Who still remembers this lion head? If you grew up in the 90s or early 2000s, you probably do. It was often found on products “Made in Singapore”. As a small nation with limited resources, we took pride in proving we could compete with the best.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Every time I return home through Changi Airport, I’m reminded of what Singapore is capable of. I can disembark, clear immigration, collect my luggage and be on my way in about 15 minutes. It feels ordinary because I got used to it, but extraordinary by global standards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That didn’t happen because we had the best procurement process or the most comprehensive governance framework. It happened because we believed Singapore could build something better than everyone expected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As organisations grew, so did the layers of process. Every failure led to another approval, another committee, another taskforce, another procurement rule, another governance framework. We became better at managing risk than creating excellence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I see this creeping in our digital services.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I find the NUHS app noticeably simpler and more intuitive than HealthHub, even though HealthHub is meant to be the national platform. Parents Gateway often sends notifications that could just as easily have been an email. There’s a separate forms service for MOE when FormsSG could have been integrated. MOE Student Learning Space (SLS) is still not an app, with various seemingly valid reasons. These aren’t major failures, but they make me wonder what question we’re optimising for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Are we asking, “what’s the best experience for citizens?”, or are we just checking boxes?<\/p>\n\n\n\n