Explore how organisations can adopt empowerment as a foundational principle for sustainable social impact in this insightful keynote. The session will highlight Singtel’s commitment to “Empower Every Generation” through initiatives such as Future Makers, Digital Thumbprint, and Digital Silvers, which focus on building skills and confidence. Additionally, discover collaborative efforts with the Australian Business and Community Network and Singapore Business Network on Disability, where corporate members mentor vulnerable youth and persons with disabilities. The keynote will also discuss the National Council of Social Services’ Sustainable Philanthropic Framework, which mobilises corporates and social services for sustained impact. Learn strategies to move beyond dependency, fostering long-term success and empowerment in communities.

• Defining your programme’s purpose, scope and end-goal
• Community mapping: Surveys, focus groups, social network analysis
• Identifying the right engagement tools to encourage participation
• Post-engagement reporting: Setting metrics that matter for evaluation

Community engagement is not an easy job—for individuals or organisations. It takes significant energy to organise these efforts, listen to stakeholders, and implement changes that address everyone’s needs, including those of your own organisation. How do we ensure that we, whether as employees, senior leaders, or organisations, continue to have the drive, passion, and the right skill set and knowledge to run effective and meaningful community engagement? Join this session with fellow practitioners to learn from the best and recharge your engagement strategies.

Community engagement is a vital component of any social impact strategy, but it can also be challenging and exhausting for both the organisers and the participants. In this talk, the speaker will share some insights and best practices from their experience as the leader of social impact for Cognizant across APAC, where they have designed and run several high-impact community engagement programmes, including mentoring, volunteering, and pro-bono consulting. This session will focus on how mentoring programmes, when incorporated into a community engagement strategy, can overcome engagement fatigue by providing mutual benefits and support for both mentors and mentees. The session will also examine data and examples to demonstrate the positive outcomes and impacts of mentoring programmes.

• How to design and run effective and sustainable community engagement programmes that leverage mentoring as a key component
• How to communicate the impact and value of mentoring programmes for both mentors and mentees
• How to overcome common challenges and pitfalls of community engagement and mentoring programmes

• Identifying the right partners with shared vision and goals
• Overcoming red tapes internally and externally for programme’s success
• Managing expectations of partners for long-term collaboration
• It’s not you, but me: Managing partnerships that no longer serve its purpose

• Identifying a cause that is aligned to business vision and mission
• Empowering employees to give back to society
• Finding the right community partners for sustainable collaboration
• Always improving: Asking the right questions to improve next programme

• What is your organisation’s success metrics
• Assessing engagement impact with tools, frameworks and reliable feedback channels
• Tracking and analysing data insights for optimal performance 

• Know your stakeholders – target community, vendors/partners
• Identifying the most effective communication channels for clarity
• Building strong relationships: How to manage conflicts or resistance
• Embracing diversity in community engagement ecosystem