Faculty Members 

Chairman of Executive Training and Consulting S.A.L

NABIL N. EL-HAGE is Chairman of Executive Training and Consulting S.A.L and recently served as Adjunct Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School in the General Management area, and was also Senior Associate Dean for External Relations. He first joined the HBS faculty in 1984, immediately after obtaining his MBA from the School, and taught the required MBA finance course in 1984-85. For the past several years, El-Hage taught the required Corporate Finance course, Fin 2, and the elective Private Equity Finance course, the development of which he spearheaded.

Previously, he taught the elective course, Active Investing - Management and Governance, and the required course, Leadership and Corporate Accountability.   Prior to returning to HBS in 2003, El-Hage gained experience in private equity and venture capital with TA Associates and Advent International, as well as on the operating side, as CFO of Back Bay Restaurant Group. He also served as Chairman and CEO of Jeepers! Inc., a private equity-financed national chain of indoor theme parks for nearly ten years.   El-Hage was a Research Consultant with McKinsey & Company, Inc. before attending business school.   El-Hage has served on a dozen boards of private and public companies, ranging from start-ups to several billion dollars in revenues. He served as president of the Yale Club of Boston from 2005 until June 2007. He is currently the independent Chairman of the MassMutual Premier Funds, a $10 billion mutual fund complex.

El-Hage graduated cum Laude from Yale University with a degree in electronic engineering (1980), and earned his MBA with the Highest Honors, as a Baker Scholar, from Harvard Business School in 1984, where he was awarded the Henry Ford Foundation Award for the Best First-Year Academic Record, the Loeb-Rhoades Fellowship for Excellence in Finance, the Copeland (Marketing) Award nomination, and a Dean's Doctoral Fellowship.

Nicholas Krasno

Nicholas Krasno is a New York-based consultant specializing in corporate governance, risk management, and strategic development for corporations and financial institutions.

His practice includes corporate governance assessments and implementation for banks and companies, as well as advising governments, central banks and stock exchanges on corporate governance codes and practices.

He has over thirty years of experience in the financial and banking world, and began his consultancy practice in 2003 after eleven years with Moody's Investors Service, where he was Senior Vice President of Moody's Financial Institutions, Banking & Sovereign Risk Group, responsible for the management and credit analysis of banks and other companies in the emerging markets of East and South Asia. Prior to his service with Moody's, Mr Krasno was a banker working in London, Toronto and New York.

Youssef Nasr

Youssef Nasr joined the HSBC Group in April 1975 and retired in March 2010. During his career in the HSBC Group, he has worked in the New York, Paris, London, Toronto, Vancouver, San Paulo and Dubai offices.

His most recent roles were as President and CEO of HSBC Canada from 1997 to 1999. After that, he served as the President and CEO of HSBC USA and North America. In 2003, he was made the President of HSBC Brazil and the Group General Manager of South America. This was a position he held till 2006. In 2007, he became the Chairman and CEO of HSBC Middle East and North Africa (MENA).

Besides serving in HSBC, Youssef has chaired and served on boards of numerous cultural, medical, professional and educational associations.  He currently serves on the boards of various companies in North America in the areas of Private Equity, Infrastructure, Bio Techonology, Electricity Generation and Real Estate. Youssef teaches an Executive MBA Programme and does some consulting work.

Youssef speaks fluent English, French, Arabic and Portuguese. He received his BA and MA in Mathematics from Cambridge University in the UK, and an MBA from the Harvard Business School in the US.  Youssef is 56, married and has two grown up children. He is a citizen of the US and Lebanon.

Mac Kalyan

Mr. Mac Kalyan is an industry veteran with a career spanning three decades in capital markets, finance and risk management. Cutting his teeth initially in the trading pits of the Chicago Board of Trade - fixed income trader - Mr. Kalyan soon gravitated to senior management positions within hedge funds with a focus on portfolio management, compliance, risk, finance and treasury management before founding his own investment vehicle - Haystack Capital Management - in the early 90s where he focused on capital allocation, liquidity risk management, ALM and all derivatives trading (securitized products, FX and exotics to manage cash flows and execute hedging strategies).

