Gave a luncheon talk to soon to be lawyers at RSC - 18th Oct 2012

Last Thursday (11th October 2012), I was invited by the Bar Council, Malaysia as a Guest Speaker to deliver a speech at a formal luncheon for soon to be lawyers (pupils in chambers) at the Ballroom, Royal Selangor Club. Puan Hendon Mohamed read a short bio data of me and introduced me as “a fellow Member of the Bar, a colleague and a good friend”. There were more than a hundred people who attended the lunch. Below is the speech given at the luncheon:-

SPEECH –Bar Council’s Ethics and Professional Conduct Luncheon, 11th October 2012

1.    Thank you and congratulations for completing the Ethics and Professional Conduct Course. You have endured and experienced two days of added wisdom, knowledge and to some extent, skills. Please give yourself a round of applause. You deserve it!

2.    Before long, you will be having another celebration – celebrating your long call to the Bar. Try to treasure every minute of it because you earned it! All the hard work you have put in and not forgetting the great support given by your family and loved ones.

3.    Once the celebration simmers down, then it will be time for you to apply what you have learned in law school should you choose to be a lawyer or in a law related field.

4.    A question that one will always ask when venturing into the professional working world for the first time is that “Am I thoroughly prepared?” “What happens if I screw it up?” “What happens if I make mistakes?”

    I am going to share with you six (6) principles that I live by when I became a lawyer. Are you ready for this?

5.    First principle, please accept yourself as being a human-being. There is no such thing as being perfect or being completely and thoroughly prepared. We can only do our very best and to pick up skills and knowledge as we go along.

6.    Second principle, don’t compare yourself with others. As they say, you do not know what the other person’s ultimate goal is. By all means, learn from them. Make them as your role models (if you wish) but don’t compare yourself with them BECAUSE you are much better in some of the areas than they are.

6.    Thirdly, allow yourself to FORGIVE yourself. Give yourself that permission. Don’t be too hard on yourself. We all make mistakes, all of us do. God knows, I have made mistakes on a number of occasions in my legal career. But what is important is that I learnt from those mistakes so that I can improve myself. Once we realize our mistakes, we learn to avoid them or remedy them. Learn to find ways and alternatives to resolve an issue. Most of the time, there is more than one way to resolve an issue or to “skin a cat” as the saying goes.

7.    Fourthly, learn to communicate with both your colleagues and clients. Try to put yourselves in their shoes and see how they would feel when faced with a certain situation or challenge. By understanding your colleagues and clients, you know you are in good footing.

8.    Fifth, when faced with challenges, accept it. Because challenges can be overcome. Sometimes, the road in front of us may not be as straight or as smooth as we want but how comfortable we want to make that journey depends on us NOT on the road. We can travel either in a bigger car or in a bus or we can always take an alternative route BUT the destination remains the same.

9.    Sixth, learn to adapt.

    Many years ago, after completing my SPM, as a matter a fact, two days after, I was literally packed and left for the US to start College. I wanted to start early and graduate early. As a matter a fact, I did graduate from one of the finest Universities in the US at the age of 21. Back in 1989, that was quite unheard of. But before I could gain entry into that university, I had to enroll myself in a Community College to prepare for my eventual entry into the University.

10.    Coming to a big city like Los Angeles, more specifically in East LA in the 1980s was a big adventure. Going to a Community College comprising of 95% of Hispanic students was one heck of an experience. I was culturally shocked but I adapted myself, learning some Spanish words, got myself well liked and enjoyed my semester there.

11.    Like in everything else in life, learn to adapt to your professional working environment, be flexible and learn to contribute to the well being of the firm and also to the Bar Council.

12.    Remember, the Bar Council is a legal statutory body which governs and looks after the welfare of pupils and lawyers. When you become a lawyer, find time to contribute to the Bar either by joining one of the Committees or volunteering your services from time to time. Not only will you meet new people and expand your network of friends and legal colleagues but it is also for self satisfaction.

13.    The journey that we are traveling and experiencing call “Life” is wide and long. We do not know where it will take us or where it will end. There may be a few bumps here and there or it may be a smooth one for majority of the time. But what we know is that we are the ones who determine how comfortable or how successful that journey will be. As lawyers, we have a duty to our clients, to the Court and to the Bar. We must ensure that our clients have confidence in us; the Court has respect for us and the Bar has trust in us to keep it independent and just. With that, I wish you all the very best in your legal career or whatever career that you choose. Thank you and best wishes.

