Covid 19 has been a catalyst for Asia's corporate world to rethink the future of work. In this episode Petrina and Laurindo hear how co-working spaces have adapted from The Great Room's Jaelle Ang. Lu-Lyn Chang from Bray Leino Splash shares creative ways for maintaining connection with teams in isolation. Shashi Nathan from Withers KhattarWong explains how the court system has gone virtual. Carrie Tan from Daughters of Tomorrow considers the impact of working from home on domestic workers. And songwriter Miss Lou explains how shifting online could make a performer's life more sustainable.

*TRANSCRIPT*

Laurindo Garcia: [00:00:00] Welcome back to another episode of inclusively in the series, we'll be asking the question, how has the pandemic help change people's lives and what lessons we have learned that could make the post pandemic world more inclusive? I'm your host Laurindo Garcia.

Petrina Kow: [00:00:15] And I'm Petrina Kow. Welcome. Today's theme is all about work and I think all of us have been probably in our lives. This is the area that has had the biggest shifts and biggest sort of seismic movements for most of us who have been working. And for me at least, I feel like, you know, it it kind of dawned on me with the work that I do, it's like, oh, I could have been doing this all my life. Why didn't I do this before? You know, and I'm very blessed. I'm very, very grateful that I'm still able to do a lot of work and in this time. And so for me, it's been really interesting just finding new audiences, finding new clients internationally, which is something I would never have, you know, thought to kind of pursue. But then it's like, oh, yeah, I can have a Canadian client. Yeah, I can you know, I can have claims from all over the world because I can see them, you know, in this way. So it's been really interesting for me just to to kind of broaden my idea of what work can be like, you know, at my end.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:01:24] I feel I'm pretty privileged. I have been working remotely and working in remote teams for the past 16 years. So I'm feeling kind of comfortable in a setup like this. But what has been the real disruption at home is my husband has now been working at home for the first time in his broadcast media and they never thought that he and his teams would be shifting to working from home. So now we're having to work out how to navigate and share the space together at home. And so for this part, because I had to kick him out and kind of move him to the other area because this is the better sounding room. So it's been interesting for him. And he's already going into the three month period because they they started quite early. But all in all, it's been pretty good. We've been both very productive and I'm feeling kind of lucky. And I know not everybody has that same same situation.

Petrina Kow: [00:02:21] I'm very excited to get right into it because I got a packed show. We have got five guests in the show today. And, you know, apart from looking at small businesses and medium to large enterprises, we're also gonna be talking to a lawyer in Singapore to think about how the legal system is continue through this lockdown in this period. I suppose like virtual courtrooms and things like that. And we'll also be speaking to a matinee executive who's led a transition from brainstorming in person to brainstorming and isolation and having to make decisions that way. So it's all gonna be very, very exciting.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:03:00] Plus, we'll have an executive director of a non for profit who's been helping women from low income families gain employment. That is Carrie Tan from Daughters of Tomorrow. Carrie will be offering a perspective on how the workforce of the future in the post pandemic world could be more inclusive. And finally, we'll also be having a guest artist today, a jazz songwriter and performer, Miss Lu.

Petrina Kow: [00:03:21] Yeah, but to kick us off, I'd like to introduce our very first guest. She is the CEO and co-founder of a lovely coworking space here in Singapore and in the region. And I think there is talks of expansion of a great room. Ladies, please welcome Ms. Jaelle. Hello. Hi, Jaelle.

Jaelle Ang: [00:03:42] Hi.

Petrina Kow: [00:03:42] So tell me, I mean, you're in in a way, as a coworking space, you've kind of been the solution, right, in a way to sort of deal with that transition between sort of traditional offices and people wanting to be a little bit more nimble and not have to deal with, like, massive overheads and catering to that kind of group of people. But but for you guys, too, you've had to kind of do the lockdown and people can't gather in those office spaces anymore. What has been the experience for you guys in this pandemic?

Jaelle Ang: [00:04:12] It's been very interesting because our business has been so much about creating a beautiful physical space that people want to be in. They want to be very productive and they want to connect with people and press clients and kind of attract like minded people. And all of a sudden they can't come in anymore. They can't make that connection any questions that they need it to. So who are we and what's our value? Continuing from this point, I think what's interesting is that we learn that we actually more just a physical space. We are a community. Then how then do we justify and push the boundaries on the notion of community, help them perform at the office or continue to engage and have these dialogues with people? So it's been quite a learning journey. But I think with. Done quite a few experiments to help people either work better. So we've created Zoom backgrounds where people still want to show that they are in a very nice workspace, very productive workspace. It's gone viral. That really helped them. We've worked with people to help the members nail virtual meetings. So how to build rapport with other people. So really just trying to, you know, build that same value without having that physical.

Petrina Kow: [00:05:32] And I mean, for, you know, for your clients or obviously your tenants in the space. Have they come to you with any sort of specific requests or, you know, difficulties or things that they've sort of come, you know, experience for themselves? And you as perhaps the provider had to sort of respond to that you were not expecting?

Jaelle Ang: [00:05:56] The biggest thing what's interesting is that flex workspace. I mean, my position has always been about flexibility. And the big hypotheses or the big estimate is by 20, 30, 30 percent of all commercial workspaces would be inflects workspaces. And what the pandemic has done, it is become a catalyst accelerated. This moving to, what, 30 percent. So we've already known that it's a good counteract to, you know, short term business cycles, more market volatility, but it's going to propel us to work towards that even faster. And the conversations that we have, the dialogue that we have with business owners and leaders are. We don't know what's going to happen. Are we planning for three months, six months or two years? How many hits are we going to have? Are we planning for growth of downsize? Which geographies are we going to have? Are we planning for business continuity or is it decentralisation and having satellite locations? So all these questions are what they are asking. Again, we have no answers. We can't plan a different scenario. But the beauty of it is more than ever the realisation that we need flexibility and agility. It's our only contract, too, too, too. That uncertainty that we're all facing. So we have to kind of do it and work with them. And sometimes even we have to learn to be more flexible than we had expected to, because before that, we're thinking businesses will know what you know, what they need needed. Six months, maybe not three years like a traditional landlord, but 26 months. The truth is right now, sometimes, as we're planning the great return, which starts next week on the second of June, which want to get a sense of, you know, it's going to be 10 percent of our members coming back and they're going to be 30 percent. And up till today, when we ask them, some of them haven't quite decided. We think it's gonna be between 10 to 20 percent. But who knows? Because when we open in Hong Kong, everyone came back. It was very quiet, but everyone came back right after they opened. They were craving for the connection. They were craving to be, you know, even if it's a and a roomful of people who don't know they want to be not knowing together.