Mr. Kalyan still retains an interest in this business and holds seats on both the CME and Eurex. An acknowledged ICAAP and Risk Appetite Expert, Mr. Kalyan has been extensively involved in several Basel rollouts in both North America and here in Asia, most recently in Korea, Singapore and Malaysia. With an extensive knowledge of the regulatory and compliance environment in several G-20 countries, Mr. Kalyan has acted in an advisory capacity to banks, central banks and regulatory agencies in both Asia and North America. As well as his interest in Haystack Capital Management, Mr. Kalyan also holds a senior management position in Black Ice Partners - a small boutique risk advisory business with operations in North America, the Middle East and Asia.

A Canadian national, he holds a degree in economics from Simon Fraser University and a Masters Degree in behaviour economics awarded by Stanford University. Mr. Kalyan is a member of numerous professional organizations, among them GARP and the Canadian Payments Association - his current interests are in Basel II Pillar II, regulatory discretion and the untilisation of common sense in risk, rather than a reliance on quantitative modeling that was demonstrated to have several data and process related weaknesses during the events of 2007/2008.

Prof. Mak Yuen Teen

Mak Yuen Teen was founding director of the Corporate Governance and Financial Reporting Centre (CGFRC) and Associate Professor of Accounting at the NUS Business School at the National University of Singapore. He holds First Class Honours, Masters and PhD degrees in accounting and finance. From 2007 to 2009, he was on leave from NUS and held the position of regional research director (Asia-Pacific) in a global consulting firm.

Prof. Mak is a fellow of CPA Australia and a member of the OECD Asian Corporate Governance Roundtable. He is on two large not-for-profit boards, holding the positions of Chairman and Deputy Chairman on those boards, is a board member of the Financial Industry Dispute Resolution Centre Ltd. which was set up to help resolve disputes between consumers and financial institutions, and a member of the audit advisory committee of the United Nations Population Fund based in New York.

Prof. Mak is also a member of the Charity Council which was set up to raise governance standards and help build capacity in the charity sector in Singapore, and chairs the subcommittee which developed and refined the code of governance for charities. Prof Mak chaired the selection committee for the Singapore Corporate Governance Awards from 2003-2009, and is currently Chair of the Investor Relations Award Committee and member of the CFO of the Year Award Committee under the Singapore Corporate Awards. He is also a member of committee for the Malaysian Corporate Governance Index and Awards. Prof. Mak was also a member of the Council on Corporate Disclosure and Governance (CCDG) from 2002-2005 and a member of the Corporate Governance Committee which released Singapore's first Code of Corporate Governance for listed companies.

Prof. Mak teaches corporate governance in the UCLA-NUS Executive MBA program and at senior undergraduate levels at the National University of Singapore, conducts training for regulators, directors and other professionals in corporate governance, and consults for local and international companies, regulators, and inter-governmental organizations. He speaks regularly in conferences in Singapore and in the region, and is a regular commentator on corporate governance issues in the local and regional media. He currently writes a regular column on corporate governance for the Business Times in Singapore. Prof. Mak has given in-house talks to directors, management, internal auditors, and ethics and compliance officers of Singapore, regional and multinational companies.

Prof. Mak developed the Governance and Transparency Index (GTI) covering all listed companies in Singapore, which is published by the Business Times, sponsored by CPA Australia and supported by the Investment Management Association of Singapore. His report on improving the implementation of corporate governance practices in Singapore, commissioned by the Monetary Authority of Singapore and Singapore Exchange, was published in June 2007 and several of his recommendations have been implemented. His book - From Conformance to Performance: Best Corporate Governance Practices for Asian Companies - was published by McGraw-Hill in 2005.

John Zinkin

John Zinkin has 39 years experience in business, of which twenty-five have been in Asia, holding senior line management and corporate strategy/business development positions in major multinational manufacturing, marketing and consulting companies.

Since moving to Malaysia in 2001, John has set up his own independent consulting company specializing in corporate positioning, change management and communication, as well as marketing strategy and training. He is also the CEO of the Securities Industry Development Corporation (SIDC) the training and development arm of the Securities Commission. He is Deputy Chairman of the Institute of Corporate Responsibility Malaysia (ICRM) and an Exco member of the Business Council for Sustainable Development Malaysia (BCSDM), and a member of the Global Coaching Partnership based in Sydney.

John has written “Challenges in Implementing Corporate Governance: Whose business is it anyway?” published by John Wiley in 2010 and “What CEOs must do to succeed” published by Prentice Hall in 2003, and coauthored “Corporate Governance” published by John Wiley in 2005. He has a fortnightly column in the Star entitled “Whose business is it anyway?” on board governance. He is a regular speaker on corporate governance and trainer of boards in the subject.

