DPM Heng Swee Keat at the Singapore Volunteer Management Conference 2025

Senior Parliamentary Secretary Eric Chua,
Ms Anita Fam, President of the National Council of Social Service (NCSS),
Ms Tan Li San, CEO of NCSS,
Mr Tony Soh, CEO of the National Volunteer and Philanthropy Centre (NVPC),
Ladies and gentlemen,

A very good morning to everyone. Let me first extend a very warm welcome to all of you to the Singapore Volunteer Management Conference 2025.

More than 600 of you are here in-person, and another 500 to 600 are online. To our online friends from all over the world, a warm welcome as well. 

This strong participation shows your collective commitment as well as the relevance of the programme that NCSS has put together today. This year, we are celebrating SG60. Building a caring and inclusive society has been an abiding priority for the Government since Singapore’s independence.  

Mr Lee Kuan Yew and his team worked with our Pioneer and Merdeka Generations to build up Singapore’s economy, infrastructure, housing, and education. At the same time, they also focused on nurturing our “heartware”. They recognised that fostering strong social and community bonds, and developing “one united people”, was equally critical to Singapore and our people’s success and well-being. Subsequent generations of leaders have shared this conviction. Our early investments in forging a strong social compact have helped Singapore weather moments of crises over the years. Most recently, during the COVID pandemic, we saw many heartwarming stories of Singaporeans coming together to support one another.

Preserving and deepening this sense of solidarity remains a work-in-progress. A cohesive society must never be taken for granted. In many parts of the world today, societies are increasingly divided and fractured. The overall effect is a decline in trust among people, and a loss of optimism for the future. This feeds a vicious cycle of doom and gloom.

Singapore, as a small and young nation, must never succumb to such divisions. Since 2022, the government has worked with our people on a Forward Singapore vision, started by Prime Minister Lawrence Wong, to refresh our social compact and shape our shared future together. Key planks under the Forward Singapore agenda include empowering low-income families, supporting disadvantaged and vulnerable groups, and enabling our seniors to age well. Through Forward Singapore, we aim to work with Singaporeans to deepen our sense of social responsibility towards one another, and to build a better home for our people. Nurturing a nation of volunteers is part of this effort. The theme of this year’s Conference, “Taking Singapore Forward Through Volunteerism”, is therefore very timely.

Indeed, every one of us, as individuals, groups, organisations and communities, can make a difference. In this regard, I am encouraged by two particular trends that we have observed in recent years. 

The first is a broadened understanding of what it means to give back to society.  Singaporeans increasingly recognise that we can contribute not only through financial donations, but also giving our ideas, energies, time and skills through volunteering. A 2023 survey by NCSS found that there were over 200,000 volunteers in the sector in 2023, a 20% increase compared to 2021. Of these, one in three were regular volunteers, contributing their time at least four times a year. NCSS aims to grow this figure to one in two by 2030.

The second trend is that the base of those who give has deepened and diversified. In particular, corporate giving and volunteerism has risen. Businesses in Singapore and around the world recognise that they contribute to building social cohesion in the communities they operate in. Being socially responsible and engaged is good for business. Customers recognise these businesses better and talent gravitates toward companies that do good. 

Since 2017, NVPC has recognised companies in Singapore with strong corporate purpose as “Champions of Good” and more recently as “Companies of Good”. At the inaugural awards ceremony in 2017, 45 companies were recognised. Last year, in 2024, close to 300 companies were recognised – more than 6 times the original number!

The diverse group gathered here this morning – social service organisations and professionals, public agencies, volunteers and volunteer managers, and corporates – reflects how our social service ecosystem has evolved and grown over the years. In 2023, we marked the Year of Celebrating Social Service Partners. 2024 was the Year of Celebrating Social Service Volunteers. 2025, this year, is the Year of Celebrating Social Service Professionals. Three consecutive years of recognising three pillars of our social services sector – partners, volunteers and professionals.

