The primary issue lies in middle management. There is a noticeable lack of core skills and the utter lack leadership competency at the senior manager and upper managerial level. Decisions often feel arbitrary rather than data-driven, and there is a lack of accountability for those in leadership roles. They will spring surprises on employees during performance reviews , where I have seen people who are good performers given “Needs Improvement” rating all because their manager didn’t like them or was biased against them. Career progression is not based on merit or KPIs. There is a clear "inner circle" culture where favorites are given the best projects and promotions regardless of their actual output or capability. If you aren't part of that circle, your contributions go unnoticed, which leads to high turnover among high performers.
Performance improvement plans are a joke- they are meant to manage you out. I’ve seen an Asm employee suffer from a mental breakdown while on PIP, and the manager used that to dismiss the employee.
Hire and fire culture here is real. I’ve seen people being fired just because they wanted to hire someone from HQ to replace the Directors in Singapore.
Directions change constantly without a clear strategy, and feedback is often vague or contradictory. The lack of "soft skills" and basic core knowledge at the top creates a vacuum of direction that the rest of the staff has to fill and are blamed if they do not “understand” what are the expectations from the clueless Senior Managers and Directors.
The culture in Asia is one that is fear-based- fear of speaking out, fear of direct managers, fear of C Suite ( CEO rules by fear, and so does the CHRO). So these toxic senior managers and above stay comfortable as reports fear to speak out due to retaliation
