Embracing Abilities: Female Social Entrepreneurs

On 27 July 2021, Soristic organised its annual Social Connex event. This year, the topic of focus is “Embracing Abilities: Female Social Entrepreneurs” where female social entrepreneurs are gathered to share the common challenges they have faced and motivation behind their work. The sharing of the webinar includes the general landscape of female social entrepreneurs and employment policies for Persons with Disabilities (PwDs) within the ASEAN community. 

Our panelists:

  1. Mrinalini Venkatachalam, WEConnect
  2. Michelle Lim, Make The Change
  3. Quek Jing Yan, Seociety
  4. Febrina Bayurini, Kesuma Indonesia

During the webinar we had a chance to get a glimpse of an insightful discussion from the panel on various topics such as their thoughts on the inclusivity of PwDs within their community, key challenges of being a female social entrepreneur and how enterprises can be more conducive and inclusive to PwDs.

Read more to catch some of the highlights from the insight discussion.

“We are slowly moving towards a much more empathetic society, and much more inclusive.”

– Michelle Lim

While talking about the perspective of the current level of inclusivity of PwDs within their community, the panelists have shared various thoughts on the topic. Firstly, Jing Yan has shared that the general public might have very little experience in interacting with PwDs and also a lack of exposure in terms of working with PwDs. She emphasised that being inclusive allows others to have the opportunities to engage and learn from a larger pool of talents, creating a greater diversity. 

Michelle commented that many external factors might not be favourable for the PwDs in terms of seeking for jobs. However, more and more small medium enterprises are looking into redesigning their job scope to be more inclusive especially when working from home is an option. She is also very positive that in the future the society will be more empathetic and inclusive.

“Receiving is through giving, the moment you thought you are giving the opportunities, but actually you are receiving more than that.”

– Michelle Lim

When asked for their advice on how enterprises of all sizes, especially SMEs can be more inclusive to PWDs, Michelle strongly encourages the hiring of people from diverse backgrounds, including PWDs. Many of the corporate cultures focus on empathy, teamwork and understanding, which Michelle believes that nothing beats having somebody different from you join the company everyone can learn from each other. 

She highlighted that most of the social entrepreneurs in Singapore embraced inclusive hiring because they truly see the power and value of inclusivity, especially the learnings from one another. 

Inclusive hiring really brings diversity and different ideas and I think that’s what makes the team stronger.”

– Quek Jing Yan

This sentiment is also echoed by Jing Yan. She mentioned the vast amount of experience that each one can bring, be it a new person who’s just starting a new job and came to prove themselves or someone who has a lot of experience. 

“Regarding the advantage that a women have as a social entrepreneur, I am able to work from home and witness the development of my children at the same time.”

– Febrina Bayurini

As a social entrepreneur in Indonesia, Febrina commented that Indonesia can also be known to have patriarchal traits in some aspects of their culture. Similarly, she echoed Jing Yan’s sentiments regarding the role that she has to play in the household. Febrina elaborated that she has to find the balance between cooking, cleaning the house, (taking care of) the children which she commented has to be done first before she can take care of her business. She also stated that although women may be managing businesses at a higher level,  she believes that these women would also hire someone to help them manage their businesses. Febrina also added that her husband is also supportive of her business. Regarding the advantage that women have, Febrina answered that she is able to work from home and witness the development of her children at the same time. She also cited the pandemic and the flexible working arrangements of her role which allows her to help support her husband economically.

Lastly, our speakers shared their key takeaways for our audience of the webinars:

“If you want to be a changemaker, first starting from your home, from people that you can influence… Before you think about caring outside people, because if you can’t even give the best love to your own familiar people, it’s tough for you to give love to strangers.” – Michelle

“Do things that you feel comfortable with and then challenge yourself to take the next step. Social enterprise is really just another way for us to change the world, but there are really many ways for us that we can do so.” – Jing Yan

“Just to give equal opportunities to both men and women, just be equal to everybody, despite different backgrounds.” – Febrina

Singapore’s Biggest Philanthropic Foundations

  • Written August 2021

Philanthropists in Singapore have been supporting causes through private donations for decades. These donations have been made through multiple channels including personal accounts, family offices, trusts and/or foundations. In particular, the wealthiest individuals and corporates establish foundations – legal entities through which they can channel giving to their preferred causes.

