Grindsets
The business moves of Singapore's brightest minds.
Articles in Series
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Running On Empty: The Junior Lawyer
“You can actually go to court, and change a person’s life.” A once fresh-faced junior lawyer joined Singapore’s judicial system with big dreams of helping people, but ended up helpless in her own mental breakdown. The crushing demands of being a lawyer are widely known, but what pushed
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Can The Four-Day Workweek Really Work? Candlenut Says ‘Yes’
This article is part of our series on burnout and work culture, Running on Empty. Stay tuned for the next video episode coming later this month. Images by Zachary Tang save where otherwise stated. It was October 2016, and Malcolm Lee was meant to be having the time of his life. His restaurant, Candl
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Meet Beckie, The Swimwear Designer Who Left Singapore For the Surf Life in Bali
Immigration has become a hot topic in recent months. But thus far, the discussion has largely centered around foreigners that choose to come to Singapore. But what about the other side of the picture? In this ‘Singaporeans Abroad’ series, we share with you the stories of locals who—thanks to l
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The Fix for Burnout: Knowing When to Ditch What’s No Longer Working
This article is part of our new series on burnout, Running on Empty. Watch the third video in the series here. The latest episode in our series Running on Empty documents the plight of Matt Oon: a start-up founder with a bad case of burnout. To be frank, the future doesn’t look
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The Rise of Alternative Careers
When circuit breaker kicked in last year, thousands of people across all sectors lost their jobs, with the F&B industry in particular taking a big hit. This led to many people breaking into burgeoning food-based alternative industries such as home businesses and even farming. In this explaine
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Fixing Burnout Starts With Fixing Organisational Failures, Not Employees
This article is part of our new series on burnout, Running on Empty. Watch the second video in the series here. Images by Liang Jin Tey/RICE file photos. Earlier this month, one of my colleagues wrote an op-ed arguing that the cure for burnout is to lower one’s expectations. He made a lot of good
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The Cure for Work Burnout Is Lower Expectations
All photography used in this article was taken from the trailer of RICE’s upcoming video series WORKISM. All images were shot by Feline Lim and Zachary Tang for RICE Media. A few years ago, a Singaporean friend of mine, Patricia, quit her job in finance and moved to the Taiwanese c
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The LOLs and Loneliness of Being Lola, The OnlyFans Girl
All images by Zachary Tang; screenshots from Lola's Instagram. Thousands of people know what Lola Woo looks like semi-naked, but there's much more to her they haven't seen. Here are some things I’ve learned about her, better known as beforeiko to her legions of followers (and not a few lurke
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Competitive Eater to Hotel Chef: An Appetite for Food Sustainability
We follow professional eater Zermatt Neo as he trades his huge appetite for a stint in the kitchen with Chef Wong, Fairmont Hotel’s Executive Chef. There, he learns what it takes to cook in a professional, sustainability-focused kitchen with a secret farm.
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These Businesses Were Hit Hard During Covid-19, Yet They Made Time For Good
Most of us, at least once in our lives, have doubted the authenticity of businesses and their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) shenanigans. Personally, I’ve always assumed that a company’s CSR activities operate mostly as peripheral functions—more often than not, lacklustre one-off events
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Can You Build A Business, Raise a Family, and Find Your Life’s Purpose? Female Entrepreneurs Say Yes
What does true work-life balance look like? For Ijah, it looks like this: Each day, around 5 AM, she helps her husband prepare for work while simultaneously rolling popiahs for her home-based business. Ijah does not like her kids starting off their day by waking up to a mess, so she rememb
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How One Woman Ushered in a Culture of Doing Good at This Five-Star Hotel
This is the story of how a visit by a group of boys from low-income backgrounds helped change the culture at a five-star heritage hotel. For Cathy Chia, 33, Director of Corporate Communications at The Fullerton Hotels and Resorts, a community outreach event that was supposed to give these youths
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Meet Wendy Ong, The Singaporean Woman Who Manages Hollywood’s Biggest Stars
Top image: Wendy Ong and Dua Lipa. Photos courtesy of Wendy Ong. Immigration has become a hot topic in recent months. But thus far, the discussion has largely centered around foreigners that choose to come to Singapore. But what about the other side of the picture? In this ‘Singaporeans Abroad’
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How To Make Money Playing Video Games—For Other People
Illustrations and infographic by Ansh Sirohi Every day, ‘Number 7’, 21, wakes up at noon. He cooks and eats lunch with his family before heading off to work—at the World’s Edge. No travel is required. World’s Edge is a map in Apex Legends, and Number 7 is an account booster for heroboos
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Extreme Upskilling: How a Med Student Completed 100 Certification Courses in 73 Days
