I love good teachers and classrooms. Something about the act of learning – sitting in a room, completely distraction-free and being a complete sponge – listening intently to a teacher at the peak of their craft, sparring with your fellow students and building new neural connections – lights me up like the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree. I love being a student. (There is a lot of regret at play here as well. I was burnt out at 18 and didn’t really take advantage of my fantastic undergrad. Grad school and a PhD was always what I wanted as a teenager, but life had its own plans for me. And while I love how my life has turned out, a part of me genuinely misses being a student.)
So in early December I found myself in cold (and I mean I-can’t-feel-parts-of-my-body cold) Boston to do the Authentic Leader Development course at HBS. ALD is not your run-of-the-mill leadership course. Its focus is completely on the individual – how do we as individuals discover our authentic selves and as a result become better leaders. It anchors on one’s formative experiences (crucibles) and pushes each student to figure out their purpose – their true north.
The 6-day course was intense. A typical day had two 90-mins classroom sessions, each followed by even more engaging 2-hour-long study sessions with your Leadership Development Group (6 individuals who were staying on the same floor and shared a massive living room/ study space for discussions). Breakfast, lunch and dinner was with the cohort of students taking the ALD course. Post-dinner was prep time for the next day – case studies that needed to be read, chapters from books that needed to be absorbed and exercises that needed to be completed.
There were intense discussions and debates – lots of hard truths uncovered as a result of self-reflection and inquiry and countless tears shed. (We were warned that this was not therapy – but being authentic does require peeling back the layers. It was definitely therapeutic and I am so thankful for the five wonderful individuals who were in my study group.) Professor Thomas DeLong shot up straight to the top of my favorite teachers list. His vulnerability and rawness is only matched by his kindness. A wonderful teacher and a true mensch. The energy of college towns is infectious. And HBS and the wider Harvard campus are magical. A combination of the cold, the Harvard atmosphere and the ALD course completely filled me with holiday cheer. Yes – grumpus maximus moi is practically an elf now. I had and still have love and gratitude for everyone around me. I hugged a lot of people, walked up to a couple at a pub and told the girl how much I thought the boy was into her (they were friends and not dating each other; we had a long chat about regrets and choices and the stochasticity of life), helped someone with a nosebleed on a United flight and generally made friends everywhere.
One of the exercises at ALD was to write letters of gratitude to those around us. I wrote one for my 9-year-old son and read it to him the moment I landed back in Singapore. I wrote one for my wife and read it to her at our 11th wedding anniversary yesterday. I am planning to read one to my parents this weekend as we holiday together in Bintan. Watch this video and you’ll perhaps understand a bit of what I am saying. Expressing gratitude is wonderful.
Have a life-changing 2025!