Inside Asian Gaming

INSIDE ASIAN GAMING | March 2011 40 SJM Succession you start to display hubris. And that can end up eroding political support and being bad for business. Many political analysts suggest the fact Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao spends significant amounts of time kissing babies on their heads and visiting the injured after China’s many natural and man- made disasters is a significant factor in maintaining the popularity and legitimacy of China’s communist regime. He’s known in the popular Chinese press as ‘Grandpa Wen’. That’s not quite as irreverent as it sounds. In Chinese culture, with its emphasis on family bonds, it’s common for unrelated friends or respected people to be given an honorary family title such as ‘uncle’. Dr Ho in his later, mellower years, can be seen in some ways as Macau’s answer to Grandpa Wen. Dr Ho’s version is to reward people in his circle and beyond and be loyal to them not because they might harm his interests if he doesn’t, but because good news travels far and fast—and buys a lot of goodwill and a lot of loyalty in turn. A room full of STDM employees who each get a lai see packet stuffed with money, just because one of Dr Ho’s horses won a race that day, tell their friends and family about that good experience. Employees who witness one of their superiors getting bawled at by a top company official (as has allegedly happened on a number of occasions at other Macau gaming companies, though not MGM Macau) go away and tell a very different story to an awful lot of people. No one is suggesting Pansy Ho should turn into a Princess Diana-type figure and start hugging AIDS patients if she wants to be STDM boss. Nor is anyone suggesting China could or would ‘dethrone’Ms Ho if she took the top job at STDM and her particular style didn’t always chime 100% with the views or tastes of China’s leadership. China is changing all the time, in terms of the way business and to some extent politics is A room full of STDM employees who each get a lai see packet stuffed with money, just because one of Dr Ho’s horses won a race that day, tell their friends and family about that good experience. Employees who witness one of their superiors getting bawled at by a top company official go away and tell a very different story to an awful lot of people. Pansy Ho would not have to transform herself into a Princess Diana-type figure in order to head STDM