The dry February northeast monsoon swept the dust off the roads outside Phnom Penh. In one of its market development trips, Siam Cement Group (SCG) hired a local driver - a self-proclaimed expert navigator - as a guide. He knew where he was heading, or so he said. Along the rugged track, climbing up a hill, the expert wanted to overtake the lorry in front. Easy, he thought, but it was a bad move. The van veered off the cliff. Kalin Sarasin, Siam Cement Industry's then marketing director, was knocked from the vehicle. He broke his hips, thighs and pelvic bones.

That was more than six years ago, and was something of a Road to Damascus experience for Kalin, who now oversees SCT, the trading arm of SCG, as its managing director. The car crash made him re-evaluate his life and bridled his ambition. Despite heading a profitable and ever-growing operation, with reported 16-per-cent growth last year plus four new overseas branches, Kalin, once a workaholic, now preaches a work-life balance.

"Whether it is doing sports or spending time with your family and friends, you have to use your time efficiently," says Kalin. Friendship and allocating enough time for yourself are very important too.

"Don't just work and pay no attention to your friends or even yourself. You need to strike the right balance," he says.

Neither a "Chainsaw Al" (Albert Dunlop former CEO of Sunbeam Products who said his two German Shepherds were his best friends) nor a resigned existentialist hermit, Kalin manages with "openness".

"There is no hierarchy between him and his staff. He doesn't like to dominate," says an SCT marketing executive. "You can talk to him openly, and he will listen."

Sitting on a bright red sofa in the company's lounge, Kalin is convinced the right working environment and atmosphere will bring out the best in people. "Innovation", an SCG corporate philosophy, "will happen only in the right ambience, with people speaking the same language working together", says Kalin.

 With this year's sales expected to reach Bt27 billion, Kalin sees SCT's biggest challenges lying in recycling and alternative energy. "They will be our driving forces for change," says Kalin, who oversaw the opening of four new SCT branches this year, in Philadelphia, Bombay, Shanghai and Jordan. The two businesses offer higher margins. Kalin expected them to contribute to 40 per cent of SCT's total revenue. SCG businesses, in particular construction materials such as cement, make up the other 60 per cent.

SCT trades 12 different categories of products from agro-industry to construction raw materials, from coal-water mixture to aluminium sheet from Alcoa.

Often acting as a spearhead for the group, recently SCT signed an agency agreement to be the sole distributor in Thailand and Vietnam for RUSAL, the world's largest producer of primary aluminium since it merged with SUAL. It took the Russian giant aluminium producer a year to study the trading company's marketing and distribution capabilities before entrusting SCT with the duty.

A sense of alliance and teamwork were ingrained in the young Kalin, who has been actively involved in sports since his boarding-school days at Deerfield Academy, Massachusetts, with soccer in autumn, squash during the short winter days, and tennis in spring. As an industrial engineering student at Lehigh University, Pennsylvania, Kalin played tennis and squash for the university teams. "I trained and competed in tournaments to a point where my joints were loose and failing," said the sportsman. "I don't play squash as often now, but I have recently started to train some staff here."

Kalin has now traded racquets for golf clubs.

Fresh out of University of Notre Dame's Mendoza College of Business, the MBA graduate joined SCG as one of 12 marketing trainees. "People joked that I would be the first to leave," said Kalin, who came from a well-known family.

"I actually started working quite early on. It was the first summer of my high school year and my father's friend, Khun Bancha Lamsam, told me I couldn't just sit around for three months. From then on, every year, I did a little bit of everything, from working over the counter as a teller to evaluating projects at Thai Farmers Bank," said Kalin. The bank has recently changed its name to KBank.

Having just returned from Harvard Business School's eight-week Advanced Management Programme, Kalin is keen to see the numerous business and life lessons he learnt come to fruition. Out of the many business concepts, the lecturers asked Kalin to just focus on three business concepts, which he will impart to his colleagues in a presentation on December 18, and see them adapted and bear fruit in the organisation. Although still in the selection process, Kalin says he would most likely concentrate on customers, working habits and leadership skills.

"Because we were taught by a world-class faculty - there was so much knowledge for you there - it was up to the individual to take what he could," says Kalin.

As part of the course, sponsored by Siam Cement Group, Kalin enjoyed interacting with his 154 classmates who came from 39 different countries. "Because people were from such diverse backgrounds and industries, it made sharing knowledge and points of view much more stimulating." Every year, for the AMP alone, SCG sent four senior managers to HBS, two in the spring term and another pair in autumn.

Studying alongside the cream of the world's top corporations, CEOs, VPs and directors from leading companies in their fields such as SSL International Plc, the successful UK-listed consumer products company, through to Mitsui & Co, the international trade and services company, meant new connections. Kalin was asked to become the coordinator for the programme's reunion in Asia, which could take place next year. A sharing session was scheduled late last month  for Thai alumni.

As Asian Wall Street Journal's Best Company in Thailand for the second year running, SCG has spent almost Bt500 million annually in training its staff. "Our group's strength is in the strong emphasis on people by education - learning and implementation," said Kalin.

Kalin's teaching bugs often prompt him to share what he has just learned from various seminars with his staff, often at the meeting every Monday morning. "He doesn't just order, but shares his experiences. Not just on business matters, but soft skills such as teamwork and communications too," reveals a staff member.

Ki Nan Tsui  

The Nation