John was Associate Professor of Marketing and Strategy at Nottingham University Business School, Malaysia Campus teaching marketing and strategy in the MBA program and International Management and International Marketing in the M.Sc program on International Business. He has published articles on CSR in international journals and is a Visiting Fellow at the International Centre for Corporate Social Responsibility in Nottingham, UK.

As Group Deputy Planning Director of Inchcape Plc, London, John developed the Group’s insurance broking, office products and wines and spirits strategies. He was responsible for the 1985-6 reorganization of the Group streamlining the business from 688 companies in thirty unrelated lines of business to 100 in ten lines of business.

John attended the London Business School where he received an MSc in Business Administration; Magdalen College, Oxford where he majored in Politics, Philosophy and Economics; and Winchester College. John has attended numerous senior executive courses at top business schools, including IMD, INSEAD, Wharton and the University of Pennsylvania.

David Berry

David Berry is Managing Director, at Columbus Circle Governance Sdn Bhd, a company providing consulting and advisory services in all areas of corporate governance. Mr. Berry heads the Corporate Governance, Investor Relations and Financial Communications practice. He has over thirty-five years experience in financial services and corporate consulting, and five years in the commercial sector. Mr. Berry provides high level training to the Boards and executive management of clients in his areas of expertise and advises and assists clients with the practical development corporate governance practices, their investor relations programs and financial communications.

Dr David S Bobker MA, DPhil, ACA
Director of Real Assurance Risk Management

Dr. Bobker is founder and Director of Real Assurance Risk Management a company dedicated to helping clients better to manage their risks and implement corporate frameworks and technologies for operational and credit risk management, internal auditing and corporate governance.  Dr Bobker's qualifications include a DPhil in mathematics from Oxford University and he is a UK qualified chartered accountant.  He has 30 years of experience in the financial services industry, working in various capacities including external audit, leading internal audit for a bank and an insurance company, compliance officer and IT manager.  He spent 2½ years as a supervisor of building societies (mortgage banks) in the UK also responsible for policy on capital adequacy. As a consultant he has provided advice on risk management and regulation to financial institutions and to the Financial Services Authority on policy studies. Dr. Bobker has authored articles on risk management, internal auditing and corporate governance and made numerous presentations to both national and international conferences on these subjects.

David A.H. Brown
Executive Director, Brown Governance

David Brown is Canada's leading thinker, speaker, writer and practitioner in corporate governance.  Since 1995, David has co-founded the International Corporate Governance Centre in Montreal, the National Awards in Governance in Toronto, the Public Enterprise Governance Centre in Ottawa, and the Directors College in Niagara.

David is probably best known for articulating and championing principle-based governance, built on economic agency theory and deriving 18 core competencies of board members.  Principle-based governance underpins all of his work, and is foundational to corporations selecting the right governance model and board practices.  This framework has been adopted by organizations as diverse as one of the GCC's leading telecom providers, one of Canada's big banks, two Canadian provinces'  Crown sectors, universities, health authorities, pension funds and military commands.

David is the author of the definitive Canadian chapter in the international handbook Corporate Governance Around the World (2008: Routledge.)  He is on the faculty of the University of Toronto's St. Michael's College and McMaster University's Directors College, where he teaches governance, corporate social responsibility, finance and risk oversight.  David was invited to serve on his first board in Montreal at age 17, and his second board in Toronto at age 22.

Debra L. Brown
President and CEO, Brown Governance

Debra Brown is President and CEO of Brown Governance and has authored a variety of nationally and internationally published works on corporate governance.  She is editor of Governance Matters, the Canadian Co-operative Association' s governance periodical.  She has planned and facilitated global, national and multi-stakeholder governance conferences and seminars, and spoken on a variety of corporate and personal development issues. 

On the national level, Debra has been a participant in the Public Policy Forum' s roundtable on the governance of Crown Corporations and has been featured in connection with her corporate governance work on Canada' s national business news produced by The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). Internationally, Debra and Brown Governance have worked with the Chinese Government' s State Enterprise Ministry, Russian executives enrolled in the Yeltsin Democracy Fellowship Foundation study tour, and with Batelco, the Kingdom of Bahrain' s largest private sector corporation.