Petrina Kow: [00:08:08] Yeah, I mean, I, I mean, it just it remains to be seen or I may June with June 2nd would feel and look like I have some physical recordings as well. I have to go into the studio which is like, oh wow, how exciting. But I guess for it, for you is as well as your your tenants. Did you find yourself having to sort of, you know, pull new skills or perhaps. And were you all thinking about where else you might have gone to perhaps be a little bit more inclusive about, you know, how we create the space for perhaps potential new clients? Maybe.

Jaelle Ang: [00:08:47] I think what's been interesting is this, you know, different groups of people that we had expected them to be much later adopters, a flexible space. And you're starting to look at a could be you know, it could be the legal profession, designers, nonprofits, social enterprise or different types. And we're going on a journey to learn about your needs. And I think the Circuit Breaker has forced us to slow down. And this pause is helping us to really, you know, force us to think about not the usual suspects. A lot of our business is technology and financial services, but actually everyone needs this flexibility and how can we cater to them? So I would say it's a learning. It's a learning journey of even how to plan, you know, now recalling more broadly gathering. So it's not always meetings. Sometimes it's dialogue. It's gathering small events with different groups. And this is so much more willingness to, you know, collaborate, to partner and to to listen to the groups that you don't usually use.

Petrina Kow: [00:09:49] Yeah, that's wonderful. I can't wait to hear more. Thank you very much, Jaelle, for joining us and telling us about what's been going on at The Great Room. Next up, we have with us the chief marketing officer at Bray Leino Splash. Miss Chang Lu- Lyn. And she's also the co-founder of this company. Hello, Miss Lu-Lyn.

Lu-Lyn Chang: [00:10:09] Hello Petrina. Thank you for having me.

Petrina Kow: [00:10:12] So I know we've been sort of chatting informally about, you know, this is your baby. This is your company that you've built from scratch with just the three of you, you know, early in the 2000s. And it's become the sort of multinational now. It's it's it's grown from just the three of you, right. To this big sort of start as a tech company. Right. You guys are the Internet business. So in a way, we think of the tech and the Internet companies as being very nimble, being very sort of like, you know, able to pivot and have been working from home. But what has the reality really been like for you guys in this time that you've had to manage such a massive operation?

Lu-Lyn Chang: [00:10:55] Okay, so where a digital marketing agency in the main. Right. So what? Because of the nature of the business, I think with we've always had a habit of collaborating remotely. So, for example, we don't have a technical development team that is exclusively in Singapore. Our entire technical development team is hubbed out of Ho Chi Minh City. Right. My entire creative and animation illustrators are the writers. That team is completely hubbed in Kuala Lumpur. Realities of business, Singapore is very expensive to do business in and to hire, etc. So that's our business strategy. We have different hubs supporting our needs in different locations so that the staff are in the other offices are very used to collaborating with their colleagues on platforms such as Skype, on JIRA and Temple for project management. And I would have to say that the transition has been fairly easy and doesn't does not mean, you know, any jarring disruptions to work. And the other thing also is that for a long time now with we've had a flexible working arrangement at the office, started really when I became a mother years ago. And I wanted to have a way to be able to spend time with my children, but also contribute at work. Right. So we come to support any of our staff members who need to work from home or to opt for a part time working arrangement. And so I would say that that's really prepared as well for this transition to be able to support everybody and have them on different platforms, but still collaborating, you know, quite smoothly.

Petrina Kow: [00:12:57] It sounds like you guys sail through no new issues.

Lu-Lyn Chang: [00:13:03] Well, it's actually been four months now, right, since we've been working when we started really, really early. Right out to Chinese New Year. You know, we decided that it was safer for everyone to just not commute anymore and to start working from home. So regionally, across all five offices in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Ho Chi Minh City. Everybody was told to just stay put and and work from home. Right. But at the same time, also, we had to do a few things differently because it's a long time to not be in in a physical space. And, you know, working face to face. And so we had to be a little more mindful about how our people were working up mentally. Right. So so we had to make sure that we started doing more pulse surveys with them, which was something we never did before. Right. Because when you're in a physical space, through body language to mood swings, to tantrums and disagreements, you you have it all out. But remotely, then we need it to send up these poll surveys as our team. And we found that that actually, you know, despite all that experience with working remotely, that the pandemic does does make people feel a little bit more isolated. You know, a little bit more physically detached. And and and the survey that show that people wanted to have that that social interaction, that was something that they missed, that they felt little bit and anxious about. And we really wanted to make sure that in that case, we we created, you know, a structured Friday CCA kind of activity where, you know, we called it a company, a Covid Company activity, where we would bring teams together, you know, to go on virtual walks. You know, it's right now they're there in a room, one on Kahoot someplace playing Charades for prizes, you know, and then we're doing a cook-a-thon together. So these little things that you actually have to put in place and, you know, have people participate so that they can have a laugh, see each other, you know, and interact a little bit more. Right. So things that, you know, previously we never used to do because five o'clock people would just go for drinks together or they'll want to go home or go to a yoga class together. But right now, we have to be conscious and we have to actually, you know, put people and resources to planning and getting these things going.

