IMPACT 0483: STARTING A BUSINESS WITH A PURPOSE TO MAKE AN IMPACT IN THE DIGITAL WORLD

Wong Wing Lum, 24, works at Hatch, an impact-driven startup with the mission to make digital and design accessible for all. She has been actively volunteering her time in various causes, ranging from children and migrants to elderly poverty and animals.

Her passion lies in making a meaningful difference in whatever she chooses to pursue, no matter the cause she finds herself working on. She shares more about what she does at Hatch and her journey thus far.

At Hatch, we offer training programmes in digital and design via Hatch Academy and provide digitalisation services for small and medium-sized organisations through Hatch Mediahouse. We primarily work with at-risk youth in our Flagship Academy impact program called Immersive+, where we train them in either Digital Marketing or User Interface and User Experience (UI/UX) before sending them to work attachments.

I first joined Hatch as a content writer, where I wrote informative guides on digital, design and careers, as well as took care of any publicity-related affairs. I was part of the earlier phase of Hatch’s work and had the opportunity of building marketing and operating systems to help scale the team. I have gone on to manage the company’s overall marketing, content and branding strategy. A huge part of my job is to unearth stories of members from the Hatch community – which includes students and graduates, as well as our impact ecosystem of youth agents (people who work with youth), partners, mentors and trainers.

Being able to capture the stories and journeys of those in our community always leaves me in awe of their exceptional resilience and kindness. It keeps me humble and grounded, as well as motivated to do more to give back.

My parents have always made it a point to instill the value of giving in my siblings and I when we were growing up. Despite not having a lot, they always tried their best to be kind towards those in need. They reminded us of the difference we can make, no matter how big or small our actions were.

I threw myself into all types of volunteering opportunities whenever possible. It wasn’t so much that I gravitated towards a specific cause, I just wanted to contribute in areas where I could make a meaningful difference.

Learning about Hatch just as I was graduating was a stroke of timely good fortune. Their work spoke to me instantly and I wanted to join the team of young, driven and passionate individuals who were all purpose aligned in helping at-risk youth take charge of their future and move up the social mobility ladder.

As I moved to a job role that deals with more macro and long-term strategic planning, there is a trade-off with some parts that I cherish most from the job – that is, having less time to be able to be on the ground and actively engaging members of our community. How I overcome this is to recognise the greater good that comes out of it. In the grand scheme of things, having a more strategic focus towards wider publicity for the company helps to scale our impact. With more eyeballs and people who know what we do, more prospective learners can enter our community and more collective impact is achieved in that sense.

If you’re looking to enter the social sector, don’t get too hung up about doing meaningful work in the conventional sense. Impact is everywhere, and it’s up to you to define what’s important to you.

I hope to see Hatch continue scaling and possibly curate programmes to include new impact groups, such as people with disabilities or special needs – I hope to be part of this to capture their journeys and inspire hope. On the side, I want to pick up more skills and knowledge, and funnel them into causes for good.