Welcome
- Good afternoon. It is my pleasure to be here at the State of Play, a gathering of corporate partners and non-profit organisations.
- I am deeply heartened by the shared sense of community displayed from businesses and charities to support society needs.
Corporate giving is a strategic imperative of businesses as they advance on their Corporate Purpose journey.
- We know that in today’s corporate world, businesses and society are interconnected and interdependent. Both communities, businesses have and need each other in order to progress and thrive together.
- At the same time, we also have a new generation of employees, who want to work for companies that are aligned with their personal values. Customers want to support brands that are socially responsible.
- We are also seeing shifting trends in giving, as shared in the City of Good Summit that is happening concurrently. People are reimagining how philanthropy should look like and are moving towards a more sustained and collaborative giving efforts, instead of one-off programmes.
- Corporate giving is thus a strategic imperative of business as they advance on their corporate purposed journey. This is why the National Volunteer & Philanthropy Centre (NVPC), National Council of Social Service (NCSS), and SG Cares Office in the Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth have embarked on the pilot, Project V in March 2023 and in Project V, we see corporates activating volunteers across various business units, enabling sustained and regular volunteering activities. In this pilot, companies can support various causes such as seniors in insolation, lower income families, persons with disabilities, and disadvantaged children.
- Through Project V, we have many interesting learning points. The team has identified crucial factors for successful partnerships between corporates and community partners. This includes identifying volunteer roles suitable for regular and sustained corporate volunteerism, and also leveraging the unique strengths and assets of the individual corporates to benefit the SSAs
- I am glad that 11 companies and three Public Sector Agencies have participated in the pilot run of Project V and contributed over 6,100 volunteering hours and 1,500 volunteers with 17 SSAs and SG Cares Volunteer Centres (VCs).
Corporates stepping up through Project V
- For corporates such as Cushman and Wakefield, it has observed a significant increase in the organisation’s volunteerism rate by 13-fold since the start of Project V.
- One of Cushman and Wakefield’s staff, Ms Cheryl Ling, shared that she appreciated her company for offering a good selection of meaningful volunteering opportunities, which inspired her to bring along her 65-year-old mother for one of the sessions at Sparkle Care, an integrated eldercare facility.
- Cheryl's corporate volunteering session turned into a family volunteering opportunity when she brought her mother along as an Activity Facilitator. They conducted and facilitated activities for seniors at the Day Activity Centre, supplementing the work of staff to make an impact on the seniors. This experience transformed Cheryl's initial curiosity into a profound commitment to volunteerism, leading her to become a regular volunteer with the SSA.
- The partnerships with Kellanova and MINDEF have also brought joy to the seniors of Care Corner’s Mindful Steps programme and AIC’s Silver Generation Ambassador programme respectively. The seniors enjoyed the experience so much that they even brought their friends along. The volunteers have helped them to reach out to some seniors who had largely kept to themselves.
- We know that increasingly we would have to tackle social isolation. This is a critical concern for seniors in Singapore and the need for volunteers to befriend them will become even more critical as Singapore’s population ages.
- We have seen the pivotal role of volunteers in supporting the community for Project V. Volunteers provide the essential manpower resources, they delivered direct assistance to service users through a needs-based driven approach, and this significantly contributes to the sector's support system.
- We all know that volunteering is important. The difficult point is how do we galvanise, how do we make it sustainable, and how do you recognise volunteers, because volunteers also need to be motivated to continue in their volunteering journey. This is something that the Ministry of Social and Family Development totally understands and that is why we have designated 2024 as the Year of Celebrating Volunteers, because we aim to appreciate and celebrate the commendable work of volunteers in the social service sector and beyond.
Bridging new collaborations at the State of Play
- Besides Project V 2023’s corporates, we also have new corporates among us today because they want to kickstart their volunteering journey. We also have charities and community groups who are ready for opportunities to get everyone involved.
- The new Company of Good Recognition System has also been launched, and we encourage companies that are purpose-driven and have done their part for the community to apply to be recognised as Companies of Good.
- So I would like to encourage all of us to have as many conversations as possible and hope that we are able to find a common cause to volunteer as a company looking for partnerships with community partners and charities and continue the virtuous cycle that the first iteration of Project V has catalysed.
- We know that there is a second iteration of Project V coming up, so you can find out at NVPC’s booth.
Closing
In closing, please allow me to appreciate and congratulate the 11 companies, three public sector agencies, 17 SSAs and SG Cares VCs for your impactful contributions to the pilot run of Project V. We are pleased to share that most of the partnerships in Project V 2023 will be sustained and they will be expanded beyond the pilot phase to deepen the impact on our society.
Lastly, I would also like to express my most sincere thanks to Ernst & Young for volunteering the time of their staff to manage Project V. With that, thank you very much and let our networking session begin.