Petrina Kow: [00:15:27] I love that. It's like me last night. I'm trying to enforce a a movie night with my kids. And god that was that that ended in disaster, you know, with like, you know, first of all, just even the choice of movie was was so, so fraught. So, yeah, I completely applaud. But the massive effort that I think a, you know, that you guys have had to sort of think about and do. But is there just one last question. I was wondering if if if this whole pandemic has has made you was prompted you to do things that you've never thought you would have to do or that really sort of did it, but it kind of send you in a bit of a existential crisis about what what you are doing and you know what this whole thing is about.

Lu-Lyn Chang: [00:16:15] I think one of the things that became quite apparent to us was that we we have to actually make very conscious efforts to step up our game in terms of reaching out and communicating with our stuff. Right. And and it's easy to think of it as, oh, yeah. You know, emails, Skype messages on teams, you know, but but. We've had to, you know, actually put in place weekly calls individually with our team members to virtual town halls where we have everybody on a platform kind of listening to financial results or how they're planning to, you know, save pennies and trim cause and just just to do that kind of thing. Right. So definitely being a little bit more switched on about the frequency. Reaching out to people, talking to them, checking in all of those things, I think has has bought a new momentum to the way that we work with all with without employers. Thank you so much, Lou.

Petrina Kow: [00:17:24] Yeah, I think it's. It's really fascinating to hear that. I mean, and I don't. And I'm hoping your like like everybody else is like you, you know. And then really sort of looking out for their employees. And it sounds like, you know, that you're really doing above and beyond what most maybe other companies. But I'm hoping that this might inspire you if you're listening to to think about that, too, if you've not. I mean, I guess, you know, in this time, a lot of a lot of companies are working really hard to fight fires. Right. And to to just really get to the bottom line and sort of try and figure things out in a very, very real way. But for you guys to really sort of show the way and to sort of say that you're out there really looking after the well-being of your staff is is very inspiring. So thank you for that.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:18:09] Thank you, Lu-Lyn. Thank you. So please stay on the line also. Jaelle, please stay on the line. We're going to come back to you later. And I do love the idea of our team. Virtual team walks in house. There is just fantastic that idea. I want to bring into the conversation now Shashi Nathan, a partner at KhattarWong. Welcome to the show. Thanks for. Thanks for joining us.

Shashi Nathan: [00:18:32] Thank you, Laurindo. Thank you. Petrina, for inviting me to this podcast.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:18:36] So I understand that you're a criminal lawyer.

Shashi Nathan: [00:18:39] Don't hold it against me.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:18:41] So can you give our audience a bit of a better understanding of what type of cases you normally handle?

Shashi Nathan: [00:18:47] I do. Basically, everything to do with criminal law. So we do. I would say 70 percent of my work is white collar defence. And so we do things like insider trading, market fraud, corruption, cheating, forgery, that kind of case. Because he knows then I do blue collar work. I do. I act for clients involved in murder, drugs, rape, sexual offences. And I have a team that also does investigations. We do corporate investigations. So we had we help corporates do in-house investigations on maybe a rogue employee or financial misfeasance in the firm. So I've got my team of lawyers in my firm. They all do a little bit of that and I help out when I can.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:19:38] And how big is your team just to help us get an understanding of them?

Shashi Nathan: [00:19:41] I have six lawyers, my team. But we are in a much larger flow. We have hundred and thirty lawyers in the firm and the firm is part of an international law firm where we have two thousand five hundred lawyers around the world. So I really think Jaelle and Lu-Lyn talk about the challenges. It's been a huge challenge for law firms generally, not just in not just in Singapore, but across the world. My firm is I wouldn't say it's unique, but we had some unique problems to be with because we have offices in 18 cities and in a different time zones, different types of different styles of working, different areas of law that they practice. So everyone has different needs and different ways how they've had to adjust to the epidemic. My colleagues in Milan, for example, when the pandemic hit Italy, it hit it really, really hard. I mean, I have some of my colleagues who got hit by the virus themselves. So emotionally, because, you know, these people, it does it does bring everybody's mood down, not just Singapore, but, of course, the partners of mine who I have known for many years and they've been the hospital. One of them just release hospital recently. So you see how the infrastructure, different countries deals with the epidemic and you try to find solutions in different countries.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:21:14] But in terms of your Singapore team, are you 100 percent working remotely now or is there some kind of exceptions to that rule?

Shashi Nathan: [00:21:22] So some of the work we do considered essential services. So the government has allowed us some exemptions. So I have a skeletal team in the office from the finance team, some of the I.T. infrastructure teams, legal aid and then individual teams of lawyers going on as it when they have to do so. So we need to get individual clearance when they want to go in. We have court order. Courts have been closed for two months. Some hearings go on as far as the hearings where a person's life or liberty is involved. So things like bail applications or someone's on death row, those cases are still going on. What we've done is that we've done all these hearings with Zoom.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:22:10] Oh wow.

Shashi Nathan: [00:22:10] So we've had to change the way we we behave in court, you know, because you don't know which camera is looking at you.

Petrina Kow: [00:22:18] I myself am so fascinated with that. How do you do a court like thing?

Shashi Nathan: [00:22:23] So what happens is.

Petrina Kow: [00:22:23] On Zoom.

Shashi Nathan: [00:22:26] Even the Court of Appeal, which is the highest court in Singapore recently, they've got a few cases of zoom. So you have some judges sitting in the physical court. Some they're just dialing in from home. The lawyers usually in from home, the accused or the criminal is dialing in from the prison, the prosecutor calling in from his office. And all the cameras are in. So what we haven't done is an actual contested hearing say we don't do a trial because I wouldn't be comfortable cross-examing a witness behind the camera. I want to see that person live. I didn't think I'd be dead. But I don't particularly like to do it if I really do question the witness. I like that person be in front of me. I want to be able to observe his or her body language, his or her reactions to the questions and the environment. The camera does catch some of it. But you miss a lot of things when the person behind the camera, you also don't know who else is in the room with that person and whether he is he or she has access to other information that document. So we've not done trials, contested hearings, but yes, appeals, other urgent matters. We've been using Zoom.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:23:39] But do you do you think that there could ever been in the pipeline that we could get to the point where the trial process is actually gone virtual as well?

