CAL has been awarded the Charity Governance Award by the Charity Council! This is the highest honour for a charity, and we were one of the three recognised for highest standards of governance. Also awarded to CAL was the Charity Transparency Award for transparency and good disclosure practices.
Tim Lee, Executive Director, shared his view of what good governance is all about:
“In my opinion, good governance is primarily about People.
It is about the people who govern as members of the board and the qualities, discernment, wisdom and commitment that they bring to the table.
It is also about people who serve as leaders and managers in the organisation and how responsible, and devoted they are, and their integrity, accountability and transparency.
Good governance is also about the people who worked in the organisation and whether they find meaning in what they do such that they will seek to do their best and be responsible to do what is right to ensure that the organisation will grow and will be sustainable so that it meet the needs of those that are being served by the organisation.
For CAL, other than the Board Members, the Management Team and the staff, there is another group of People that support good governance in CAL. CAL is blessed with good volunteers – we have many more eyes, many more voices and many more hands that are helping to serve the needs of our beneficiaries. They hold us accountable with their feedback and we have to be very transparent and responsive with them because we interact with them very frequently and very closely as we serve together.”
Mr. Chew Sutat, Board Chairman of CAL, also found that having a large number of caregivers continuing on as volunteers with the organisation have increased the understanding, knowledge and support for the cause of mental health and caregiving in Singapore.
With this national recognition, CAL hopes to continue to maintain the trust of caregivers of persons with mental health issues as well as agencies that would like to partner with CAL for services related to caregiving and mental health. Most importantly, CAL hopes that this award can spur more to step forward to seek support through our services amidst the strong stigma related to mental health issues.
Read more about the Charity Transparency and Governance Awards here: http://cta-cga.sg/