SMU Associate Professor of Law Eugene Tan said that Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong had "a much tougher job than his predecessors", as "Twenty years of preparation have not made things any easier for PM Lee's tenure as premier, as Singapore faces its mid-life crisis with inflection points politically, economically and socially." He added that PM Lee had to "emote" more than his predecessors, as it is "a challenge to get the balance of hard and soft power of governing in the right proportions."