Inclusive leadership: Secret weapon for tech’s future

After more than three decades in senior leadership roles at major financial institutions across the region, Michele Wee has embarked on a new chapter. Fourteen months ago, she stepped away from banking to launch Who Says I Can’t, a Singapore-based management consultancy that partners with leaders and organizations to envision the future, navigate transformation, and build resilient, purpose-driven teams.

At the center of this new journey is her enduring focus on human capital and a deep commitment to mentoring the next generation of leaders.

Beyond her role as an entrepreneur, Wee also serves as an advisor to Women in Tech Vietnam, an international non-profit dedicated to narrowing the gender gap in technology. Through education, business engagement, social inclusion, and advocacy, the organization works to empower girls and women to embrace opportunities in the digital economy. The mission closely aligns with Wee’s own north star of fostering inclusive and empowered workplaces.

In this conversation with TheLEADER, Wee reflects on why human capital is emerging as a defining advantage for organizations and explains why inclusive leadership is no longer a social aspiration but a strategic imperative in the digital age.

What does inclusive leadership mean to you and how can it help women grow in their careers?

Michele Wee: Inclusive leadership is when I feel safe and empowered to share my perspectives to my community. The best outcome of inclusive relationship in my view is that we collective make the best decision. When women experience this environment, they are more willing to speak up, contribute ideas, and participate in decision-making, activities that are essential for visibility, confidence, and career progression.

What advice would you give to young women aspiring for leadership roles in tech?

Michele Wee: The door is far more open today than it used to be. DEI movement for Gender equality and equity has highlighted the benefits of women in leadership. Progressing in your career is a constant and consistent focus to building your skills, for example problem solving, communication, technical competence, innovation and creativity. It is also necessary to speak up and be visible, share your ideas, present your work on time and always ask for opportunities.

From your perspective as an advisor of Women in Tech Vietnam, what are the most structural barriers preventing women in Vietnam from advancing into senior tech leadership roles?

Michele Wee: I will highlight cultural and organizational barriers that make it harder for women to reach senior leadership roles.

Culturally, a perception that leadership in tech is “men’s territory” and the expectations around family and caregiving is disproportionately shouldered by women. Organizationally, I feel there is weaker mentorship for women and fewer networking pipelines for peer support.

For example, unfettered access to senior management and sponsorships from executives will give visibility to the candidate and peer support networks to reduce isolation and accelerate progress. Organizational biases and non-transparent promotion practices also lead to women being overlooked in the promotion process.

Many organizations speak about diversity, yet progress remains slow. In your view, what separates companies that truly commit to inclusion from those that treat it as a branding exercise?

Michele Wee: Mindset empowers you to make changes and deliver the impact that you are looking for. The connection is action. Without action, nothing will happen. Therefore, the role models who have made up their minds that inclusion makes money for the business have success as they execute with purpose, transparently, and with consistency.

Having led large financial institutions and now mentoring women in tech, how do you see the intersection between digital transformation and inclusive leadership?

Michele Wee: The intersection of digital transformation and inclusive leadership creates a powerful multiplier effect. Organizations evolve to be more innovative, more equitable, and more resilient in my view.

Inclusive leadership ensures that digital tools and systems are designed for everyone, while digital transformation amplifies the reach and impact of inclusive practices. The end result should deliver higher productivity through better job fit, stronger employee engagement and more sustainable long-term growth.

In high-performance corporate cultures, women often feel pressure to “prove more.” How can organizations redesign performance metrics to create a more level playing field?

Michele Wee: I do feel that women are the glue of the workplace and society and we sometimes put too much pressure on ourselves to outperform at every task that can lead to all sort of mental health issues.

In this time, organizations culture should be inclusive, foster belonging to enable employee loyalty, be psychologically safe place to work, have equitable systems and data driven fairness.

The last point I will emphasize for organization to focus on as transparent promotion criteria, gender inclusive pipelines and bias aware evaluation process will reduce the gap of women being overlooked for technical leadership roles.

What role does male allyship play in accelerating gender equality in tech, and how can leaders actively cultivate it?

Michele Wee: Vietnamese women make up nearly 35 per cent of STEM workforce yet leadership roles in tech remain overwhelmingly male. This creates limited opportunities for women in senior roles, fewer female role models and a perception that leadership in tech is “men’s territory”.

Male allyship is therefore critical as they have more decision-making power, more influence over the organizational culture and more control over resources and promotion.

To cultivate allyship, the first step is to reframe DEI as a leadership skill and accompany this journey with data to make inequities visible. Engage senior male leaders as the champions and role model and allow safe learning space for others to engage. Then institutionalize this through system-level accountability e.g. KPIs, performance metrics, sponsorship programs and transparent promotion processes. System make allyship sustainable, not optional.

Vietnam is emerging as a dynamic tech hub in Southeast Asia. How can we ensure that women are not only participants but architects of this transformation?

Michele Wee: Women have to take responsibility and accountability for our own destiny. The mindset and culture change forces are at work from policy and organizational level, however, it is up to us to to be more visible so opportunities are open to us too.

I always encourage speaking up, raising your hand, asking for more, take charge and be the architect of mixed gender networks. You can do this by being courageous. Courage you build by choosing discomfort, keeping promises to yourself and building technical competence

Women have to take responsibility and accountability for our own destiny.

Looking back at your own career, was there a defining moment that reshaped your understanding of power, influence, and responsibility as a woman leader?

Michele Wee: Yes, it was when I learnt to power of gravitas. Gravitas is about substance and presence, the ability to command attention without demanding it.

As a leader this skill I found is very effective in all situations as gravitas is being myself – the good, bad, vulnerable human. It’s about becoming the most grounded, intentional version of myself.

I don’t try to impress, but express myself with clarity, calm, and conviction and others respond to this energy. Through this presence I feel that I am more productive in any setting as I can get things done more effectively and in the right way delivering the right outcome. I am consciously working on improving myself, learning is never done.

As AI and emerging technologies reshape industries, what new opportunities and new risks do you see specifically for women in the workforce?

Michele Wee: From my view, AI and emerging technologies is inevitable and so we must prepare for this. Focusing on the opportunities first. There will be new career pathways in high growth field e.g. Digital project management, AI ethics and governance, human centered design, customer experience by AI tools, data annotation and data quality. These roles value empathy, communication, collaborative decision making, inclusive leadership, ethical reasoning and systems thinking. Women have these skills in spades! Another part that I love about AI- enabled workflows is the flexible and remote work hours, this helps with balancing work and life.

The risk that I see is to these areas – routine administrative work and support, customer support, retail and clerical work, basic accounting, generally entry level roles. The risk is that they get left behind as organizations adopt AI and women have less access to digital skills and AI literacy programs. Overall though, there will be fewer jobs in these areas and there can be inherent bias embedded in employment systems as without inclusive insight, AI can hard-code inequity and exacerbates unemployment for women.

If you could propose one bold policy or corporate commitment that would meaningfully change the trajectory for women in tech in Vietnam over the next decade, what would it be?

Michele Wee: I would like to see mandatory gender balanced targets/quotas for all organizations. This is bold in my view as this will identify and sponsor high potential women early, break the “men’s club” narrative and build real pathways into STEM leadership. The impact we will see is women stop being exceptions and become part a normal part of leadership bench.

Thank you very much for sharing!