Shashi Nathan: [00:23:47] We've we've done it in Singapore already. There have been cases in Singapore where we tried to procure a witness who is overseas and cannot come to Singapore for one reason or the other? And if parties come to a concession that, OK, we can't get him, rather than not having the trial will allow him to give evidence by video? Not my my preferred choice. Some some other lies. I'm okay with it. But sometimes you have to you've got to get the case moving and the law allows for a video evidence to be given. And of course, you need the court, the court to agree to that as well. But it's been given some of get experts say you need a a scientist or a medical doctor who for some reason can come in. He's not giving direct evidence on the case, but his scientific expert evidence. Those kind of cases, there's no there's no issue him giving evidence by camera. No, there is no prejudice, certainly. And so I think we would have to look at each case and each witness differently.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:24:53] So it sounds as though that the measures and the processes were in place. It's it's sounding almost like it was smooth sailing. I mean, did anything go and unexpected given the pandemic?

Shashi Nathan: [00:25:05] No, it's I think it's been quite smooth sailing since we've all been on lockdown. The other aspect is not just court. I mean, we also as a business, we have to be in regular contact with clients. I also have to have regular calls with my team of lawyers, with my management. So I do things. I find this quite different. If I spend a lot of time on calls every day, you know, you know, I use it in the normal working day. I go to the office, I'll do it. I know some people believe it, but I do work sometimes. I still go around and have a chat with my colleagues. I go out and have a coffee. The day passes by and you know it. There's a flow to it here. I do an hour meeting and the next thing I know at the next meeting is starting at the next meeting starting. And suddenly it's like five thirty in the evening. And I have done it. I was six meetings and I think it physically and mentally more tired than when I was sitting in the office and trying to do some work. So it's different. It is different between the court because you've got a court. You've got to regulate the you're in the court room. You don't feel tired at all. But visiting the office in front of a computer does greet you. And I felt that personally for the last two months,

Laurindo Garcia: [00:26:23] There are many people that we've been speaking to also saying the same thing that, you know, in theory, during things at home should theoretically feel more relaxing, but also disease back to back calls. And you need to compensate for that. Lack of physical interaction means that you're having to work harder just to stay engaged and really understand what's going on there. I'm curious, though, the one final question before we move to two to bring Carrie into the conversation, which is then if you're doing a lot of the court work or virtually, how does that affect your wardrobe that are here?

Shashi Nathan: [00:26:57] I think I've talked about judges, lawyers at my table, other lawyers. I usually wear a suit, a black suit when I'm in court. And I know some of my friends. What they did was they wore a suit and a tie. But there wore their boxers below the camera. I was going to do that. But then my wife gave me a look. And I said OK. So I actually I was at home. I had a full suit on, but no socks. And I did argument, but it's it's I could ever want. Do you do that? Just to make myself you happy that I could appear in the court in my boxer shorts. But my wife, who obviously makes the rules here, didn't agree.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:27:40] Like you went barefoot just to stay grounded.

Shashi Nathan: [00:27:42] Yes.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:27:42] It's almost theatrical.

Shashi Nathan: [00:27:45] I had to break up a little bit of the rules.

Petrina Kow: [00:27:49] I'm sorry. You're not the only lawyer I would have tried.

Shashi Nathan: [00:27:51] Right. There were guys who, who've done it the boxer shorts who sent me their pictures after.

Petrina Kow: [00:27:57] Oh, just what little what little thrills that can sort of get us through the just these small things make us happy. I was I was in a squeeze in one quick little question. I was curious to ask you about. I mean, now that you've come through this whole experience and maybe, you know, moving forward, I have you guys that have tackled it as a business and also maybe in terms of the legal system, how we can use the lessons from this pandemic to to figure out what we can do a little bit more inclusively. I mean, I, I'm loving that. I'm hearing that we can actually dial in, you know, witnesses from overseas, which maybe would not have been an option before. But what else do you think could be done? And we were we were just sort of casually discussing. But what about.

Shashi Nathan: [00:28:40] What about it wasn't an option. It was always an option. It just wasn't a popular option. But now reality is sunk in and we have to use it if we like. Trials get delayed. But, you know, when when I saw this topic about inclusivty, I thought you were talking about how different industries and how inclusive we are of people. Is that off topic?

Laurindo Garcia: [00:29:03] No not all all.

Petrina Kow: [00:29:04] Totally on on topic.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:29:06] What's your take on it.

Shashi Nathan: [00:29:07] I wanted to share what I did with I spoke to Petrina about very briefly is that when I started practicing as a lawyer in Singapore 26 years ago, I didn't want to be a criminal lawyer initially. And somehow I fell into this route that I became a criminal lawyer. But one of the things that startled me was the preponderance of Indian male lawyers who are criminal laywers you know, you never hear of a female Chinese or male Chinese or female Malay lawyer, who's at the top of the game for the criminal law practice, is always some Indian male. And I didn't realize it until I entered the practice. And then, of course, over the years, it's true. I mean, I can look around and I know who are the main players in the game and they all male in Indian. And I don't think it's I don't think it's a question of of race or stereotypes. It's a it's a client perception. It's really a client perception, because what I did about 12 years ago is that I started hiring females in my team. I have I have a good mix of male and female lawyers in my team. But I've probably got more females on my team that most of the other large firms. And for them to do criminal law, it was already quite a big thing because you don't expect a Chinese girl to be doing criminal law. They would do corporate or intellectual property or something sexier. But you know, who wants to do blood and guts, right? So when I first introduce one of them has become already a partner in my firm. That shows how well she's done. But it was it was a bit of a jolt to the system because you'd rarely see a female Chinese person doing high profile criminal cases. And I felt that that was important because you need to change things. It's not a question of whether you can do it or not. Of course you can do it. The question with turning the mindset of the client. And this is difficult. The clients could be across the board. You can have Chinese, Indian, Malay, foreigners who are Singapore, anyone. If they had trouble for criminal problem. They'll say, I want an Indian lawyer.

