Sustainability

Conversations with Social Impact Leaders: Warren Ang

Daniel Whitehead — Thu, 21 Sep 2023 10:07:46 +0000

Conversations with Social Impact Leaders: Warren Ang Daniel Whitehead

With the continued focus to integrate ESG into Corporate Strategy & Operations, Page Executive is keen on playing our part to help draw stronger awareness within our business community by launching our latest Conversation with Social Impact Leaders online.

In every episode, we are going to invite one leader from the social impact sector (non-profit, public, social enterprise, education) to share more about his/her passion in this arena as well their advice and tips on the marketplace.

This time, Page Executive's Gabriel Nam speaks to Warren Ang, Founder and CEO of GDI East Asia. Here are some of the key highlights from the conversation:

As a leader, what is your biggest pain-point when it comes to talent management in the space?

Attracting top talent into the impact sector is a shared pain-point for those of us in East Asia / South East Asia, where there is still only a handful of organisations genuinely looking for and able to absorb this tier of talent.

We are looking for an incredibly rare mix of top-tier strategy and execution capabilities, local language and cultural depth, demonstrated passion and curiosity for impact at scale, and the entrepreneurial willingness and risk-taking to jump into start-up environments.

It is getting better as we grow our own internal talent base, and as more vehicles emerge requiring top talent in the impact space, but we need more players so that there can be an industry to enable diverse career paths for those wanting to work in impact in Asia.

Despite the challenge you mentioned above, we see that GDI hires quite a lot of ex-management consultants. How are you able to put them to work in social impact and what is the attraction for consulting talent to join GDI?

We do not just do the strategy, we build and scale the initiative too - it means that you get to create and see the results and impact of your work. In my conversations with young management consultants, seeing the real impact of their work is increasingly important to them.

The part that is often more refreshing to ex-consultants is getting to drive and own the ideas for scaling impact. This is in stark contrast to the nature of consultants as a service provider, where success is largely measured by number of projects, profitability, and client satisfaction. For us, we focus long-term on 2-3 big bets in each market, where our primary measure of success is 'the extent to which our initiatives create impact at scale relative to the problems we seek to solve'.

Functionally, the closest thing to GDI in the for-profit world would be VC/PE portfolio managers who identify start-ups or growth-stage companies with potential, and partner for the long-term to scale their results. There are two differences: first, our results are in scaling the impact of the organisations vs. the financial return of the organisations. Second, the types of initiatives we incubate are often multi-stakeholder in nature, and seek to facilitate collaboration across public, private actors. Meaningful collaboration does not usually happen on its own given the different agendas, interests of actors. It often needs new entities and initiatives to anchor, facilitate and execute win-win projects.

As an ex-management consultant yourself, what are your rewards and sacrifices (e.g. financially or psychologically?) of working for a non-profit?

The rewarding parts…

I have always believed that I am not in the social impact space because of only altruistic reasons. I also believe that social problems are more complex and interesting to work on than the corporate or business challenges I worked on at the start of my career.

When I was in strategy consulting in the private sector, there is an agreed upon definition of success (maximising shareholder value), and there were blueprints to look at in terms of how others did competitive or market-entry strategy. In the social sector, there are multiple, often conflicting measures of success, and there are rarely blueprints to look at. What’s the blueprint to address the large and growing mental health challenges? Or for how education needs to change in the age of AI? Or how we can strengthen the value of the social sector in solving social problems in Mainland China? To people who like strategy, problem solving and building things, the lack of blueprints is the fun part.

The power structures governing social problems are also far more complex than market-forces alone; it requires an ability not just to look at the problem from a content or issue perspective, but be able to understand the system that it is a part of, politically, culturally and socially. Elevating up to the systems' perspective rather than a single organisation perspective, is the other fun part for working as an 'architect' to create impact at scale.

One of the biggest rewards for working in this space, is the satisfaction of working on problems that matter, at the systems' level. It is the satisfaction of knowing that you made a real contribution that might not have happened otherwise. If you were to leave your job in the corporate world, there is always someone to replace you, but often in our sector, if our teams didn’t tackle these challenges, solutions may never have happened.

The required mindset adjustment….

Financially, getting the pay-levels up to make it acceptable for top tier talent is still a work in progress in East Asia / South East Asia. As the industry grows, it will get better over time, and it is also something that candidates need to realise they can contribute to, by helping to create value.

