Vanessa Audris Lim, Assistant Director, Learning & Organisational Development, Centre for Healthcare Innovation, NHG Health, Singapore

1) What does public service mean to you? Can you share more about your role in the public sector?

Public service, to me, is what the name entails, being in service to the public, and to the greater good.  

It requires thinking beyond individual roles and considering the larger system we are part of. This inevitably introduces complexity, because the needs we are responding to are interconnected, evolving, and often without clear boundaries.  

In this context, public service is not just about delivering solutions, but about shaping systems so that better outcomes can emerge consistently.

Delivering solutions is essential, people need tangible improvements, and action cannot wait. At the same time, I have found that the effectiveness of any solution depends heavily on the conditions it lands in.  

I work in the Centre for Healthcare Innovation (CHI), NHG Health, within Singapore’s public healthcare system, where my role sits at the intersection of leadership, learning, and system transformation.

The focus is on how we build the conditions that enable innovation and change to take root across the healthcare system.

Much of my work involves designing experiences that help leaders and teams make sense of complexity, see patterns more clearly, and act more adaptively in their contexts.  

2) Tell us about a project you championed. What impact did it have on the community?

One way this shows up in my work through developing and applying a “conditions for innovation” lens across our organisation.  

Rather than starting with solutions, we focus on understanding the conditions shaping how people think, collaborate, and act, such as clarity of direction, quality of relationships access to resources, and how learning and experimentation are enabled.  

In a recent engagement with colleagues across healthcare institutions, we designed a session to surface where work was getting stuck, where ideas slow down, stall or lose momentum.

Instead of immediately solving these issues, we guide participants to diagnose what underlying conditions are contributing to these patterns.   

This does not produce a single solution. Instead, it created a different way for teams to see their work, surfacing shared patterns of friction and helping them look beyond surface-level problems. 

Conversations begin to shift from “what should we do?” to “what is actually happening, and what is shaping it?”, opening up more deliberate ways of thinking about how to move forward.   

In my experience, it is not solutions or conditions alone, it is both, together. Solutions create movement, but conditions determine whether that movement sustains.

Over time, this builds stronger capacity within the system to respond to challenges, rather than relying on one-off fixes.  

3) As a young professional, how has your unique background or perspective allowed you to identify a solution that others in your organisation might have overlooked?

I tend to pay attention less to individual problems and more to patterns in how people interact and make decisions.  

In many organisations, there is a strong bias towards solving visible issues quickly. However, similar challenges often re-occur because the underlying conditions have not changed.  

By focusing on these patterns, how decisions are made, how information flows, and where trust is strong or weak, it becomes more possible to identify leverage points that are less obvious, but more impactful over time.  

4) What is your personal strategy for maintaining your creative energy when faced with bureaucracy?

I try not to see bureaucracy as something to work against, but as a signal of underlying constraints in the system.  

Policies and processes often exist to manage risk, ensure accountability, or maintain consistency. Instead of resisting them outright, I find it more useful to understand what they are protecting and then explore how to work within or around those constraints.  

This allows me to stay constructive and focused, and often opens up more creative ways forward.  

5) If you had just one area to invest in to accelerate transformation in the public sector (regulation, technology, talent, etc.), which one would you choose and why?

I would invest in strengthening how we learn and make sense of complex situations as a system, particularly our capacity for inquiry and curiosity.  

Many transformation efforts focus on introducing new technologies or structures. While these are important, their effectiveness depends on how people interpret and use them.

Too often, we prioritise answers over understanding, which can lead to repeated cycles of effort without meaningful change.  

Building a stronger culture of inquiry, where people are encouraged to ask better questions, challenge assumptions, and stay with complexity long enough to understand it before acting, creates a different foundation for action.

It allows teams to see patterns more clearly and respond more thoughtfully.  

I believe this is what enables both solutions and strategies to take root and evolve meaningfully over time. 

6) What is your greatest ambition as you grow in your public service career?

I would like to build systems where good thinking and adaptive action are part of how the system works and not just dependent on a few individuals.  

This means creating environments where people are able to make sense of complexity, work across boundaries, and take thoughtful action, consistently and collectively.  

7) What is a “universal value” that connects everyone in your department – from interns to directors – and how do you use that to drive collaboration?

Where I am, a shared commitment to improving health for all is something that cuts across all roles and levels.  

Even when there are differences in perspectives or priorities, this common intent provides a grounding point. In my work, I often return to this shared purpose to anchor conversations, especially when navigating disagreements or trade-offs.  

By keeping the focus on what we are collectively trying to enable at a system level, it becomes easier to move beyond individual positions and work more constructively together.  

8) What is the best piece of advice you’ve got for the next generation of public servants?

Don’t rush to prove your value through solutions. 

Spend time understanding what is really happening in the system, the patterns, constraints and relationships that shape outcomes. This often requires patience, but it leads to more meaningful and sustainable change.  

9) What is a myth you wish to debunk about young public servants?

A common myth is that younger officers lack experience and should therefore focus mainly on execution.  

I believe that younger officers often bring a different kind of value. Because they are less shaped by established ways of thinking, they can more readily see patterns, question assumptions, and imagine possibilities before they are narrowed by existing ways of thinking.  

This does not replace experience but complements it. When combined well, experience provides depth and judgement, while younger perspectives open new ways of seeing and acting. 

10) Write a letter to your future self in 2035. Please keep it within 200 words.

I hope you are still asking good questions.  

I imagine you are still open, still curious, and still allowing your thinking to evolve. I hope you haven’t lost your sense of awe, at how complex and beautifully connected everything is.  

I hope you’re still learning. Not just in the formal sense, but in the way you notice, make sense and continue to grow through the work and the people around you.  

And I hope you remember you were never meant to do this alone. That the work has always been about finding others, learning with them, and moving together.  

Don’t forget to notice the small shifts, the conversations that changed how someone saw a problem, the moments where a team chose to act differently.  

Change is already happening.  

The story was made possible due a partnership with the CHI FLYING (Future Leaders and Young INnovators Guild) Network, hosted by NHG Health's Centre for Healthcare Innovation, with over 300 members connecting young health and social care leaders across Singapore and beyond.