Judy Lee’s Story: Out of Asia and into Africa

Abstract

Judy Lee is an impeccably dressed Taiwanese businesswoman in her late thirties. I interviewed Ms. Lee in December 2010 in Hong Kong and continued our meetings and correspondence until mid-2012. I was introduced to Ms. Lee through a former business colleague in Hong Kong. Ms. Lee and I always met in the Four Seasons Hotel lobby or in an upscale European coffee house in Hong Kong’s central business district. Ms. Lee is the poster child for understated luxury, a legacy left over from her work with luxury brands. Sitting in the Four Seasons surrounded by the power brokers of Hong Kong’s banking community, Ms. Lee is thousands of miles away from the dirt roads of Nigeria where she previously worked for a global consumer products company. The waiters address her in Cantonese, but she immediately responds in English. Today she is a freelance consultant for a variety of US consumer brands, helping them with market entry strategies and business transformation.