WHEN American Chip Goodyear, the former chief executive of BHP Billiton, walked into the legal department of the Singapore government's $100 billion investment fund Temasek earlier this year, he looked around and saw files everywhere.
The chief executive in waiting, a 51-year-old urbane Ivy League graduate and international business executive, was not impressed.
Word went out across the organisation, which is one of the world's oldest sovereign wealth funds: tidy up your room in case Chip walks in.
Singapore's business community was abuzz yesterday with the surprising news that Goodyear would not be taking over as head of the powerful investment agency as planned on October 1.
The agency, which has stakes in most of Singapore's blue-chip companies including Singapore Airlines, Singtel, and Singapore power, has been run for the past 5 1/2 years by the low-key Ho Ching, the wife of Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.
The official statement revealing that Goodyear would be pulling out of the job, less than six months after accepting and joining the Temasek board, said there had been "differences regarding strategic issues that could not be resolved".
"In the light of the differences both parties decided that it was in their mutual interest to terminate (the) leadership transition process," the statement said.
Speculation about reasons for the split yesterday ranged from the idea that Goodyear may have found he did not have the freedom he wanted to run Temasek, to a possible rift caused by his US management style clashing with Temasek's public service-orientated culture.
One Singapore blog yesterday contained a spoof poster of the movie Runaway Bride, depicting Goodyear, dressed in a white wedding dress, lacing his running shoes and getting ready to escape from a cardigan-wearing Ho Ching. "Catch him if you can," it added.
"Every one is talking about it today," American David Cohen, director of Asian economic forecasting for Action Economics, told The Australian. "I assume, at the end of the day, that he wanted to move in some direction and they (the Temasek board) insisted on telling him he couldn't do it.
"It's a little embarrassing for them. It was a plum job for Goodyear. Jobs managing $100billion portfolios don't come along every day."
The news in February that someone of international standing was to become the first foreigner to run the agency, founded in 1974, was a sign of the board's desire to bring in fresh talent.
It was also seen as a way of calming community concern about the losses incurred by Temasek, whose assets fell from $US134 billion in March 2008 to $US84bn by the end of last year.
Only last month, Singapore's founder, Lee Kwan Yew, was lauding Goodyear's appointment, saying: "We hired the best."
But as Goodyear walked the corridors of Temasek's Singapore headquarters in the past few months, it became obvious that he brought a very different management style to the organisation.
Yesterday's Wall Street Journal noted that Goodyear had been keen to instill a "tighter sense of discipline" in the organisation, fining people for turning up late for meetings and banning the use of Blackberries during meetings.
A keen cyclist, Goodyear started an in-house cycling club in the organisation.
He was known for walking around the organisation, entering offices unannounced and chatting informally to staff.
The culture gap between the Wall Street-honed executive who had never lived in Singapore and the complex, more bureaucratic approach of the government-owned agency was becoming apparent. Singapore is one of the Asian countries most open to Westerners, but there are many cultural differences that are not always immediately obvious to outsiders.
"It would not have been easy for an outsider, particularly a Westerner, to come into a big Singapore Government-owned organisation," said one Singaporean academic yesterday.
"He would have a lot of work to do to get used to the local politics, society and management culture."
With his strong background in the mining industry, there had been much speculation that Goodyear might cut back Temasek's extensive investment in international banks and finance houses to focus on commodities and natural resources. Goodyear, who joined BHP in 1999 as chief financial officer, was instrumental in building the company into the world's top mining company largely as a result of its merger with Billiton of South Africa.
Under Ho Ching, Temasek boosted its holdings in financial stocks to about 40 per cent of its total investment. It was a move that cost the organisation dearly in the wake of the global financial crisis. Temasek lost more than $US4 billion on its investments in organisations such as Merrill Lynch, Barclays Bank and Bank of America. Under Ho, the organisation also made its controversial investment in Shin Corporation of Thailand, the telecommunications company controlled by former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra.
The embarrassing transaction provoked a storm of controversy, becoming one of the factors behind his demise as prime minister. Once known for its secrecy, Temasek has made steps in recent years to become more transparent. It began releasing annual reports and meeting with foreign journalists.
Its public relations staff have made several visits to Australia in the past few years to explain the organisation and its strategy and to stress its independence from the Singapore Government.
But its attempts at openness have only gone so far.
Asked to comment about Goodyear's departure, New Zealand-born businessman Simon Israel, who joined Temasek several years ago as an executive director, said: " Unfortunately, from time to time, chief executive succession does not work out, no matter how carefully it is prepared.
"This is the case here and I wouldn't read more into it. Our press release has explained the reason for it and we are not going to elaborate further."
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/business/story/0,28124,25821574-36418,00.html
), what's the big deal in losing billions?