What candidates sometimes have not yet realised, is that their salary in the corporate world is not a reflection of their universal labour market value. It is a reflection of their job’s value in a given company’s economic model. You are given that salary because that is a reflection of how much money the company makes from you being there in that particular role.

Your value in the social sector might be completely different, depending on your ability to create value in this ecosystem. For example, many foundations in East Asia had no history of engaging professionals to work in partnership prior to us working with them. It takes time to demonstrate your value, but once you do, you are able to raise the salaries of the team because people are always willing to pay for quality work and partnership.

Like any new market-build, the talent that the social sector needs now are the ‘early adopters’ and the ‘early majority’. If you are willing to adopt that mindset, then it’s possible to invest time and get to top tier salaries for the social sector.

If you are considering working in social impact space, the first decision is to ask yourself whether you want to work there full-time. Once you decide this, then you should compare the salaries of those who get to work in social impact full-time. In this industry, there are opportunities to earn top tier (for the social sector) and comfortable salaries. It may take 2-3 years of your investment, but you can play a key part in creating your future job and the compensation you receive.

In reality, the financial rewards on an absolute basis will not match what you can earn by staying in the private sector. However, what you lose in pay, you often more than make up for in terms of impact, culture and personal fulfilment.

Many professionals ask us about making the switch from corporate to impact, but it is not always as easy and straightforward as we think. When is the right time in your view?

There is no right time for everyone, but if you have had significant experience in the corporate sector, and you are convinced that what you want to do in your career is build initiatives that have large scale social impact, then there is no better way than jumping in and doing it. You cannot learn this in master's programs, or by staying in companies where it is not their mission or focus.

I have seen quite a few cases where individuals join a corporate foundation or impact team with lots of excitement, only to realise that the priority for impact is highly correlated to business performance, and it is never going to be 'core business'.

Jump into a vehicle where impact is the core business, and you can build your own track-record of designing and building impactful initiatives. What matters in our sector is your track-record, and what you have been able to do, as opposed to your titles.

I would also encourage people to be creative and taking small steps, particularly if big life changes feel less possible. You can still be in a corporate role, but start engaging with organisations you admire. Taking a significant leave of absence to do a secondment (6-12 months) is a great way to get to know the impact space, whilst still retaining your safety net.

> Photo credit: Yidan Prize Foundation

Summary

About GDI:
GDI (Global Development Incubator) is an incubator for ventures and initiatives that create social impact at scale. Our track record includes 40+ social impact ventures and initiatives, many are multi-million USD efforts tackling systems change across multiple issue areas such as poverty alleviation, education, health, climate, and social inclusion.

About Warren Ang:
Warren is the Founder and CEO of GDI East Asia. He works with foundations and NGOs to design, build, and grow initiatives to achieve large scale impact and systems change in Migration and Livelihoods, Health and Mental Health, Education, Disability Inclusion, and Poverty Alleviation across Greater China, and South Asia.

In addition to scaling impact ventures and initiatives, he is regularly engaged with philanthropic foundations for long-range strategic planning, where his work has shaped hundreds of millions of USDs of grant-making. He also sits on the Judging Panel for the Yidan Prize for Education Development.

Prior to GDI, Warren was a strategy consultant in both private and public sectors, and has served in executive positions at NGOs, grant-making funds, and impact investing funds. Warren holds an MBA with Distinction from INSEAD.

About Gabriel Nam
Gabriel is the Partner of Page Executive, leading the ESG, Strategy and Transformation practice in Asia. Based in Singapore with Asia-wide coverage, Gabriel advised his clients on senior-level executive searches across industries throughout Asia. In addition, Gabriel is also an active member in conducting senior talents searches in social impact and business/professional services sectors with 15+ years of experience in research, recruitment/executive search, and leadership roles at various organizations.

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Exclusive eBook: How to Build a Sustainability Function in Your Business

Daniel Whitehead — Fri, 02 Jun 2023 15:06:06 +0000

Exclusive eBook: How to Build a Sustainability Function in Your Business

Daniel Whitehead Fri, 06/02/2023 - 16:06

Access exclusive data on career paths in sustainability and guidance on building your sustainability function

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Conversations with Social Impact Leaders: SuiJin Kon

Daniel Whitehead — Tue, 23 May 2023 15:33:13 +0000

Conversations with Social Impact Leaders: SuiJin Kon Daniel Whitehead

This time, Page Executive's Gabriel Nam speaks to SuiJin Kon from the Blockchain Association Singapore. Here are some of the key highlights from the conversation:

SuiJin’s motivation to move from her highly successful corporate career to government and non-profit sector…

In my career, my internal compass has always led me to seek meaningful work and projects that enable me to contribute positively to the communities that I work in and that my work will serve, ultimately it will always be about where I can make the bigger impact.

