Meet the data analyst who went from F&B to building Singapore’s digital health platform

There’s a kind of restlessness that sets when you know you’re ready for a change.

Eight years building her career in the food and beverage (F&B) sector had made Sakina competent and comfortable in her role. But comfortable wasn’t enough anymore.

With a background in project management and business strategy, she delved into data when her company sought for more data-driven insights and key performance indicators (KPI) tracking.

Between picking up tools like Tableau, data science skills through the Institute of Data's Data Science and AI Singapore Program, and taking a deliberate career break, Sakina spent her transition period retooling and reflecting.

The next opportunity revealed itself on a government careers portal. While the role was in healthcare, the skills she had spent years building were what the role required.

“I reached a point where I was ready for a new challenge. I wanted to apply my skills in service of the community in a more meaningful way,” says the now Synapxe’s Product Analyst Sakina Binte Sakdun.

She shares with GovInsider about how this career shift occurred, and how her journey in Singapore’s national healthtech agency has shifted her focus from technical outputs to delivering insightful data that creates meaningful outcomes for people.

Starting anew

Sakina joined Synapxe and stepped into the role of HealthHub’s first Product Analyst.

HealthHub is Singapore's one-stop national digital health online portal and mobile application.

She helped to build things from the ground up – establishing processes, identifying use cases, aligning stakeholders, and delivering the team’s first automated dashboard.

“To me, meaningful work is defined by continuous growth, delivering value to others and having the autonomy to execute,” she recalls.

Sitting within HealthHub’s product team, she is responsible for the project management, data analytics and even data engineering, shifting between disciplines as timelines and stakeholder priorities evolve.

“No two weeks are the same, which keeps things interesting. My work varies significantly as I wear multiple hats, handling a mix of business and technical responsibilities.

“One day I'm deep in data analysis preparing insights for stakeholders; the next I'm planning project scope and requirements with the development team. I also spend time building data pipelines and designing data warehouse structures,” shares Sakina.

Getting there took time. Having not actively sought out healthcare, Sakina found the ecosystem daunting at first.

“It wasn’t just about understanding the technology. I had to grasp the regulatory environment, identify key stakeholders, and see how everything interconnected,” she says, adding that Synapxe’s onboarding programme helped her find her footing and her place in the larger picture.

Taking on new projects

One of the most significant projects that Sakina has been involved in is the ongoing effort to unify multiple cluster healthcare apps into a single unified platform by 2027.

“The first task for me was accessing and consolidating all the data,” she explains.

With information spread across multiple systems, getting a complete and accurate picture required close coordination across the different teams.

Once the data foundation was established, the process of mapping user journeys could then start, by tracking how users moved between the different healthcare apps.

“These insights fed back into our unification strategy,” says Sakina.

It is this evidence-based, user-centric approach that makes good digital government innovation and delivers tangible benefits to citizens.

“Previously, I was focused on creating dashboards and technical solutions for business needs. Now, I'm constantly thinking about the potential impact on millions of people's healthcare experiences,” Sakina says.

Scale changes everything

The career shift also brought a different pace and scale of changes with every project.

To create real impact within a large, complex system like public healthcare, she realises the importance of zooming out and see how each individual’s work contributes to the bigger picture.

“I focus on what I can control and produce consistently useful work that helps stakeholders make better decisions.

“Small, reliable contributions build the trust and credibility that eventually create space for bigger changes.”

Whether it is tracking a user’s journey or providing insights that shape policy, every piece contributes to the goal of fostering a healthier nation, she adds.

“A dashboard I build today helps teams make better decisions immediately, which then improves processes that touch millions of users subsequently. Each analysis contributes to the bigger vision while creating tangible wins along the way,” says Sakina.

If you’re on the fence…

For anyone sitting in a role while feeling a pull towards something more purposeful, Sakina says: “Don't ignore that quiet pull – it exists for a reason”.

Her experience proves that skills are often transferable, and experience in different sectors can contribute to fresher perspectives and new ideas.

“Fresh perspectives can lead to solutions that might not be obvious to those who have always worked in the same industry," she says, adding that her previous experience helped her tackle healthcare challenges in innovative ways.

“The skills you have built are more transferable than you think, and it is never too late to start, so don’t be afraid to take that step towards change. You never know where that leap might take you!” she says.