Petrina Kow: [00:31:28] Really?

Shashi Nathan: [00:31:29] It's strange. But it's it's so I would I mean, I would sometimes bring in one of my young Chinese lawyers to sit in and say, look, you know, this is my fee. But, you know, she's very good. She'd be working in me. And, you know, this is her fee. Why did you consider that? This guy who has spent an hour telling me he cannot afford my fees. The woman I give him a slightly cheaper option. But, you know, she's very good. It's okay I'll pay your fees. Wow. Oh, you know, it's changing. It's it is changing because I think you're getting more visibility now. But certainly when I first started. Forget about a female Indian lawyer. She won't event get into the room for the clients.

Petrina Kow: [00:32:12] Really?

Shashi Nathan: [00:32:14] Yeah.

Petrina Kow: [00:32:15] Wow. This is.

Shashi Nathan: [00:32:16] So you have many male Chinese lawyers. No problem. Did they get a good fair share pieces? But the perception is client driven, not from the industry. The industry is trying to open up one to get more people. If I wonder the wider skillset, I want people with different experiences, different viewpoints of life to come in to the market because that's the best way you could build your teams. But clients are the biggest hurdle cases I have to. Even if I don't want to do it because I want to do something else. If you're going to keep the client, I have to get involved.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:32:54] I'm so happy to hear that you're putting in extra time to do the client education work because it is so sorely needed, not only in the legal profession, but also other industries as well, where they're trying to diversify their workforce. But at the end of the day, it's the clients who are kind of making call. We want this person, not that person. So I'm so glad to hear that you're putting in those hard miles so early. Please stay with us as we move the conversation forward. I'd like to invite Carrie Tan to the show. Welcome. Thanks for joining us. And your executive director of Daughters of Tomorrow as I write. Carrie.

Carrie Tan: [00:33:31] Yes. Hi, Laurindo and Petrina. Thanks for having me on the show. Yes, my day job, I am the executive director of Daughters of Tomorrow, which is a charity that enables livelihood opportunities for low income women in Singapore. But for the purposes of this discussion, I'd also like to mention that in my spare time, I volunteer with a social enterprise called Anisya that provides employer transfers for foreign domestic workers in Singapore who wish to change employers or after they finish a contract. And this particular social enterprise tries to provide this employment bridging without any cost or agent fees to the domestic worker. So why do I find that is relevant for our discussion today? Because I'm going to be speaking on behalf of the female or women's perspective in this Covid pandemic. And I think both groups of women form a very important part of our value chain when we are looking at, you know, the whole transformation of how our work life is going to look like in future.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:34:39] So what have some of the things that you've been seeing? And I really welcome you to kind of talk across the different work and there are different organisations that you are involved in. Well, what are some of the things that you've observed in how employers are reacting to the pandemic with things, with the lockdown things, or how some employees are having to be deployed and how that impacts, you know, the women that you are then also having to supporters as well. I mean, what are some of your observations?

Carrie Tan: [00:35:08] So during the pre Covid time, one of the biggest breakthroughs that Daughters of Tomorrow managed to create was in the area of retail and F&B sector hiring because for the longest time, these sectors practice this shift work rostering, right? And we finally, you know, diagnosed the issue as to how come local women couldn't find or sustain jobs in these sectors. And it was because of childcare constraints, like because of the limitation of formal childcare hours to 7:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. taking roster shift work in any industry wouldn't work for them. So actually, between 2018 to most recently Daughters of Tomorrow has successfully converted many employers in these sectors to practice what we call core and stable scheduling, which basically means giving office hours to non office jobs so that these mothers can go to work, get jobs in these sectors, and to be able to pick up their kids from childcare. But then moving into Covid times, I think even in PMET jobs and we're seeing this office hours is disappearing because as people shift to working from home, our daily lives, our caregiving responsibilities and our workplace responsibilities are all merging. And I've been hearing from many women how they are under the double burden of having to take care of both fronts with the heavy expectation that whether it's from their bosses or from your co-workers of a faster response time, because you’re from home you don't need to travel and you could be online all the time. And I think this is creating quite a unsustainable work practice that really we need to look into. So that's one particular area that I know, creating some time boundaries for the new normal of work. Right. Then the other thing is also, of course, for the low wage women that we work with. Gone. Gone are the opportunities in retail and F&B for, I don't know, the foreseeable few months. So we've already started pivoting our employment bridging efforts to channel them to the caregiving sectors like the eldercare, the nursing homes are still operating, our old people still need looking after. So there is still continuing to be positions that are open for them. And we are increasingly starting to work with tech companies to ask them if they have openings for our women. We have seen some successes of having women take on Home-Based administrative jobs as well as jobs in the AI sectors. So we’re very encouraged. And I think with continued efforts to reach out to this group of employers, we are looking at bringing new channels of industries for job opportunities for the women.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:37:58] That's great. I mean, so a lot of the changes that employers have been making during this time, particularly around being more cognisant of of flexibility, if you're a caregiver or working parent as well, have been addressed with some more flexibility now. And, um, and I know that this is something that you've been advocating for for a long time. And I'm just curious now that you're seeing at least a glimmer of hope with some of these changes being made. I mean, what's what's what's your take on that on on what's taken the employers  so long?

