Dragonfly

The HP spying scandal rages on, with Dunn and others being charged with felonies. Meanwhile, Fiorina publishes her new book, which reportedly paints a picture of male establishment ganging up against women executives.

As a woman, it is always interesting to see how others have climbed or helicoptered above the old boys club and done well for themselves -- or sometimes, fallen spectacularly. Some years back, I read about a magazine trying to survey and measure the power of women in the corporate world. Apparently, when the reporter interviewed a certain large Asian company on women representation on its senior management team, the representative of the company laughed in the reporter's face.

I am far from the stage of corporate life where I could tell for sure if there were a glass ceiling for women. I suppose it differs from job to job. Some women I know have also opted to run their own businesses, rather than go through with the ladder-climbing process. Of course, I think there is a whole lot of other great reasons to run your own business.

Locally, the best-known female entrepreneur is probably Olivia Lum. In a strange way, I always associate her with the dragonfly. I guess it is because of the Hyflux product by the same name.

Dragonflies are supposedly the fastest insects in the world, going up to 97 km/h. They can also approach a target speedily, while appearing to be stationery from the victim's angle. This technique is called motion camouflage, a form of optical illusion.

Does the dragonfly look like it is stationery, or moving?