Michael Jenkins

Michael was born and spent his early years in Malaysia and Uganda. He graduated from Durham University in Chinese followed by postgraduate studies in Japanese language, politics and economics at Nanzan University, Nagoya, after which he worked for Toyota Motor Corporation in Toyota City, Aichi prefecture. As Director of the Foreign Languages Centre at the University of Bath in England, Michael spent nine years working with G3 multinationals on a wide variety of projects. He co-authored Teach Yourself Business Japanese (Hodder) and was the editor of Cassell’s Business Briefing: Japan and launched the UK’s first interpreting and translating MA in Japanese and English.

In 2001, Michael returned to Asia as Director of INSEAD Executive Education in Singapore. He subsequently took on the role of Managing Director of the Center for Creative Leadership Asia Pacific. In 2009 he joined Roffey Park Institute in the UK as CEO. Michael contributed to the Singapore Ministry of Manpower’s publication Asian Leadership: What Works and wrote the CEO leader profiles of Indra Nooyi (PepsiCo), Yun Jong Yong (Samsung Electronics) and Fujio Mitarai (Canon) for The 50 Best Business Leaders (Future Publishing, 2013). Michael joined the Human Capital Leadership Institute (HCLI) in Singapore as CEO in 2018. His current interests lie in “making Human Capital, Human” and in a related topic, compassionate leadership, captured in an article in the European Foundation for Management Development (EFMD)’s Global Focus 2016 magazine: The Global Workplace – A compassion-free zone? The UK’s HR Magazine named Michael as one of the UK’s Most Influential Thinkers in Human Resources in 2013 and again in 2016. Michael now works in partnership with his colleagues at HCLI on Board-related topics and was recently a contributor at the Global Board Leadership Summit in Singapore, a global board programme created by HCLI jointly with the Board Leadership Society of Denmark and Copenhagen Business School. He has a strong interest in sustainability and the role of Boards and CEOs in advancing sustainable leadership practices.

Michael is a regular judge in the UK’s Personnel Today Awards specialising in the talent management category and has also judged leadership development submissions in the EFMD Excellence in Practice Awards. He has spoken at many events across Asia and Europe covering leadership development and HR-related topics in the humanitarian, financial services and semi-conductor sectors and is currently working on digital disruption and its effect on people in organisations. Michael is a Fellow of the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust, a Rotary Foundation Scholar for International Understanding and a former Council member (SE England) of the Confederation of British Industries (CBI). In Singapore he is a Board member of the IHRP (Institute for Human Resource Professionals).

Education

• University of Durham BAField Of StudyOriental Studies (Chinese) 1979 – 1983

• Nanzan University, Nagoya, Japan PG DiplomaField Of StudyJapanese language, politics and economicsGradePass 1984 – 1985

• Gwendraeth Grammar School 1976 – 1979