5 March 2019 – Singapore Pools and iShine Cloud invited close to 50 leaders from the social service sector for the first time to join its employees on 5 and 6 March at Singapore Pools Building for the fourth edition of its annual Learning Festival, an initiative aimed at promoting a culture of continuous learning. Themed “People 2.0. Rethinking the Ways We Work and Learn”, this gesture was made in part to create greater value for the community through the many learning opportunities available to them.

One of the biggest challenges faced by this sector is the access to quality learning for their employees. By leveraging on this year’s Learning Festival, the team hoped to have provided the participating charities the means to keep themselves sustainable through a learning culture so that they would have the capabilities to serve the less fortunate in our community.

The event began with a keynote address given by Dr Daniel H. Kim, founder of Systems Thinking. In the subsequent parallel sessions, participants were able to choose among 19 talks that included topics such as ‘Future proofing business operating models’, ‘Design thinking application’, as well as ‘Why business agility matters in digital transformation’.

“I’m really heartened that Singapore Pools looks at the people’s sector as being a sector that they want to partner with.” – commented Miss April Lee, Chairperson of Sembawang Family Service Centre.

Said an iShine Cloud client, Charles Loh, CEO of Bone Marrow Donor Programme (Singapore): “There is a lot of rethinking that is needed, in particular, the mental model that we have been so used to frame our thoughts and to work out our solution.”

Other participating organisations included Beyond Social Services, Community Foundation of Singapore, Handicaps Welfare Association, Metta Welfare Association, National Volunteer & Philanthropy Centre – NVPC, Ronald McDonald House Charities Singapore, Singapore Children’s Society, Singapore Cancer Society, Singapore Disability Sports Council, Special Olympics Singapore, TOUCH Community Services, Very Special Arts Singapore Ltd (VSA), and more.