Mediation Skills Training Course at the Bar Council - 3rd Oct until 7th Oct 2012

Mediation Skills Training Course October 2012

Mediation - role play in session

Mediator "mirroring" one of the parties

"Mirroring" in action

The wonderful participants

Mediator setting the Agenda

Me and Faizal

Last week was a very busy week for me. I was asked by the Malaysian Mediation Centre (MMC) to be the Course Leader and the Lead Trainer for a 5 days Mediation Skills Training Course at the Bar Council, Malaysia. The course ran from 3rd October until 7th October 2012. The thing I like about the MMC is that they give you a free hand to run the course as you deem fit. I decided to rope my colleagues and friends to help me out in the Mediation Skills Training Course. All of them are Certified Mediation Trainers and like me, we are all doing it pro bono. We are not paid a single cent. All the monies collected from the Training Course go to MMC for the upkeep and the maintaining of the Centre.

The people who came and helped were Wong Lu Peen (she was there the whole of first day as she already had plans to travel to overseas the following day), Marcus Hwang, Tejinderpal, Puan Hendon (Tejinderpal and Puan Hendon have been helping me since Day 1 of the Course), Serene, Chan Kheng Hoe, Nacha, Sumathi, KL Choy, Tay Bee Choo and Christine Khor. Serene, KL Choy, Bee Choo and Christine are from outstation. Due to the spirit of volunteerism and camaraderie, they made the extra effort to be with us at the Training.

During the Training, Bee Choo (from Johor Baru) and Christine (from Penang) stayed at my place. After the Training on Day 3, I took Bee Choo, Jennifer, my father and our friend, Catherine Eu (former Executive Director of the Bar Council, Malaysia) to Jinjang (Kepong) to try this unique steamboat porridge dinner. Amongst the dishes was a plate of “live” prawns. The prawns were still moving and active. You have to literally and physically put the prawns into the pot of hot steamboat porridge. You can’t get the prawns any fresher than that. Without a doubt, the prawns were simply delicious. On Day 4, Christine Khor joined us from Penang. Catherine Eu invited us over to her place for dinner but we had a better idea, we asked her to join us for seafood dinner in Port Klang. We went to this place called “Klang Seafood” and had crabs, “sotong”, fried “hokkien mee” just to name a few. It was real fun having Bee Choo and Catherine over at our place.

When it comes to food, I digressed. Let us get back to the Training. We had a wonderful group of people comprising of senior lawyers, marriage therapist, psychologist and a medical doctor as participants. As Puan Hendon remarked in her closing speech, this Training was conducted in a different style compared  to the previous trainings. In this Training, we played games, had short exercises, several role plays and we showed seven (7) different video clips. The clips are fun videos featuring flash mob, baby laughing and also “gang-nam style”. We wanted to keep the Training exciting and lively for the participants. It was our intention get them on their feet and keep them moving. We even had a “set-up” sketch where my secretary, Michelle Martin played the role of the “rude lady” who kept on interrupting me while I was conducting the Training. It was all done in good fun with a specific purpose. If you want to know the purpose, come and join us in the next Training.

Besides having fun, the Training was also quite a personal challenge for me. On the last day, I had food poisoning and was throwing up. Later on, I discovered that a number of participants also experienced the same thing. However, as they say, “the show must go on”. I am thankful to Bee Choo, Christine and a few others who were constantly checking on me throughout the day. My thanks also go to Marianna Tan and Faizal who showed genuine concern. They are from the Malaysian Mediation Centre and have been a great help throughout the Training. In that Training, I also took my final bow as that was my final training given as a member of the Malaysian Bar. A lot of nice memories and I made a lot of good friends. Thank you everyone!

Risk Management Workshop 2012 - "Communication: Connecting People"

I was amazed with this wonderful group of people!

Here is Betty, the lady with the big smile (far right)

Almost full house!

Kudos go to Mysahra Shawkat Ali 

I gave a talk on “Communication: Connecting People” which was one of the sessions in the Risk Management Workshop held at the Bar Council Auditorium on 21st June 2012. The workshop was very well attended, as a matter a fact, almost full capacity. The organisers mentioned that they have to turn down a number of people as they could not accomodate anymore due to logistic issues. The Risk Management Workshop was very well organised by Mysahra Shawkat Ali and her team.


Before my session started, I was pleasantly surprised when a fairly mature and pleasant lady participant walked up to me to introduce herself. She mentioned that she met me almost ten years ago and is a classmate of Jennifer’s aunty. She remembered meeting me and my family almost a decade ago. We had a nice chat, catching up with each other’s life. Her name is Betty and has been working with Tommy Thomas (a senior lawyer) for many years.


I enjoyed interacting with this group of wonderful participants. It is always a real joy to speak at a workshop where you can see so many smiling faces. I spoke about handling internal, external and electronic communications in the Company. I also shared with the participants some of the techniques that they can use to deal with challenging clients and also I went through a list of DOs and DON’Ts.


At the end of the workshop, a short video clip of my book launch was shown. Again, I was pleasantly surprised when a thunderous round of applause was given at the end of the video clip which also signalled the end my session. Mysahra, thank you for making it a memorable day for me! Let’s hope I get some good reviews from the participants!