Whilst the career progression and compensation do play a part in my choice of work, I always look for something more than that, an opportunity to leave a place or a community better than when I found it.

The spirit of adventure lives strongly in me, and I am always open explore new and different areas of work – ideally opportunities that allow me to differentiate myself in the market. That is how I got started on my journey of discovery and has led to my career evolution to date.

SuiJin’s general view on room for development in social impact sector in order to be able to make bigger impact…

I am of the firm belief that the line between private enterprise and social impact sectors is an imaginary one. The one cannot survive without the other and we are all part of a larger eco-system that exists to make life better for everyone.

If we are to grow the eco-system, we should regard both sides of the fence as being integral partners to each other and work in that direction, and in so doing, we can and will be able to recognize synergies and forge partnerships all around. That spirit of collaboration, I believe, is what will ultimately deliver results for everyone.

SuiJin’s advice on how to combat greenwashing, which seems to be a growing challenge for many organisations…

Greenwashing is an unfortunate reality of the work that we live in today, but without being totally negative, it is at least a sign that companies in different industries are beginning to talk about it, and eventually do something about it.

My belief is that we all need to start somewhere, and then gradually level up, so there will always be room for improvement.

We (Blockchain Association Singapore) are exactly trying to use advanced technology like blockchain to help track and measure the progress and impact that the companies are making in these all-encompassing issues and in so doing, we will not merely stay at ‘talking level’.

Hopefully when we can really make meaningful progress, companies will really be looking at the ESG issues seriously and tackle the issues together with all their stakeholders.

SuiJin’s elaboration on how blockchain can help drive sustainability…

When I first joined the organisation, I was keen on advocating the use of blockchain in 'non-conventional' forms across as many industries as possible, this made ESG and Impact the obvious choice as they are issues that cut across a large swathe of industries.

Usually people associate blockchain with cryptocurrency, NFT or Esports or gaming etc because of the immediate business opportunities. However, what most people do not realise is that blockchain is such a powerful tool that there is a vast applicability across all industries that they are as yet unaware of.

A simple example could be – when an individual makes a donation to a non-profit organisation, that individual or organisation makes that donation with the best of intentions and frequently for a specific cause. Currently, there is no simple way to show where the money goes and if it is eventually spent on the cause that the donation was made for.

That is where is where blockchain can play a role to ensure the transparency, traceability and verifiability of those donated monies, so that people will eventually gain more confidence to support the causes that believe in in much bigger ways than they do currently.

SuiJin’s advice for individuals who are keen on moving into the social impact sector…

Having a mission to achieve something meaningful in your career would probably be the guiding north star in creating a pathway towards making such a move. It is also essential to have transferrable skill sets and a willingness to keep learning and evolving.

When I look back on my career, I started off in corporate finance and corporate development, and that helped me move into public health heading up that very same function. From there, I honed my skill sets in program management, public policy, and government affairs, both locally and internationally, which then eventually led to me now leading an entire organisation.

It is really about understanding what your values are, what you will stand for, and making the most of the opportunities that are offered to you.

Summary

About Blockchain Association Singapore
Blockchain Association Singapore is the leading organization for the advocacy, collaboration, convergence, and fair use of blockchain and emerging technologies both within and outside of Singapore.
BAS empowers communities to adopt blockchain and emerging technologies to transform and grow their businesses by promoting borderless engagement and encouraging collaboration across industries.

About SuiJin Kon:
Sui Jin is a seasoned professional with wide industry and functional experience. Starting off her career in logistics, real estate and infrastructure industry with strong corporate finance and development skills in Singapore, Hong Kong, Mainland China, Europe and the Americas. She has also worked in the government and non-profit sectors. She currently leads Blockchain Association Singapore her capacity as its Executive Director. She is also co-chair of Green Trees Initiative.

About Gabriel Nam
Gabriel is the Partner of Page Executive, leading the ESG, Strategy and Transformation practice in Asia. Based in Singapore with Asia-wide coverage, Gabriel advised his clients on senior-level executive searches across industries throughout Asia. In addition, Gabriel is also an active member in conducting senior talents searches in social impact and business/professional services sectors with 15+ years of experience in research, recruitment/executive search, and leadership roles at various organizations.

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Thank you for submitting the form

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