Hong Kong Club Thrives, Plans Next Global Alumni Conference
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| Joseph Yam (fourth from left), chief executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA), and Vincent Lee, administrative assistant to the HKMA chief executive
(third from left), with HBSA-HK copresident Hamilton Tang (MBA '90), Stephanie Hui (MBA '00), Anthony Teo (MBA '69), Roger King (101st AMP), and
Andrew Yao (MBA '92) at a recent Distinguished Speakers' Forum. Photo courtesy HBSA-HK |
Anthony Teo (MBA '69, ITP '68), vice president of the Harvard Business School Association of Hong Kong (HBSA-HK), has long been an active alumnus. After leaving Soldiers Field, Teo returned to his native Singapore and built an alumni club from the ground up, serving as committee member, secretary, and president between 1970 and 1988. In 1994, Teo became publisher and chief executive of Far East Trade Press and moved to Hong Kong — a city he likens to New York and describes as “the frontier of capitalism.” In Hong Kong, Teo immersed himself in the local club, where Philip Leung (MBA '76) and Hamilton Ty Tang (MBA '90) currently serve as copresidents.
“Before I knew it,” he says, “we were in charge of putting on the 1997 HBS Global Alumni Conference.” The remarkable success of the '97 GAC — which took place just months before Hong Kong's “handover” to China — has put Teo and the HBSA-HK into the limelight once more: The Hong Kong club has been selected to organize the upcoming GAC, to be held in Shanghai June 1720, 2003. “We have already laid the foundation, and drawing from the experience of 1997, we are racing ahead,” says Teo.
As a leader of HBSA-HK, Teo runs one of the most popular events on the club's calendar: the Distinguished Speakers' Forum (DSF). The DSF hosts prominent leaders who are so sought-after that Teo and his colleagues are routinely forced to bar the news media from attending the quarterly event. “We try to do it without the press,” he explains. “That's how we preserve the frankness and fluidity of the symposium.” Recent forums featured Lau Siu-kai, head of the Central Policy Unit of the Hong Kong SAR government and former Harvard-Yenching Visiting Scholar (1981), and Joseph Yam, Chief executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority. In November, HBSA-HK celebrated its 24th anniversary at a DSF with guest speaker Laura Cha (AMP 159), vi ce chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission. Teo's expertise at landing top speakers for the club is being parlayed into the planning for Shanghai. “For my sins,” he jokes, “I was appointed the chairman of the speakers committee for the GAC.” The conference, “From the Commanding Heights to the Market: The Changing Face of Business,” will present entrepreneurs, professors, and politicians from China, Hong Kong, the United States, and Europe. The strength of the conference, Teo stresses, will come from “the intellectual value of the leading research from HBS, combined with the power of practice from experts in the field.”
Teo has long been interested in maintaining the transglobal connection between HBS and Asia. He worked with Professor F. Warren McFarlan to establish the HBS Asia-Pacific Research Center in Hong Kong and to facilitate trips to the region for HBS faculty. Teo is particularly proud of the HBSA-HK Trust's Andrew Choa (MBA '51) Memorial Scholarship, which sends managers from Hong Kong or China to an HBS Executive Education program.
With membership at two hundred, the HBSA-HK is thriving, thanks in part to a mentoring system that links active board members with young alumni. The board members “take care of the alums,” Teo says, by keeping them informed of activities and encouraging participation. Teo, who recently started his own consulting firm, Croda Resources and Associates, shows no signs of retiring from alumni activity anytime soon. “I enjoy it so much that I will continue on as vice president,” he says. “It's one little thing that I can do to give back to the School.”
— Amy Burton
For further information on the 2003 GAC, visit www.hbsshanghai2003.org.