"Mediation Skills and Techniques" book launch - The Video

If you missed the "Mediation Skills and Techniques" book launch on 14th May 2012. You 

can watch it here. It is only 5 minutes long. Enjoy! Please leave your comment(s). Thanks.

The Launching of “Mediation Skills and Techniques”

The book launch held on 14^th May 2012 was a great success. We had about a hundred people who attended the launch. Mediation Skills and Techniques became a best seller on that day. The books were completely sold out. A number of guests were disappointed that they were not able to purchase the book on the day of the launch. However, the publisher Thomson Reuters / Sweet & Maxwell Asia managed to remedy the situation by handing out order forms and promising quick delivery as soon as the books are in stock. For my part, if you have received the book, please contact me at Seumas@MediationSkills.org and I will be more than happy to autograph it for you.

Speaking about autographing, the books were supposed to go on sale after the official launch, however, something amusing happened along the way that got the books to go on sale before the official launch took place. Immediately after the workshop, I was approached by Mahendran from Thomson Reuters’ marketing department to sign two copies of the book. One copy was to be given to Lim Chee Wee (President of the Malaysian Bar) while the other was to be given to Datuk Kuthubul Zaman Bukhari (Chairman of the Malaysian Mediation Centre /Chairman of the Asian Mediation Association) as token of appreciation for launching the book. As I was signing the two copies, I did not realize there was already a queue forming in front of me waiting to purchase the book. I was truly humbled by that experience to see so many of you supporting my writing career. Mahendran asked me whether he could go ahead to sell the book in view that Mediation Skills and Techniques has not been formally launched yet. Well, for logistic reason, I asked Mahendran to go ahead with the sale as there was already a line forming. I was most delighted to meet so many of you and it has been an honour and privilege to sign so many books on that day. By the time Mediation Skills and Techniques was officially launched, the books have already gone out of stock. According to the Publisher, this was one of the rarest moments as far as they can remember or perhaps the first time ever that the books were completely sold out at a launch! 

The programme for the book launch started right on the dot (the Malaysian time concept certainly did not apply here!). Rachel Tan being the ever gracious person accepted my invitation to be the MC for the book launch. She did a splendid job! The programme started with a short speech from Prakash Nagarajan who is the Business Development Manager, Thomson Reuters / Sweet & Maxwell, South East Asia who represented the Managing Director who was away at that time. 

Immediately after Prakash’s speech was my turn to speak. In my speech, I shared with the guests on what inspired me to write and how I believe in writing books which are easy to read and understand, simple and yet practical. I informed the guests that I do not believe in writing voluminous books and if anyone can even remember half of what they have read, that would have been fantastic. It was precisely for that very reason, I put in a lot of stories and illustrations in the book. It is my hope that the readers are able to relate to those stories and easily recall the techniques and skills when the need arises. It is easier to remember the story rather than the theory. At the end, I thanked all those people who have supported me and gave me unconditional love all these years – just to name a few, my beautiful wife Jennifer, my kids Ashley and Douglas and my parents.

Immediately after my speech came Lim Chee Wee’s speech. Chee Wee, the ever humble fella who had sportingly allowed me to pick on him during my speech started by saying “In consistent with my height, my speech is going to be SHORT!!!” Chee Wee gave a very touching speech saying that the Malaysian Bar will miss me when I move to Sydney at the end of the year. Chee Wee paid a small tribute to me by saying that when I leave Malaysia, I will be leaving a small legacy behind knowing that the book will leave a mark in Malaysia. Chee Wee urged me to consider to remain as a lawyer in Malaysia and also a lawyer in Sydney, thus becoming an international lawyer (hmmm…..sounds tempting but I am not sure whether the Legal Profession Act 1976 would allow it. I need to check on that).

The next speech came from Datuk Kuthubul Zaman who said that when he first met me, he was amazed that I could hypnotized people, however, at that time he wasn’t sure whether I would make a good Mediator. Datuk Zaman related some old and amusing stories and finally concluded that I have met all of the criterias (I am not sure what the criterias are now) that made me an excellent Mediator! Well, thank you for your kind words, Datuk. It looks like I got some big shoes to fill!

Then the highlight of the launch was the signing of the mock book cover by Lim Chee Wee and Datuk Kuthubul Zaman. It was a wonderful day for me. Many friends attended the launch. Some of them were my former school mates like Yip Chee Seng and my good buddies, Choong Tuck Meng and wife, Daniel Boon, Leong Meng Leong, Syed Annuar, Sharifah, Francis Chong, Mark Ong and Suresh Kumar. His Excellency, the High Commissioner of Singapore, Mr Ong Keng Yong and the Counsellor Mike Kuek were there as well. My fellow Mediators, Gunavathi, Nacha, Tejinder, Wong Lu Peen, Sivanesan and Sumathi were there to lend support as well. I have also invited the High Commissioner of Australia who unfortunately was unable to attend as he had a prior engagement. In view of my ties with Australia, it would have been nice if the Australian High Commission send a representative to the launch instead. Oh, well.....things happen for a reason.  

