammed into its locomotive at 3.10am, shutting down the track between Tanah Merah and Pasir Ris stations.
This resulted in a seven-hour-long disruption to train service along the East-West line and about 57,000 rush-hour commuters were inconvenienced.
SMRT was fined an unprecedented $387,176 by the Land Transport Authority.
'I was at the scene from 4am and my whole management team was out on the streets, on the rails, on the tracks, as were hundreds of our staff. We were doing everything we could.
'We arranged for 70 buses and ferried people to work for free, and what we get is a lot of blame,' she says.
Shrugging, she adds: 'People don't appreciate what you do. When a train breaks down, you're bad, you're evil. That's not right. Even if you own a Rolls Royce, I guarantee you, it will break down one day.'
Indignant, not sorry
BORN in Kuala Lumpur on Oct 25, 1954, her strong character was honed from a young age.
After she was born, her father sent her away to live with her maternal grandmother and three aunts.
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=2 cellPadding=2 bgColor=white align=right><TBODY><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=240>
He had five daughters and a son with his first wife, who has died. Saw was the only child who lived apart from him - her younger brother was welcomed into the family when he was born subsequently.
'I wasn't sorry for myself. Rather, I felt indignant,' she says, adding that she was very well-treated by her grandmother and aunts.
Father and daughter were not close when she was growing up and she seldom saw him.
Even when he was around, he ignored her completely and did not respond when she called him 'Pa'.
She attended the prestigious girls' school Convent Bukit Nanas in Kuala Lumpur and remembers taking the bus to school every day.
'When I was walking up the hill to school, sometimes I would see my mother driving my stepsisters, who studied there too. I had questions, but I can imagine my mother's position,' she says matter of factly.
Just before she turned 16, she decided to do something about the situation. She wrote to her father and introduced herself and said that she would like to get to know him, as a friend and not as a father.
To her pleasant surprise, he responded and took her out for a meal at an A&W restaurant in Petaling Jaya.
'I told him, I don't understand why we're in this state, but whatever it was, I'm sure it wasn't my fault,' she says.
'I think it must have been quite a shock for him to have this daughter who is not afraid of him.'
They chatted like friends, and a relationship developed over countless meals, hunting excursions and overseas trips, including flying together on the first Boeing 747 commercial flight to Hong Kong in 1970.
Now 90, he lives in Kuala Lumpur with Saw's eldest sister. Her mother has died.
After her O levels, she came to Singapore to continue her studies, first doing a pre-university course at Swiss Cottage Secondary School and then the National University of Singapore, where she studied Science.
=> But die die refuse to take up pink tampon. WHY?
The four years spent living in Eusoff College was a 'life-changing experience' for her.
'Those were the character-forming years. I enjoyed the camaraderie and I made many life-long friends there,' she says.
<TABLE border=0 cellSpacing=2 cellPadding=2 bgColor=white align=right><TBODY><TR><TD bgColor=#e8e8e8 width=240>
=> Gecko's relative?
'Phaik Hwa stands by what she believes in and speaks her mind. Sometimes, I worry for her as her words might not go down well with some people,' she says.
'She can be impatient but she is also one of the most focused and determined people I know.'
Saw had wanted to pursue a master's degree after completing her Honours year in biochemistry, but her father stopped her as he felt 'girls who study too much will not find a husband'.
'Well, I proved him wrong by not finding a husband despite not doing my master's,' she says, chuckling.
She joined Metro in 1978 as a management trainee and left for DFS in 1981.
After more than five years at SMRT, she says she is still learning.
=> Sounds familiar?
When asked to describe her management style, she quips: 'My dream management style is not having to do anything.'
Taking a sip of water from a mug, she continues: 'I believe in letting people have their own life outside of work. I try not to call my staff after office hours unless absolutely necessary, and I expect them to do the same for me.'
However, she admits to calling people and giving instructions first thing in the morning when she is driving to work in her Mercedes 500.
On what is the biggest challenge facing her as the chief of SMRT, she ponders before replying: 'We are trying very hard, but how do we win the hearts and minds of Singaporeans, to be compassionate to what we do?
'Beyond having free public service: free trains, never break down, come once every two, three minutes. Your boyfriend can promise you the moon too, will you believe him? We're never perfect but we've tried our best and by world standards, we're doing very well.'
=> Typical FAPee-speak to make it look like Sporns are frivolous in their demand. Did Sporns ask for free rides?
She smiles and looks at you, her colourful hair shining in the late afternoon light.
This article was first published in The Straits Times on Apr 21, 2008.
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