All images courtesy of Nadine Villaret. Note: In light of many of us receiving our SkillsFuture credits by 1 Oct 2020 (and for some 31 Dec 2020), the following account is part of RICE’s Extreme Upskilling series, where we speak with an individual who has gone above and beyond the norm in what w
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These 21-Year-Olds Started, Of All Things, A Tuition Centre. Here’s Why It Was Worth The Risk
All images by RICE / Thaddeus Loh. As of 2020, there are more than 1000 tuition centres in Singapore. One of them is The Fine Minds (TFM), run by a group of 21-year-olds, dedicated to teaching secondary school students. Warren and Jin Xuan met during their time in NS, and started to think of w
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How One Man Failed To Do His Homework, And Accidentally Reshaped Hospitality
Today, it is impossible to imagine Phuket without its legions of holiday-makers, lounging on the beach with coconuts in hand. Before the 20th century however, you might be surprised to learn that Phuket was more Ipoh than Bali. The island’s main source of income came from tin-mining, not tour
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4 Self Development Books To Read Today, Ranked By A Psychologist
‘Upgrade yourself.’ ‘Never stop learning. ‘Better your life.’ Growing up, these slogans nagged at us at every milestone. When we finish school, go to university, change jobs or … live through a pandemic, we’re told to one-up for the competitive future. I used to think improving
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“There’s Nothing to Lose”: Why Two 21-Year-Olds Set Up Their Own Vintage Clothing Store
All images by Thaddeus Loh for RICE Media. “When I interned at Bosch during poly, I felt so lost in the hundreds and thousands of people, and I just did the same thing every day,” Gayle laments, “Being my own boss … I don’t feel like a slave to anyone.” She’s 21 years old this ye
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How Becoming A Cam Girl Freed This Singaporean Woman Of Her Self-Esteem Issues
Everyday at around noon, Dana sits in her bedroom and starts a live show for her fans. There’s a routine to it: Dana announces when she will go live on her social media channels a few hours early, she sets up her iPhone and a ring light in her bedroom, and voilà—dozens of viewers join her strea
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How Do You Move A Cinema Online? For The Projector, It Starts With Community
All images courtesy of The Projector. “How do you translate community during a shutdown?” Karen, one of the co-founders of The Projector, echoes my question, more to herself than to me. There’s a long pause. “It’s hard.” Nearly three weeks have gone by since the entertainm
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Meet The Singaporean Woman Who Went From Corporate HR To Selling Sex Toys
Images by Marisse Caine. “Since this virus outbreak, I have been so busy,” Janice tells me as we sit down for a chat in her home. Finding the time for the interview amid this pandemic was not easy—she has been getting plenty of new clients looking for new ways to fill their days.
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2 Weeks of WFH Convinced Me That This Is The Future Of Work in Singapore
Top image: Zachary Tang. I’m writing this while lying in bed, still in my pyjamas (it’s 4:26 PM, if you’re wondering), and have just farted, which has earned me a disapproving stare from my dog. You can say I’m living the life. Because of COVID-19, the RICE editorial team, like employ
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The Road to the Singaporean Dream: Blue-collar Edition
Images: Zachary Tang. This is the fourth in a series of stories told to us by Singaporeans from varying walks of life. The process was simple: meet someone on the street and spend time with them talking about life. Singaporeans often think other Singaporeans are boring, but everyone has a story
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Inside the Brain of A Pawnshop Owner
All images by Zachary Tang. Living in Singapore is expensive. The cost of education is increasing. The Goods and Services Tax (GST) is continually going up. Public transport fare hikes have made getting around more expensive than ever. Car? Sorry, can’t afford it. The money crunch gets wo
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A Diamond Business? In This Economy? Meet the Millennial Who Dreamt Big—and Achieved It
All images courtesy of LUXIEE. Diamonds are a girl’s best friend, so goes the iconic tune from the1950s. But this is 2019, so they are also LUXIEE founder, Nicholas Lim’s. Marrying the ease of online retail, the impatience of the modern shopper, and the flexibility that millennials desir
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Who Does M Ravi, Crusader For The Condemned, Think He Is?
M Ravi's public image has been defined by his mental health struggles as much as his unusual client list in his time as a human rights lawyer: underdogs, drug traffickers on death row, and people who've pissed the government off. News of his death this morning is tragic. This 2019 profile reflects on the tensions that shaped his life, his work, and the seeds of his persistence.
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10 Questions with Addynna Azlinor, One of Singapore’s Next Generation of Leather Artisans
(All images courtesy of ForestChild.com) Once upon a time in Singapore, craftsmen/women were the beating heart of local consumerism. There were no megamalls in which you could buy stuff “off the rack” from one of the many shops. Back then, if you wanted something, chances were you’d ha
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Money Bootcamp: How Did This 21-year-old Start A Business Right After He ORD-ed?
Welcome to Money Bootcamp, where we help our readers reach their personal goals by putting them through a rigorous financial transformation. Our third intrepid spender/saver is Seah Pei Song, a 21-year-old university student who managed to save up enough money to start his own business last year