I would like to mention a special thank you to my good friend Yuen Wing Soon whom I regard as one of the top photographers in Malaysia for taking all the wonderful pictures. Yuen normally takes photographs of catwalk models. I guess by taking photos of me, it would be a great challenge for him, especially the touching up of the photos! As my wife said, even though the launch has been over for more than a week, my tail is still wagging!

Introduction to "Mediation Skills and Techniques" workshop

In conjunction with the launching of “Mediation Skills and Techniques”, I conducted a workshop called “Introduction to Mediation Skills and Techniques” at the Raja Aziz Addruse Auditorium, Bar Council. We had over 40 participants in that workshop! I was informed that as at to date, this is the biggest group of participants in any Mediation training course held at the Bar Council.

The purpose of the workshop was to introduce some of the techniques in creating rapport, eliciting information and accessing the parties as an effective way in communicating with people. We started the workshop at 9.00am by doing a quick overview on what is Mediation and the protocols associated with Mediation. After that, we explore the concept of reframing, anchoring/associating and “mirroring”. We then applied those techniques in creating rapport and eliciting information. To demonstrate the use of those techniques, I had the privilege of meeting a very nice and enthusiastic Mediator by the name of Kamsimah Mohamed from the Financial Mediation Bureau. She sportingly volunteered to be my “target” and shared with us some information of her private life. Thank you, Kamsimah!

After that, we had a couple of breakout sessions and then time for a tea break. As usual, Mr. Ragu and his team (the caterers) provided some mouth watering food such as nasi lemak and some kueh for breakfast. I did not partake in the food as I normally do not have a heavy meal when conducting workshops.

After the break, we did listening skills and more techniques. I introduced the technique in picking up cues from the parties. That segment went on until 1.00pm. We then took an hour break for lunch. Again, the lunch prepared by Ragu was sumptious! What followed after lunch was something different. I decided to hypnotise the participants and created a “Circle of Excellence”. The “Circle of Excellence” is a subconscious programme that the participants can call on when they require a boost in their confidence either to speak or to perform in public or whenever they want to feel motivated.

Immediately following that, we did a role play. The role play was done in two different styles. The role players were Sivanesan Nadarajah, Rachel Brooke, Jonathan Yoon and myself. I think the participants enjoyed the role play as there were some laughter and applause.

All in all, I believe it was a pleasant workshop. I am truly privilege and honoured to have met so many people both from near and a far (as far as from Penang) who attended the workshop. Some of them include Natalie Shobana Ambrose (an Analyst with ISIS and a Columnist with The Sun), Kamsimah Mohamed (Financial Mediation Bureau), Nehrman (Financial Mediation Bureau), Ibrahim Baharom (IRD, Ministry of Human Resources), Farez Mohd Ali Jinnah (a young and upcoming lawyer) and Khairul Anuar Che Azmi (Universiti Sains Malaysia). If there are participants who are reading this article, feel free to comment as I would love to hear from you.

Promoting ADR at KLCC

Rachel Brooke Tan (right) and Sumitra Penesar (left), both amateur models, posed for the camera while promoting ADR at the recent ADR Seminar organized by the Kuala Lumpur Regional Centre for Arbitration (KLRCA). The seminar was held in KLCC. Rachel and Sumitra were both former staff members of the Bar Council. Rachel is now the PR Executive in KLRCA while Sumitra is the Conference Producer with Crimson Logic. Way to go, ladies!

Invitation to the Book Launch

The Malaysian Mediation Centre (MMC), Bar Council has very kindly organized the book launch for me. Besides organizing the launch, the MMC is also hosting it. I am deeply honored and touched by MMC's very kind gesture. Lim Chee Wee (President, Malaysian Bar) and Datuk Zaman (Chairman, MMC) without any hesitation agreed to launch the book. I have volunteered and served in the various Committees in the Bar Council for many years now. I did it because I believe in contributing to the Bar and I have never in my life expect anything in return. To have the launch at the Bar Council means a lot to me and for them to organize it too, that is like the icing on the cake! Thank you MMC and Bar Council, you guys are fantastic! Special thanks should go to Marianna Tan, Faizal and Khairul from the Bar Council who have put in great efforts in getting the launch moving. Also, a special mention should be given to Catherine Eu (former Executive Director of the Bar Council) for her valuable insights. Thank you, everyone.

If you like to attend the launch, please drop me a line at Seumas@MediationSkills.org. I will be more than happy to have you as a guest.