The making of Shaukat Aziz

When Pervez Musharraf took over from Nawaz Sharif, Shaukat Aziz was working in New York as one of the senior most executives of Citibank, the largest banking institution in the world. He was reporting to John Reed, the bank's chairman.
He remembers that day well as he watched Pakistan's new leader on television in commando uniform from his office at 399 Park Avenue. His secretary said, "there has been a change of government in Pakistan. The new leader is going to be addressing the nation." And he watched it live on CNN.
"I saw President Musharraf for the first time. I thought he was an impressive and straightforward man." Aziz didn't know that within the week he would be called to GHQ, Rawalpindi, for a meeting that would change the course of his life.
Leaving behind a very different life of financial rewards, professional challenges, corporate jets and the trappings of success, Shaukat Aziz reflects, "I took charge just under five years ago. It's been a long journey, but I've built a good team. I have a total commitment to restoring Pakistan's financial credibility, sovereignty, and rebuilding Pakistan's economy. My team has worked very hard turning things around. In fact, this team has worked harder than any private sector team I've known, even though most of them haven't had the same kind of training." he says. As a leader he treats his team fairly, but he also works to improve their weaker areas. "Much more needs to be done. If you look at the economic histories of countries like China or Thailand or Malaysia, you'll see it took almost two decades to turn those countries around. It's like a treadmill. You just keep going." He goes on to add: "Change is difficult and painful. I've been treading on a lot of toes and tails. You need to have nerves of steel to implement change. Various interests will oppose change. You need conviction and determination and willpower to carry change through. It is made easier if your decisions are not ad hoc but based on strategies, like the PRSP and the Debt Strategy. All the stakeholders have an opportunity to share in the thinking process."
Hard work is not something he shies away from. In fact, even his detractors admit that he is highly motivated and puts in 12 hour days, six days a week. "What I require of my team are high standards of integrity and humility. There are no short cuts to hard work or competence." His team say that one of his greatest strengths is his ability to handle stress with cool and composure, and his relentless energy and drive. "Yes I am motivated. This job motivates me. I feel passion, energy and drive. I hasten to add that Rome wasn't built in a day and there's a lot more to be done. We're turning the economy around."
When I ask him which historical figure he admires the most he says, "the Quaid". For a millisecond I raise my eyebrows. It's such a pat answer that I want to disbelieve him. I wonder, is this just patriotic banter for a journalist? I think he can see me squirming slightly in my chair so he goes on to justify: "He was tenacious, determined and had amazing leadership skills and against tremendous odds managed to galvanise the Muslim community to achieve his objective of an Islamic State. Despite the shocks of 1971 etc, we're benefiting from his vision till today." Later in the interview, I ask the same question again. This time he answers to other South Asian leaders, "Mahathir, Lee Kwan Yew, Deng Xiao Ping." I'm appeased.
Shaukat Aziz was born in March 1949 in Karachi. He has two sisters and an "excellent mother" and they come from what he calls "a good, middle class background." His father was a government servant, and the young family moved around Pakistan. Young Shaukat attended St Patrick's in Karachi, did a stint in Abbotabad, and graduated from Gordon College, Rawalpindi before he joined IBA in Karachi for his MBA, "because business and the private sector fascinated me." During his MBA he joined Citibank for a summer job. "My initial plan was to complete my MBA degree in Pakistan and get another degree overseas." In those days, FNCB (First National Citibank) was not well known in Pakistan, but his bosses saw potential in their summer recruit and offered him a permanent job once he graduated. "When my father asked me where I had got a job and I told him FNCB, he said, 'What's that?'. "
Shaukat Aziz married young, at age 23. With his new bride, Rukhsana, Aziz was sent to Manila for nine months for an executive training programme two years after joining. It was his first international experience. There, Rukhsana gave birth to their eldest daughter, Lubna. When they returned, Aziz joined corporate banking, but soon became the branch manager, Lahore. He was just 26. The branch did well and the business grew, as did the family: Rukhsana gave birth to a son, Abid. When Ed Hoffmann, the regional head of Africa and the Middle East visited Lahore he told the bank's country head that, "this talent can be used elsewhere, why can't we use some of these young men in the Middle East?" The oil boom had just begun.
The Middle East and Africa headquarters were in Athens and Aziz was appointed head of the training centre and regional treasury. "As a family, it was the first time we visited Europe. We enjoyed the Greek culture immensely. For my career it was very exciting. Regionally, we were interacting with over 25 countries." However, Aziz sees his first big break as being appointed country head of Citibank Jordan. "In those days having a non-US citizen heading a Citibank franchise raised a lot of eyebrows. It was a beginning." In Jordan, they had their third child, daughter Maha.
After Jordan, Aziz went back to Athens and then to New York "which was my first exposure to corporate headquarters. Being overseas is like being in a cocoon. It's like working as a Deputy Commissioner in a small, remote district and then coming to the secretariat where the issues, the ambience, the culture is different. We moved to New York with three children in tow. The senior management of the company got to see me at close quarters for the first time, saw my potential and moved me to Malaysia which was a unique experience. That was a larger operation and we did very well, personally and professionally." Malaysia was beginning to start its ascent as a major economic player in South East Asia.