Carrie Tan: [00:38:33] Well, I think it's just very human and people are afraid of change. And I think you guys mentioned the culture of Asian culture. It's so hard. Just not having visibility, I think, create some anxiety in employers and bosses as well is going to require some adjustment. I think both on employer’s side, and employee’s side. I wanted to kind of bring in a point that Jaelle made earlier about creating beautiful workplaces. Right. And this is the point where I want to connect to our domestic workers, because in the new normal, our homes are going to be all workplaces and the army of people out there keeping it, keeping our homes beautiful, clean, organised and conducive for everyone to stay together, cooped up and productive and healthy is going to be our domestic workers and our homes are their workplaces. And increasingly in the circuit breaker, we’re seeing that domestic workers are suffering a lot of stress because you know that they can go out even on their off days. And with all the employees being at home, you know, adults, children, they have to cook three meals a day. Sometimes they're running out of recipes. There's no clear communication of when they can rest. And even in the rest times, do they have the freedom to move around the house? And these are all, I think, some things we need to think about, because I think without the domestic workers helping us at home as women, I think we will have a lot on our hands. Right. Being parents and cleaning and caregiving and working. So I think this value chain is something that we need to look into and employers can take the lead. I think whether it's in the office workplace or the workplace at home, employers can take the lead to carve out time boundaries right. Of personal time versus work time? Personal space and workspace. So there can be a more sustainable environment for the people who work for us and hopefully for the people that we work with as well.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:40:39] I'm glad that you raise the issue of domestic workers. I think that that's definitely a blind spot in the national conversation about the situation for migrant workers in the country and across the region as well. One final point before hand it back to you, Petrina. In every episode, we ask our inclusion experts to imagine that they were bestowed with a world changing magical power after a pandemic. So so, Carrie, my question to you is that if you are given this power, what are your top three things that you would do to make the employment sector more inclusive?

Carrie Tan: [00:41:13] Wow. I wouldn't call myself an inclusion expert. And the things I wish for are not something that only employers can do, I think is something that maybe we as a society can try to imagine, reimagine and create for the future. Number one is I hope that we have more sustainable care structures in place. One example could be that we could have a contingent workforce of domestic workers and caregivers so that when we have to let our own domestic workers go on break, on leave or rest, there is another pool of shared resources that we can tap into. And if we don't have to step in ourselves, not that we don't want to, but it can be very draining. Number two, I think creating a new framework for what is good work life balance while working from home, I think, would be tremendously important. In fact, I don't think that by having proper balance of personal time versus work time is necessarily detrimental to productivity. In fact, you know, studies have shown that if you are able to toggle amongst different kind of activities that tap different parts of your brain, you can actually increase creativity in people. Right. And problem solving abilities. So I think there's an opportunity there for people to really think and reimagine how the new work would look like. And thirdly, in the grand scheme of things, probably a very tangible ask is for companies who can afford it to consider subsidising the telco subscriptions costs of their low wage employees. Many of our women live in rental flats. It doesn't come with, you know fibre broadband. They're living off prepaid phone cards. Right. And it takes a toll. You know these costs take a toll. And if you are providing a job to them in which they can work from home, I think to be considerate of this significant additional cost to their daily expenses and helping them with it would really go a long way to include them in the workplace.

Petrina Kow: [00:43:19] Thank you so much, Carrie, for these these wonderful ideas and I think very actionable. It feels like it. It can be done. Let's hope. Let's hope this conversation reaches the right ears. I'm just I'm so glad you mentioned the domestic helpers, because I don't have one at the moment. And every day I look at the layer of dust all over everything, and I weigh it against what else I have to do. And I just go let the layer of dust be there, because I guess I just can't be asked anymore, can I? Do I want to scrub of that mildew? Maybe not today. What if it just gathers another centimetre? And you know, we'll deal with it then. Is usually my thought process. So if you can have a solution to this interim group of contingent cleaning workers that I can employ, I'll be very happy to contribute to that pile. My husband came up with a genius idea of there of these dish washing services where you can collect all your dishes for the day, you know, put it in a bag and then tomorrow I'd like laundry. It comes back, washed and ready to go. So another business idea for you to.

Carrie Tan: [00:44:44] Let’s discuss it. It's a great job for the neighbourhood, right?

Petrina Kow: [00:44:51] Yeah, I invested in the machines. I've been using that since. But thank you so much to all our guests. Our last guest is also perhaps the most glamorous one. She is known as the glamour vintage songbird, Miss Lou. And I've really enjoyed watching you not only live in person when you're performing in all your life venues, but of late you've been coming online to show us what we can do with some of this music and entertainment, because obviously with as artists and as as musicians, you have no venues to sing in and form in anymore. So welcome faith in the listeners. Lou, could you tell us a little bit about what you've done to sort of react to this pandemic?

