Tech leadership programme in Singapore: Inside SGLN TECH

If Melissa Kwek is offered a leadership role in an unfamiliar region, she will now look beyond her inner circle for advice, and turn to a trusted network of peers in Singapore.

She met these fellow professionals as part of the inaugural cohort of the Singapore Leaders Network Tech (SGLN TECH) programme. This initiative, open to Singaporeans and Permanent Residents, is supported by the Singapore Economic Development Board and Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA).

It is dedicated to helping talented Singaporeans prepare to take on senior regional and global leadership roles in the tech industry.

The candid discussions during leadership modules and dialogues stretched Kwek’s thinking and helped her test her assumptions against perspectives different from her own, says the Hong Kong-based client solutions director at Meta. This has helped her make better decisions as a leader.

The experience showed her how even seasoned leaders can benefit from sounding boards, such as when they are weighing decisions in unfamiliar markets, she adds.

SGLN TECH was developed by the Singapore Leaders Network, which runs a suite of initiatives including SGLN Fellowship, SGLN Launchpad, Overseas Transition Support. These programmes are aimed at supporting leaders at different career stages, and as they take on overseas or global roles.

Ultimately, SGLN aims to strengthen the pool of Singapore leaders in industries and functions essential to the economy – including biopharmaceutical manufacturing, technology and supply chain.

Writing a new playbook and navigating a changing environment

A veteran in the field, Singaporean Kwek spent 16 years moving across the public service, Procter & Gamble and Meta, while building a career that now spans different markets and cultures.

Experience alone, she says, is not enough when the environment itself keeps changing.

“In technology, what you know last week may change this week, and then you have to relearn, unlearn and relearn,” she adds. “The playbook for the AI era is not defined yet, so companies need someone to write its chapters.”

That means leaders increasingly need to be comfortable operating without a clear template – experimenting, adapting their approach and learning from people whose experiences differ from their own.

“Having a network of people out of work, whom I can seek advice from is very important now as a leader, because we all learn from each other,” she says.

Kwek was among the 50 leaders from all corners of the technology ecosystem, such as multinational companies, large local enterprises, and small and medium-sized enterprises.

Over six months from April to September this year, they spent time learning together through leadership modules, masterclasses and closed-door conversations with technology and public sector leaders. They also worked in teams to develop and pitch a solution to a real-world problem.

The biggest takeaway for another participant Derrick Lee was that technical expertise could only take him so far as his company – and his responsibilities – grew.

Derrick Lee is the co-founder and chief technology officer (CTO) of verifiable document management platform Accredify. He had spent much of his career doing what came naturally to him – building technology.

As Accredify grew, he found that being CTO meant not just innovating tech, but also getting people to understand his thinking and on board with where he was taking the company. SGLN TECH gave Lee an opportunity to learn how other leaders approached similar challenges as their roles and organisations grew.

One area he has been working on is how to make his ideas easier for others to understand.

During a communication masterclass, Lee was introduced to the idea of using stories to explain complex points more clearly. He began keeping a “story bank” of everyday experiences he could draw on when trying to make an idea more relatable.

“Leadership and communication are what we have to constantly work on, and something that we constantly have to get feedback on from people,” he says.

That becomes more important as he thinks about taking Accredify into more markets, part of what led him to apply for SGLN TECH.

Different markets bring different cultural norms and “invisible rules”, Lee says, making it harder to assume that the same way of communicating – or leading – will work everywhere.

“As we grow in different markets, I need to think about changes I need to make to myself, and those of our processes, our people, our company,” he adds.

Learning to see the bigger picture

Fellow participant Shobhit Singhal took part in SGLN TECH while navigating a career transition.

The former chief operating officer of Gojek left the ride-hailing company in July, and since the programme wrapped up in September, Singhal is now taking a break to consider his next chapter.

The exercises he did during the programme strengthened an ability he calls “looking around the corners” – anticipating what may matter next rather than concentrating only on what is directly in front of him.

Even a career spanning industries and countries – he had also worked at Bain & Company and Apple – can leave leaders viewing the world through too narrow a lens.

“A lot of the time, you’re looking from within one perspective – of a company, of a client or an industry,” says Singhal.

That can become a blind spot as responsibilities grow. At SGLN TECH, Singhal began thinking more intentionally about how new technologies, regulation, supply chains and other players in the market interact with one another, rather than looking only at the part of the business right in front of him.

Having that broader view, he says, helps him lead with greater foresight – spotting opportunities and risks he might otherwise have missed.

The bigger picture was also what fellow participant Tracie Teo started thinking about more closely.

She came away from SGLN TECH with a greater appreciation of how a small market like Singapore could still create an edge – not by trying to match larger technology hubs, but by building on its own strengths.

Teo was with ST Engineering for 15 years, moving from senior engineering roles to leadership positions. Last year, she became the founding chief executive officer of Codex Solutions which focuses on developing public safety solutions for Singapore.

During the programme, a conversation on Singapore’s place in the global AI ecosystem, led by IMDA cluster director Yvonne Lim, left a deep impression on her.

That discussion brought home that Singapore’s future as a technology hub depends not only on infrastructure and investment, but also on the calibre of people capable of turning those advantages into globally competitive companies.

“Developing people who can innovate and build globally competitive tech organisations will be critical,” says Teo.

This is where a programme like SGLN TECH can play a role, she says – by bringing leaders from different parts of the technology sector together to exchange experiences, challenge one another’s thinking and strengthen the capabilities to succeed across markets.

Those relationships may matter beyond the six months themselves. As technology and leadership challenges keep changing, she sees value in having people outside her own organisation who can offer a different perspective.

“It may not be as tangible as the lessons or frameworks, but I believe the most enduring outcome of the programme will be the community it has created,” she says. “It has fostered a trusted network of leaders who learn from one another, share perspectives and support each other’s growth.”

Singaporeans and Permanent Residents in mid- to senior-level leadership roles in the technology sector can register their interest in the 2027 edition of SGLN TECH or find out more here.