Brown Governance, led by Debra, has developed and tested a comprehensive principle-based governance system that has been adopted and adapted by award-winning, leading governance organizations including The Conference Board and BMO Financial Group (Bank of Montreal) in Canada's private sector, federal and provincial governments in the public sector, numerous not-for-profit organizations and associations.  It is also the foundation on which they created the program and curriculum for The Directors College. Prior to forming Brown Governance, she spent several years in the Canadian financial sector, working most recently as CEO. 

David Brearley
Managing Director, Technology Connexion UK

David has 40 years experience in technology, 20 years as the leader of the IT function in large, international institutions including ten years as the global CIO of Standard Chartered Bank.  Living in Asia for the last 12 years, he has also consulted with a number of institutions in Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand and observed at first hand the use of IT locally.

His experience includes:-     

-  Manager in London Office of Arthur Andersen (now Accenture) conducting projects in the UK, Turkey and Kuwait (primarily the initial computerization of banks, stock exchanges and bancassurance);

-  CIO of Swiss Bank International (capital markets subsidiary of Swiss []Bank with operations in London, New York and Tokyo), now UBS;

-  Group Head of Technology and Operations (CIO) of Standard Chartered Bank Group for ten years; led transformation of Information Technology and standardization of banking processes and technology platforms across 53 countries with strong focus on building Asian retail banking franchise;

- In 1999, established a consultancy, Technology Connexion, as a senior level consulting and execution company focused on ASEAN financial services. He also advises CEOs/CIOs of technology services companies in Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. Executive Chairman of a Singapore-based software company

He has advised CEOs/CIOs of financial services institutions and technology services companies in Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. David is a UK Citizen and a Graduate of Oxford University.

Thakurdas Naraindas
Senior Lawyer, Thakurdas Advocates & Solicitors

Thakurdas is a senior Lawyer, Consultant and Trainer with over 35 years experience.

He graduated from the University of Malaya in 1976 with an LL.B (Hons) and did his Masters in Law (Tax) in 1980 at the University of Melbourne. He completed the year-long International Program at the Harvard Law School, where he was also a distinguished Visiting Research Fellow, and a Fulbright Exchange Scholar at the International Tax Program.

Thakurdas has practiced at the highest courts in Malaysia for over thirty years, primarily in Commercial Law, Corporate Law, Taxation, Conveyancing & Asset Securitisation, Land Law, and Banking Law He has been actively involved in advisory & consultancy work, tax-planning, drafting, strategic legal planning, and in commercial & corporate negotiations. His experience in litigation ranges at all levels from Magistrate' s to Federal (Supreme) Court, and to FOSFA arbitrations in London.

Thakurdas has conducted public and in-house training courses in Malaysia, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, and Mauritius in the fields of Contract Law and Administration, Corporate Law, Commercial Law, Negotiations & Dispute Resolution, Project Management, Business Process Management, Tax Law, Knowledge Management, Critical and Strategic Thinking Skills, Legal Risk Management, and Business Strategies.

He is also conducting high-level training on the module 'Malaysian Regulatory & Legal Environment: Directors Duties, Responsibilities & Liabilities' organised for directors of banks and insurance companies in Malaysia by Bank Negara Malaysia.

Rafe Haneef
Managing Director, HSBC Amanah

Rafe Haneef  is currently a Managing Director at HSBC Amanah responsible for Global Markets in Asia Pacific. He has played a leadership role in developing Sukuk and Islamic structured and project finance since 1999 at HSBC, ABN AMRO and Citigroup.

He was previously the Head of Islamic Banking for Citigroup Asia based in Kuala Lumpur. He was responsible for developing Malaysia as a regional Islamic finance hub for Citigroup and spread its Islamic business footprint across the region.

Prior to joining Citigroup, he established the Global Islamic Finance Department at ABN AMRO based in Dubai and was in charge of the Islamic wholesale and retail businesses for the group. Prior to that he was with HSBC Amanah in London & Dubai focusing on Islamically-structured cross-border transactions and the Sukuk market.

He was also a managing director at Fajr Capital, a Dubai-based Islamic investment company, looking at principal investments in the Islamic financial sector.

Rafe Haneef read law and Shariah at the International Islamic University in Malaysia.  He was admitted to the Malaysian Bar and was practicing law in Malaysia specialising in Islamic finance.  He then pursued his Master of Laws at Harvard Law School and subsequently qualified to the New York Bar.