Achieving Work-Life Balance: A Tan Sri Syed Zainal Experience

One Saturday morning in 2005, Syed Zainal sat at his desk contemplating the career decision he would have to make over the weekend. At 38, Syed Zainal was Chief Executive Officer (CEO) at HICOM Holdings Berhad, a Malaysian automotive manufacturing company, for ten years. Perodua just offered Syed Zainal a promotion to CEO, a position that would make him responsible for the entire division. Normally, Syed Zainal would have been blissful by such an opportunity, but he worried about its impact on his already fatigued personal life. Since his last promotion, he has struggled to balance an increasingly demanding workload with his responsibilities at home. Syed Zainal explained: “I have worked my whole career, and until now, I have never had any issues balancing work and home. However, things started spinning a bit out of control after my last promotion. At first, I thought I could handle the longer hours and more frequent travel, but it became a real drag on the family after a while. Then, two kids need my attention. That is when I realized it was time to change the situation. Syed Zainal has mixed feelings about accepting the promotion.” Over the past several years, Syed Zainal has taken steps to get his schedule under control. He and his wife Jan agreed that things were better. Nevertheless, another promotion would invert their lives all over again. As CEO, he could expect to be busier than before. It actually worried him. Syed Zainal found it hard to decide about accepting the promotion. He knew that the CEO of Perodua expected him to accept; in fact, he had emphasized that he had no second choice.