Datuk Lee Yeow Chor: Engaged, involved and committed. Always ready to execute well. Continuously learning and improving with the ability to adapt quickly in today’s rapidly evolving world.
By Foong Pek Yee
foongpekyee@gmail.com
Aug 26, 2024
The Dutch like sailing and biking.
And Datuk Lee Yeow Chor made it a point to join his business associates and staff for the sports on weekends during his business trips to Netherlands.
“This is one way to understand each others culture ,” says Lee.
The 57-year -old IOI Corporation Berhad (IOI) Group Managing Director and Chief Executive who is known for his exemplary leadership is adept at interacting in the world arena.
IOI is a leading global integrated and sustainable palm oil player.
It has plantations in Malaysia and Indonesia ; and resource based manufacturing business in Netherlands, Germany, United States, Canada, China and Ghana.
Lee was also educated abroad.
He has LLB (Honours) King’s College , London, Bar Finals, Gray’s Inn, London and a post graduate diploma in Finance and Accounting from the London School of Economics.
Dedicated to education: UTAR chancellor Tun Dr Ling Liong Sik (seated); and from left; UTAR council chairman Tan Sri Dr Ting Chew Peh, IOI Group Managing Director Datuk Lee Yeow Chor and UTAR president Datuk Professor Dr Ewe Hong Tat at the UTAR 39th convocation ceremony session 2 at the Kampar campus on Aug 17, 2024.
Sharing his business experience at Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR) 39 th convocation in the Kampar campus on Aug 17, 2024, Lee who was the event’s guest of honour highlighted the importance of synergy in business .
It is about having a great team -tapping into each others strength, seamlessly.
Lee says: “IOI’s core values and belief is excellence in execution and learning while doing things, even doing seemingly mundane things like comparing specifications from suppliers’ quotations to which I still do.
“The western managers meanwhile are very good in analysis, planning and presentation. They can even give a 10-year-plan.
“My senior management and I have to adjust their focus to avoid analysis paralysis ,overelaborate plans. And to get them start doing things as soon as possible.”
After managing the overseas food ingredients company for 13 years, Lee says the company grew and consequently Europe and North America became important markets for this company and also indirectly IOI plantations which supply crude palm oil with the raw materials to this company.
Then came the acid test in 2016.
That year, Lee recalls , an NGO (non- governmental organisation) from Netherlands reported that one of IOI’s plantations in Indonesia did not follow some environmental regulations. The area involved was 3% of the planted area.
Soon after, an international organisation – Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) – suspended the plantation certification for the total planted area.
The company supplying food ingredients to the six countries also had its certification suspended.
It was a huge crisis for IOI.
Lee says: ” Two very powerful NGOs also campaigned against IOI , pressuring all our multinational customers to stop buying from IOI.
” IOI quickly had an open discussion with RSPO and had their Auditors to visit and verify the situation on the ground where breaches were found.
“We (IOI) published a time-bound rectification plan with regular updates.
“Within four months, we managed to get back the RSPO certification.”
But the crisis was far from over.
“For the next 18 months, we got UK based consultants to engage with the NGOs and published rectifications and improvement updates on our website every two or three weeks.
“And another 12 months to persuade the NGOs to call off their campaign that pressured our multinational customers.”
Lee says the IOI team – engaged, involved and committed – rode out the crisis and emerged stronger.
He says IOI’s honesty and preparedness to admit its mistakes had immediately reduced, if not removed, distrust on the company .
Being open to views and suggestions, Lee says IOI accepted views and suggestions from the NGOs and consultants.
He says IOI even suspended the planting activities for about two years while engaging with the NGOs
Lee says IOI took the setback as an opportunity to improve and reinvent itself, and the company subsequently introduced many sustainability related policies and guidelines and intensified efforts to beef up environmental sustainability.
Last year, Lee says IOI Corporation was awarded TheEdge Malaysia Environmental , Social and Governance (ESG) Gold Award.
He says IOI, at the international level, has also received several ESG Gold Awards.
Congratulating the graduates, Lee says he hopes the lessons he learned from his business life would be relevant to them in their daily lives later.
“Executing well, being transparent, reinventing oneself and embracing values like empathy, humility and honesty .
“You have the power to shape your own future and make a positive impact on the world,” says Lee in his very inspiring speech and timely advice for the graduates.
Congratulations: UTAR council chairman Tan Sri Dr Ting Chew Peh (right) presenting a scroll to a graduate at the UTAR 39th convocation on Aug 17, 2024.
Congratulations: UTAR Education Foundation Board of Trustees member Tan Sri Lee Oi Hian (right) presenting a scroll to a graduate at the UTAR 39th convocation on Aug 17, 2024.
Congratulations: UTAR council member Datuk Lim Si Cheng (left) presenting a scroll to a graduate at the UTAR 39th convocation on Aug 17, 2024.
