Tan Chuan-Jin

Tan Chuan-Jin

Entrepreneur and Advisor

Tan Chuan-Jin believes people, not systems, are the real constraint on any transformation effort, digital or otherwise. Get the capacity-building and people dimension right, he argues, and organisations become far better equipped to solve the harder, domain-specific problems in front of them, from digital marketing to workforce transformation. He calls this the “heartware” dimension, and has spent his working life studying how to unlock it — from coordinating Singapore’s humanitarian response to the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami to building teams inside a fast-scaling fintech business today.

He is an entrepreneur with businesses spanning payments fintech, data centers, and leadership training, and advises companies across sectors internationally. He previously served as Speaker of Parliament of Singapore, a Cabinet Minister, Deputy Chairman of Mandai Wildlife Reserve, President of the Singapore National Olympic Council, and a Brigadier-General in the Singapore Armed Forces, experience that spans government, policy, military, and business at scale.

At this event, his starting point is that if you get the people part right, the digital marketing solutions will follow. Not the other way around.