A challenging but fruitful posting to Saudi Arabia followed. "Citibank had a joint operation with local shareholders that needed turning around. This was a large bank and it was a turning point for me in my career because it was a very difficult job. It was an independent job, and being a major bank in the Middle East with a big stake from Citibank and local shareholders, we had prominence and attention. I was successful in turning around the bank and restoring its financial health and building it. This clearly established my credibility within and outside the bank and because it was a public limited company, the results were published every quarter. The whole region could see what was going on."
In each of their postings abroad, the Aziz family forged close personal relationships with locals. What did they seek in their friendships? "Openness, shared values, support for the right things when needed." The children always attended International Schools for continuity. But Pakistan was always their lodestar. Aziz attributes this to the fact that each of his postings was short, so the family never really put down roots in any one place for too long. Pakistan always remained their home and the place they would return to, again and again. "My children were very young and as a family we made an effort to assimilate with the local population in each country and we developed friendships which have lasted. There were lots of expatriates who would only mix with other expatriates, but we would make an effort to mix with locals in each posting. Till today we keep in touch. If I were to say that I had dozens of friends in each place, then you would know that they were not friends just acquaintances. There have been few but deep friendships." The Aziz family has moved frequently and have learned to adjust to new surroundings and cultures. "It's an attitude."
After Aziz's success in Saudi Arabia, he shifted to London where he became Citibank regional head for the Middle East. This involved a lot of travel, opening franchises. "The London assignment opened my eyes because I was working in the City of London, a major financial centre, interacting with ministers of finance, governors of central banks, and managing the Middle East, Central Eastern Europe and Africa. I was head of the Middle East during the Gulf War and the bank went through it unscathed because our risk management and contingency plans stood the test of times."
Latin American debt issues and domestic real estate problems affected Citibank as a company and John Reed appointed 15 people to function as independent CEOs of their respective businesses. "I was privileged to be one of them and moved to Singapore to be head of Citibank's Asia Pacific corporate and investment banking business reporting directly to John Reed. I saw the Asian growth process move ahead and expanded our businesses. The thing about all these jobs was, 1) remote management, so you have to develop the art of building and managing a team, 2) to take a view of all the various countries, their macroeconomic situation, the risk profile and add value to the business, 3) selecting the right CEO.
In the private sector one is very results oriented, so the premium is on what you know and what you deliver, not who you know, and it's a very transparent process where the results are seen by management monthly. 50% of the senior management of Citibank was non-US. It was fascinating. Of the Fortune-500 companies, ours was the only one with such a mix. 15 of us would meet every month. I would fly from Singapore every month. I was perpetually jetlagged! The chairman wanted to build a team that was welded together and shared the same objectives. We had fire in our bellies and a commitment to succeed. Fascinating leader! It was the largest bank in the world with 15 independent senior executives."
"My job as regional head allowed me to access top business and government people and I used to take special time to meet civil society and think tanks and was not just restricted solely to what we were doing. That enriched my thinking and knowledge of the country. Or I'd go to an art gallery, or to a concert, to get a true flavour of what a country is about. Over time you develop the art of assimilating what is good in any particular place and finding out where the risks are from a professional point of view. Citibank gave us virtually unlimited authority to take important decisions, so I had total empowerment, but also total accountability. And that gave one the ability to take measured risks and that develops confidence and analytical ability."
After three years in Singapore living through the Asian miracle, Aziz moved to New York to work for the Chairman, John Reed, as his corporate planning officer on the executive floor. "I learned about global relations, acquisitions, global risks, Wall Street relations, investor relations, dealings with regulators. My last assignment was as head of the global private bank for two years. It had serious administrative and management issues and I was sent in to rebuild it as head of the private bank. During this time, Citibank merged with the Travellers Group and a merger is like a new marriage. For me the merger went well."
"The Ministry of Finance job is a very sought after job. I believe many people were lobbying for the job. A week after I had met Musharraf, I was in Europe when General Aziz called saying that Musharraf had appointed me Minister of Finance and Commerce. I had 3,500 people working for me, so I had to speak to my family and key people at work and that's how I came here. The financial situation was much worse than I had anticipated, but it's been fascinating to come back in a major position having never worked in government and having come from the private sector. I've built a good team of motivated professionals. We have tremendous support from the President. Gradually, people recognise that you are serious professionals and our work is transparent. The results are there for the nation to judge. Looking back, there are things we could have done differently. I have had to learn to say "no" and allocate scarce resources. I'm judged daily. No one is happy. This is a particularly aggressive budget," he says referring to Budget 2004. He looks tired.
Shaukat Aziz speaks quietly, yet his words are measured and forceful. He makes his point, although he thinks that sometimes he can be "too polite". I can tell he's given many interviews before because his boundaries are clearly in place.
He's an intensely private man, one can tell. He is an art connoisseur and has a collection that he prizes. "Music is like food for thought, the mind and soul." Aziz listens to classical, qawwali and ghazals. His family, his children and his grandchildren give him tremendous joy.
Earlier he had mentioned his intense lifestyle "I haven't been able to give Rukhsana all the time she should have had, yet she has been an immense source of strength to me and our children." In his office, amongst the photos of him shaking hands with visiting dignitaries, are baby photos, incongruously, of his grandchildren presumably. "You have to be at peace with yourself before you can be effective. If you are not at peace with yourself, you'll not be able to use your true energy and may be working at cross purposes."