Today, we have more than 500 social service agencies and over 20,000 sector professionals nationwide working tirelessly to uplift and empower those in need. You serve a range of causes, including at-risk youth, persons with mental health conditions and disabilities, low-income families, and many other valuable causes. To further support our social service professionals, the Singapore University of Social Sciences has just announced the School of Social Work and Social Development, and this will be set up in the third quarter of 2025. 

Volunteers are critical partners for our social service agencies. For example, Filos Community Services runs the SG Cares Volunteer Centre in the East Coast area. Filos has a staff strength of 37 but manages a volunteer force of close to 1,300. With the strong support of its volunteers, Filos was able to serve more than 31,000 service users last year. Given the importance of volunteers, our social service agencies recognise the value of managing volunteers well. Today, almost seven in 10 social service agencies have hired dedicated Volunteer Managers, and eight in 10 have implemented strong volunteer management practices and processes.

In 2014, NCSS launched a Volunteer Management Toolkit to help social service agencies implement effective volunteer management practices, focusing on areas such as organisational culture and readiness, collaboration, and volunteer recruitment, onboarding, engagement and experience. This toolkit was upgraded in 2020. It will be refreshed further later this year, as a Volunteer Management Toolkit 3.0.

In the coming years, the scope and scale of demand for social services in Singapore will continue to grow. We must find innovative ways to meet and manage this rising demand, and to match the demand with supply efficiently and effectively if we are to make a difference in the lives of the people we serve. Let me suggest three ideas for your discussion later today, and beyond. 

First, to step up transformation in the social services sector. Since 2017, I have chaired the Future Economy Council – and now Future Economy Advisory Panel – that has steered Singapore’s economic transformation. The Council’s flagship was 23 Industry Transformation Maps or ITMs to guide different sectors of our economy to grow new capabilities, build greater resilience, and to seize new opportunities. Across the 23 maps, work in each sector was centred on six horizontal pillars. These were, namely – productivity, technology and innovation, jobs and skills, internationalisation, resilience and sustainability. This work took time and dedicated effort but strengthened our economy. We achieved good growth, labour productivity and wage increases. We also weathered the economic impact of COVID-19 well. So I encourage the social services sector to also undertake a systematic transformation. 

I would like to briefly outline three pillars that you can consider for such a transformation.

One is digitalisation. The digital era is already transforming economies and societies all around the world. Recent advances in artificial intelligence and robotics will accelerate this wave of transformation. We should seriously consider how we can use technology to build digital infrastructure for our social service sector. How can we aggregate demand and provide shared services in functional areas like IT, finance, volunteer management, and administrative work? Doing this allow us to use resources, including many of our donor contributions, more optimally to channel them to the core function of social service agencies, which is to directly support beneficiaries.

Another possible pillar for this transformation is to take a citizen-centric and family-centric approach. Beneficiaries often have multiple needs that cut across different agencies – the challenges they face seldom develop in silos. As part of our economic transformation, we learned to adopt a company-centric approach to avoid working at cross purposes as we supported our enterprises in transforming.  In the same way, I hope that we can support our citizens and our families in a much more citizen-centric, family-centric way.By collaborating across agencies and pooling your resources, you can serve beneficiaries more holistically without diluting the enthusiasm of your respective volunteers for causes that they are passionate about. This is one of the aims of the ComLink+ project that Minister Masagos launched. 

A third pillar is building lateral capabilities. For example, volunteer managers could be cross-posted across social service agencies for better exposure to manage different groups of people, skills and talent. One reason why the public service in Singapore has been much less siloed than in other countries is that officers are posted across ministries. This allows officers to understand the needs of the different ministries well. I hope a similar approach can be adopted in the social service sector as well. 

In fact, I am very glad to see some of this already underway.For example, NCSS and the Institute of Mental Health are bringing together 12 partners to co-locate services at an integrated mental health centre called grovve. To be launched at *SCAPE later this year, this offers youths and caregivers a one-stop platform for mental health support and services. I am sure that there is much more we can do, and at scale.