Miss Lou: [00:45:39] Yeah, so. Hi, Patrina. Laurindo. Thank you for having me on this podcast. Yeah. So one of the first few things to go was the life venues and bars. Those were the moment that hit. I think my husband and I, we quickly had a discussion and we said I think I told him, I think it's going to get worse and it's gonna go down quite quickly. And then the wedding started getting postponed or canceled. And we really had to huddle together as a team because I called on this company called Loud and clear as well. So loud and clear is founded by my husband and myself. And right now, he's a three person team. We have a technical personnel with us. And together we manage all of our live music. We also organise events and we also manage all of the performance contracts and things like that for my husband and myself, course, both of us, our full time professional musicians. So when the gig started getting canceled, we we had to think of other solutions. And thankfully, we were already on track to move a lot of our performances and our activities online. For example, from the start on November last year, I had already decided, OK, I want to kind of pivot to more. Off. I want to do more of my own original material rather than, you know, relying on corporate events and the weddings, which have been a really, really good. Had has been sustaining my entire practice. So I had made a conscious decision last November. Thing we need to kind of do more things online and that kind of set the tone for what quickly happened in January and February. Yeah, and I think at the beginning of the year, things were still pretty good with the with the events side of things. So call it divine intervention or something. But we we thankfully had a lot of stores and our reserves to be able to type through these next few months as we tried to move things online. So because the events started dwindling, we already had our our equipment ready with us because his my husband's other company provided these equipment for us to use for our live performances. And because we had this in place, we could be thought of. OK, so now that this is not being used. How else can we convert it and continue our life performances to bring our music to audiences? So we quickly went to YouTube and looked up how to Lifestream. And we quickly went to places like Sim Lim Square before the Circuit Breaker kicked in to get all the equipment that we needed. And we looked at what we already had. OK. We had this camera. How do we connect this to our computer? How do we go? From our studio. So this current studio that I'm recording this in right now, this used to be just a rehearsal room and recording studio. But now it's our live streaming studio. We've kind of converted it same. Same, but different. Now we've built in the the visual aspect into our daily workflow. Yeah. So we had to quickly find a resources online and many people were actually really quite happy to help. And we realised that. Okay. Now that we can livestream, this also opens up a whole new world because we can actually using a zoom call. We can approach people, guests from overseas, bring them on the show, and you suddenly don't have those cost issues off. What if I have to fly a guest in from the US, for example, where we're going to put them up? All those things disappear and suddenly with in light, there is the dark side of things, but there's also the really positive side if you choose to look at it, and that's how we choose to look at things, how can we get this going? How can we continue to bring music to people and also for our own sanity? We need it to continue being creatively productive. And. Thankfully, we started our own YouTube Lifestream show series. So I have one and he has one. And we recently did a 12 hour livestream where we invited guests dialing in from L.A., from Thailand. We hit Miss Greece will come on the show to talk about how to how we can prepare for things. Yeah, sorry. Was it really makes me feel like other than just being a musician right now. We have already explored tap into our other creative outlets like how do we program ashore? How do we get our favourite guests, our favourite people, onto the show without any geographical constraints? And yeah, now, if you'd like, the world is our oyster. So really, there's a silver lining to this entire situation. And I think if you're willing to put in the work. Yeah, you'll be able to.

Petrina Kow: [00:50:27] It's wonderful. Yeah. And and I was very taken with what you're putting out online, too, because I think for the other performers, they were either waiting out the situation or they had quit the they felt a lot of resistance to the technical aspects of of being a performer. Right. And maybe because you and your husband are a great sort of complementary team. I know he's a saxophonist right. And and also, you think you're one of the few that are doing a subscription service to your performances and a pay per watch or something like that. So you're you're thinking about monetising your performances. And I'm I'm just curious as to what how that sort of came about and, you know, what was the response like and is it sustainable? Do you feel like, you know, this is this is kind of the way to go now?

Miss Lou: [00:51:17] So there are actually a lot of people, a lot of touring musicians who are who have really sustainable careers, even if you've even if most of us have never heard of them. And I think one of the turning points in how I view my career was I forgot who whose material it was, but I chanced upon someone's writing on how being a sustainable musician is more important than being a successful musician, because our view of what a successful musician or artist this is usually like the pop stars. Those were at the top of their game. But there's so many other people in that in the layers underneath that who are who have very fulfilling lives. They tour the record. They put out the music. They have audiences who love them. And that was the kind of career I wanted for myself. So. From there, I actually discovered a Web site called Patreon. So that's where I first got the idea of the subscription thing. And what that does is basically people who like your creative output, who like your work, they get to support you directly by giving you either a monthly contribution or a per project contribution, depending on what your what you expect output frequency to be like. So I thought, okay, if Patreon can provide that service and I already have a Web site that has this service, I don't need to go on Patreon. If people already are familiar with this concept of Patreon, then I can start my own on my own Web site. And I offer exclusive POCs to them. And then the same time, I get to build long term relationships with my friends. In that sense, I get to hear from them directly. I'm actually holding a Zoom call for the first time with my inner circle subscribers tomorrow afternoon to actually see who these people are because they've been supporting me. They've been commenting. They've been requesting for songs. And all I've seen are their comments, but not their faces and their names. Yeah. So I think that it pulls me closer to them and I get to directly offer them what they want.

Petrina Kow: [00:53:24] That's a wonderful. I mean, to be. Yeah. It's always, you know, I think as a musician on stage, you're you're I mean, you're there with your audience, but you don't really know. I mean, most people are kind of shy to kind of come up to you and say, hey, you know, I really enjoyed that, blah, blah, blah. But this really gives you that intimacy and that direct link with the people who are literally. Right. Supporting you. So I think that is just so genius in such a quick and nimble, you know, move on your part to sort of take this and turn this into something that is really fulfilling and interesting for you. And I think I'm very much looking forward to this myself. You're having a Broadway night. Excuse me.

Miss Lou: [00:54:05] Yes, yes. Yes. So.

Petrina Kow: [00:54:07] That's happening Sunday, right?

Miss Lou: [00:54:09] That's right. Sunday night at 8:00 p.m. So we're excited about it.

Petrina Kow: [00:54:13] Wonderful. Right. I'm not sure we'll be a good episode before that, but we will definitely try and spread the word. But thank you so much, Miss Lou

Miss Lou: [00:54:24] Thank you.

Petrina Kow: [00:54:24] For sharing with us your journey. Yeah, I am. Before we get to hear your beautiful, lovely voice, and I don't know if you guys heard this woman saying, but she is amazing. She also has such a beautiful look and presence. Right. She has this really lovely of cat eye glasses and she's always so, so glamorous, like sort of harking back to the abroad days of the 60s. This is my favourite era. So it's really been so wonderful to watch you onstage and watch your growth as well as an artist. But before you get to your lovely song, I think we want to go back round again to our guests to ask them what is the one thing that they would like to sort of let our listeners know? What's the one thing that you'd like to share. So perhaps we'll we'll we'll start with you again. Jaelle.

