Reflection on the Mapletree challenge Forum

Honestly, I was not keen to attend the forum. Once the panel started, I did not feel the need to leave as soon as possible like the most forum I attended to previously. The panellists were remarkable in their enthusiasm and the messages they were putting across the auditorium. One could not help but learn something in the forum. There was a variety of keen and experienced personnel sharing their expertise and lessons learned.

I always had the impression that entrepreneurship and sustainability could never find common ground. As the foremost is to exploit opportunity brought by change and not something which causes change. Whereas, sustainability is something that brings about change that acts towards nature and how it is responsible to others and the future.

By marrying both concepts, we are urging business to look further than mere financial performance as a core purpose but also in term of social and environmental sustainability.  This development ensures both the needs of the present-day without compromising for future generations.

Each panellist shared their own sets of challenges and solutions they sought after. One such example I would like to highlight is Mr Shamir Rahim the Founder and CEO of VersaFleet Pte Ltd. He found a lucrative solution which resolved the need to spend substantial amount man-hours to schedule the delivery routes to each driver. Moreover, the solution reduced the carbon footprint of the lorries by routing an effective route with a need for lesser lorries which allowed better use of the resources in other avenues which were not possible previously.

I also learned from all the panellists that entrepreneurship is a mindset (As mentioned by Ms Ling, "fire in the belly") that is one of the central sustainable business practices. There is always a need for constant hunger for innovative ways to protect the environment or improve social conditions by providing a product/solution while also making profits to sustain the business. Individuals who have this mindset is always doing things in new and improved ways, entrepreneurship is highly appropriate to them.

I would like to thank the organisers of the Mappletree challenge for organising this fruitful forum and Professor Blackstone in suggesting our class to attend this forum. I would want to end my reflection with a quote from Mr Jack Ma, Founder of Alibaba, related to this topic “the last century, if you wanna grow, you should find a good opportunity. However, today, if you want to be a great company, think about what social problem you could solve.”.

Commented of Baizurah, Lu Sheng and Jayce on 31 March 2019.