Concurrent with transformation, there is also much that the different stakeholders in the ecosystem can learn from one another, and leverage on collaboration. So my second suggestion is to promote greater cross-pollination of ideas and expertise. Our social service agencies, with their familiarity of the different groups and communities, understand the problems on the ground well. Corporates, on their part, often have good innovative ideas and a familiarity with how to scale operations and amplify their innovations.

Since 2023, NCSS and NVPC have collaborated on Project V, bringing corporates together with social service agencies to build a steady and reliable pipeline of volunteers for more holistic and longer-term support. In the pilot phase, close to 40 corporates were matched with 40 social service agencies. Participating agencies received more than 12,000 volunteering hours as a result. To catalyse more regular volunteerism by corporates, NCSS and NVPC will be scaling up Project V. In the next three years, Project V will aim to engage more than 150 corporates to cement their partnerships with different social service agencies and help them develop their volunteering portfolio.

My third suggestion is to explore how the journey of volunteerism can be made more meaningful to those who step forward. NCSS’ 2024 Quality of Life study found that respondents who volunteered at least once a month were 1.5 times more likely to report a good quality of life compared to non-volunteers. Respondents who volunteered regularly also reported better close social relationships and psychological well-being and were more likely to find their lives meaningful.

In other words, volunteerism brings positive impact to both benefactors and beneficiaries. Well-structured volunteering experiences build lasting capabilities in helping us empathise with and support various vulnerable groups.  These qualities go beyond the volunteering experience. They mould individuals to be better citizens, family members, friends and colleagues. A well-structured volunteering experience can therefore keep volunteers driven and motivated to give more of themselves and also be more broadly transformative to volunteers’ holistic well-being.

Let me also suggest working more closely with the Ministry of Education. For many years, MOE had put in place a Community Involvement Programme for our students.  When I was at MOE a decade ago, we launched a Character and Citizenship programme and also introduced a Values in Action programme. These were meant to bring together and integrate the various strands of values-driven education we had in place, such as civics and moral education and national education. Encouraging our young to volunteer, and creating opportunities for them to do so, is an important part of their education to help them build an understanding of our society, and to help them build empathy for people around them. 

Before I conclude, let me recap my main points. First, building a more inclusive, caring, resilient and cohesive society remains a priority for the government six decades into Singapore’s independence. It is a key objective under our Forward Singapore agenda. Second, achieving this will take the collective effort of an ecosystem. Enabling and sustaining greater volunteerism is one powerful driver within this ecosystem. Third, our social service agencies must embrace transformation and collaboration, including with corporates, to better harness volunteerism to achieve greater impact for beneficiaries. By doing so, you can both shape more positive ground outcomes and keep volunteers motivated and engaged.

We celebrate SG60 this year with the theme “Building Our Singapore Together”. It is a call to all of us, that every one of us can play a part in writing the next chapter of the Singapore Story.

I am glad that we will be recognising 26 pairs of social service agencies and their corporate partners this morning, for their contributions in supporting Project V. Let me thank all volunteers and volunteer managers over the many years for your dedication and service to Singapore, and for your tireless efforts in helping to improve and uplift the lives of others. It is very challenging work, and you set a good example for others to follow.

On this occasion, let me also encourage all Singaporeans and residents to give and contribute to SGShare – a national giving initiative by Community Chest. This will provide reliable and sustained funding to support many critical social service programmes. With your collective giving, both in donations and volunteering, and with professional management by our social service agencies – we can empower individuals and communities in need to live with dignity in a more caring and inclusive Singapore. 

The Singapore we live in today was shaped by the hard work and collective contributions of the generations who came before us. Let us all work together to shape a better future for our nation, not only for ourselves but also those who come after us.

I wish you fruitful discussions throughout the rest of the Conference today. Thank you.