Jaelle Ang: [00:55:14] Since we're talking about work. I think post-pandemic what I like to see the workplace become its first seems to be much more respectful and more conscious of our wellness. I think that would be one thing I'd like to see. And and second thing would be how workspaces really need to be the modern Agora of learning more than just a functional workspace. It needs to be a place of natural growth, of learning from your experts were out in the field every day that learning should be continual and must energize and rejuvenate our journey. I think the last thing it's you know, when we get the chance to meet with everyone in person, I really hope that it's not going through the motion much more deeply engagement and much more appreciative of each moment that we have each other. And I think workplaces can achieve these three things. I'll be really happy about that.

Petrina Kow: [00:56:12] Thank you so much. Jaelle and it's Jaelle the founder, co-founder and CEO of The Great Room. Next, I'd like to call upon Miss Chang Lu-Lyn from Bayer. What was it? The long company name again. I know your company as Splash.

Lu-Lyn Chang: [00:56:30] Yeah. Splash is fine.

Petrina Kow: [00:56:31] Yeah. What is the one thing?

Lu-Lyn Chang: [00:56:33] I think contrary to what you hear about, you know, the pandemic not being discriminatory, I think it does discriminate, discriminates against all those people who are less privileged than us, you know, less able bodied than us, less well-off than us. And so what? What I would really like to see is if there are any employers out there, you know, whether you're running a small business or, you know, a big corporation to really look at stepping up the. Flexible, working from home and the part time work. Hiring policies that you have. Because this will really and able people who, you know, are caregivers, mothers with children and and disabled people to be able to use their talents and be able to contribute and work at the same time in a known living. And it's really not so difficult as the pandemic has shown us. So when business goes back to usual, that's that's one thing I think, you know, that I would like to see.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:57:44] Thank you, Lu-Lyn for reiterating the point about flexible workplaces and providing that is an option for for you, for your teams. Thank you so much for that. I'd like to move now to Shashi Nathan. What's one thing that you want to do? You would like our audience to to know after this conversation?

Shashi Nathan: [00:58:02] One thing that I think resonated very strongly with me during the last few months is the fact that I think many of us take a lot of things for granted. Our friends, the social groups, we keep, our colleagues, the people we deal with on a day-to-day basis. The last two and a half months, I think it's something for me. How much you missed, how much you need that day to day interaction, that exchange of ideas. It would disappear. Laughing around. All those things are important. Take on Lu-Lyn's point. Not everyone has the benefit of doing that during this period. There are people who don't have that. Friends who send you delicious food regularly or things like that. Those things. Not just for this time of the year. What we're going through, those things are meaningful. They they remind you how lucky you are that you've got good people, good friends around you. So the only thing I want to say is that when we go back, let's not forget that in those days, only in times like this, that we remember who our friends are, the relationships we have. And because if you keep that in mind and don't take it for granted, when things go back to normal, you'll appreciate those friendships. Those collaborations. Those what relationships. And you will not maybe take it for granted that we all probably have done so in the past.

Laurindo Garcia: [00:59:42] Thank you, Shashi. I mean, remembering not to take our people in our lives for granted is I think is a very good reminder is especially in times like this, and we don't want this to this period. Just to be the end of that as well. Right. So thank you. Thank you so much. How are you? Carrie, what is what is one thing that you would like our audience to to know?

Carrie Tan: [01:00:04] I think this pandemic really throws out this situation where I think more and more people in society are going to be struggling because we don't know what the economy is going to look like, and when it is going to recover. In the past and so far we we've had this, you know, unconscious narrative, of , who are the “deserving” people in in society. Whether they're deserving of help, or are they  deserving of assistance and deserving of subsidies. And I hope that in the post pandemic world, will people have or develop more empathy for, you know, the common experience of struggle. And I hope that the word deserving can be removed from our national vocabulary, because you know, everyone could fall into hard times and need help at some point. I think if we can extend our graciousness and generosity and kindness amongst those of us who can afford it and are blessed enough to be able to afford it, we could do that. And the other thing is also to look out for our neighbours instead of looking out as in like to report them. Maybe we can look out for them and see whether we can help them. So I think this is an opportunity for people to come together and we need to be very mindful of falling into a very easy and tempting ways to become blaming, which is really a crisis response, a natural human crisis response but we can catch ourselves. And instead of blaming let’s be kinder to one another.

Petrina Kow: [01:01:35] There was so clear. Thank you very much, Carrie Tan from Daughters of Tomorrow and all our other guests. Jaelle from The Great Room. Miss Chang Lu-Lyn, Shashi Nathan and of course, Miss Lou. For more information on our guests and their work, make sure to check out the Inclusively website for details. And remember to like this podcast and submit a review. Your feedback will help us improve. And it's very, very welcome. Don't get us to like us on Apple Podcasts or follow us on Spotify or YouTube for notifications when we have got new episodes out.

Laurindo Garcia: [01:02:05] Miss Lu will be sending us off today with a song. Can you give us a bit of a insight on what you'll be performing and what's the what was your inspiration for choosing the song?

Miss Lou: [01:02:15] So this song is called Fresh Air, which I think everybody sorely needs right now as we're approaching the end of the circuit breaker period. And the funny thing is that I actually wrote this at the beginning of the circuit breaker and I had a vision. I thought to myself, while we're gonna be stuck in indorse for one month. At that point, it was supposed to be a month. And I thought, well, this is something that we're all going to be craving and looking forward to. So I thought I had already written half of this song, but I completed it with this in mind. And the chorus, which you hear later says Loving you is like fresh air. And I didn't write. Being loved by you is fresh air. And it kind of reminds ourselves that ourselves that we can be that fresh air for other people. We can be the change you want to see in the world. Right. We can be the people to bring light to other people. So this is the kind of the love and the relationship and the neighborliness that we want to. Yeah. We want to bring across with this song.

Laurindo Garcia: [01:03:10] Thank you so much for that Miss Lou. I think we're all looking forward to a little bit more fresh air and a little bit more love. So that's all for our show today. Miss Lou will be taking us out. But until next time. I'm Laurindo Garcia.

Petrina Kow: [01:03:25] And I'm Petrina Kow. Thanks for listening.