To identify the biggest philanthropic foundations in Singapore, we examined those listed in the Charity Portal[1] since it has the most extensive listing of such foundations in Singapore. These foundations are registered as charities with the Commissioner of Charities and must allocate most of their expenditure to causes in Singapore unless they receive an exemption.

Foundations not found in Charity Portal were excluded since there was a lack of public data on them. Foundations that derived most of their income from public donations were also excluded since our focus was on philanthropic foundations.

The latest available annual expenditure and grant data of these philanthropic foundations were collected between January and May 2021 from the portal as well as from public documents such as annual reports[2]. Since grant data was not available for a number of the foundations, expenditure data was used to rank them.

In total, 91 philanthropic foundations were identified. Together they spent over S$264 million in their latest financial year to support a variety of causes, including poverty alleviation, education, healthcare, people with special needs and disabilities, ageing and the environment. Currently, this expenditure represents about 9%[3] of total donations received by over 2,000 charities in Singapore.

Among the 91 philanthropic foundations, 33 foundations spend at least S$1 million each in the period under review. The ten biggest philanthropic foundations in Singapore spent a total of $189 million in their latest financial year. The biggest giver was the Lee Foundation with an expenditure of S$52.8 million in 2019. Most of this was spent on grants to causes such as community services, poverty alleviation, education and disaster relief.

Second and third places in terms of spending were taken by Temasek Foundation Innovates and the Community Foundation of Singapore[4]. It is worth noting that Temasek has six foundations, of which four – Innovates, Cares, Connects and Nurtures – are registered with the Commissioner of Charities. These four entities spent $55.7 million from April 2019 to March 2020 and, if taken together, would make Temasek the biggest grant-maker in Singapore.

The biggest philanthropic foundations in our study were mostly well-established. The top 10 foundations ranked by expenditure – except for the Temasek related foundations and the Community Foundation of Singapore – were at least 20 years old. Among the top 11 to 34 foundations, most were at least 10 years old. There were also emerging philanthropic organisations such as Ishk Tolaram, Changi, Octava and Quantedge foundations that were less than a decade old.

Philanthropic giving through foundations is set to grow as more wealthy individuals and companies set up foundations.  Hence, the influence and role of philanthropic foundations in addressing needs in the community is set to grow.

[1] The Charity Portal (https://www.charities.gov.sg/) gives information on charities in Singapore and is managed by the Commissioner of Charities.

[2] Most of the foundations registered with the Commissioner of Charities have significant presence in Singapore. Some foundations in Singapore, particularly those focused on overseas grant-making, may not have been registered with Charity Portal and they were excluded from the study.

[3] Based on the Commission of Charity Annual Report 2019 published in September 2020, total donations in FY 2018 amounted to S$2.9 billion.

[4] The Community Foundation of Singapore is a grant-making public charity that facilitates and pools funds from donors to address community needs. It currently manages more than 160 donor advised funds and has given out more than S$114 million in grants since 2008. (The Community Foundation of Singapore, 2021).

The full list of the 91 foundations – including information such as their latest annual expenditure, grants disbursed, causes supported, website and email address – is available for purchase at $50. To purchase, please email us at connect@soristic.asia .

The full list of the 91 foundations – including information such as their latest annual expenditure, grants disbursed, causes supported, website and email address – is available for purchase at $50. To purchase, please email us at connect@soristic.asia .

Replacing Social Media with Modern Art

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Abstract Photography

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Imagine & Create

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Focus & Radius

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