How Tay Ling Contributed His Expertise to a Cause Close to His Heart | Swire Trust Go-Givers of 2021

Together with Time Auction, the Swire Trust Go-Givers Program encourages skilled volunteers for Swire Trust NGOs partners from 2020 to 2022. 10 outstanding volunteers will be selected annually as the “Swire Trust Go-Givers of the Year” with special rewards & recognition. Meet our 10 Go-Givers of 2021!

Meet Tay Ling!

Tay Ling is Vice President of The Pico Group - an international brand activation agency, leading the regional team to empower brands with engagement, experience design, and digital enablement across North Asia. 

Before moving to Hong Kong, he was an entrepreneur in Singapore, who ran his own marketing agency. Having amassed expertise across entrepreneurship, marketing, and engineering, he wanted to make a positive impact on society.

Prior to learning about Time Auction, Tay Ling had already immersed himself in skilled volunteering, remarking that “volunteering was a great way for me to expand my portfolio.” During his time as an entrepreneur in Singapore, he volunteered for multiple organizations, such as The Singapore Disability Sports Council, Samaritans of Singapore (SOS), and the Physical Disability Council, to name a few. He is currently volunteering for Gay Games 11 Hong Kong, as a Marketing and HR Business Partner. Skilled volunteering has long been a habit of his. 

As a longtime fan of Sammi Cheng, Tay Ling instantly registered to be our skilled-volunteer after coming across our mentorship event with Sammi. “I never knew that there are incentives for volunteering, let alone opportunities to meet such inspiring icons and leaders!”

Volunteering For a Cause Close to His Heart

As a dog parent of three, Tay Ling is passionate about animal welfare. With long-term aspirations to one day start an animal shelter, rescuing and helping stray animals, he immediately signed up for the volunteer opportunity with Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) on our platform and matched with them as a Graphic Designer! 

Tay Ling’s responsibility was to help with SPCA’s 100th Anniversary campaign and education programme. What better way to gain insight into the operations of a shelter, than by volunteering for an animal welfare charity?

Well equipped with his professional experience and clear guidelines from SPCA, Tay Ling planned and created marketing materials and collateral for their 100th Anniversary campaign. As an experienced marketing professional, he proposed several concepts and creative options for the organization to review, showcasing the impact generated by SPCA in previous years. 

Here are some fantastic campaigns created by Tay Ling, (which you might have seen on trams and in MTR stations!): 

“The key to volunteerism is that in helping others, you help yourself.”

Skilled Volunteering is a great way to explore your other talents and skills, expanding your portfolio, whilst helping others. Volunteering will offer skills that can be used throughout career development. Through volunteering for SPCA, Tay Ling learnt more about the organization and its operations, which helped him gain experience and insights towards his future shelter project, taking a step closer to fulfilling his aspirations.

Congratulations on Tay Ling’s Well-Deserved Recognition!

"Tay is very professional and easy to work with. After my briefing to Tay for developing a key visual for our 100th Anniversary, I was really impressed that Tay has promptly shared his proposed concept and creative options for my review. He’s open to fine-tune the creative upon receipt of feedback, and helped to adapt the creative to different required formats. Really appreciate Tay’s timely support for developing our 100th Anniversary collaterals, and thanks to Time Auction."

— Olive Lau, SPCA

Being selected of the ten Swire Trust Go-Givers of the year, came as a big surprise for Tay Ling, as he never volunteered in the hopes of any return. “I immediately texted my wife about it, when I received the email!”

He feels that the award is very empowering for the volunteers, knowing that their work is recognized. “Thank you Time Auction and The Swire Group Charitable Trust for the initiative to encourage more people to volunteer their skills, and help out more NGOs in need!”

Last but not least, Tay Ling offers his words of encouragement to the people who have doubts about whether or not volunteering is right for them- “volunteer now, it doesn’t take much for anyone to volunteer”. 

Volunteering your time, skills, and resources is one of the most powerful ways to make a difference, and as it turns out, is just as rewarding for you, as to those you are helping!

Thank you so much to Tay Ling for contributing 26 volunteer hours at SPCA and more to come!

To see details of the Swire Trust Go-Givers Program and support their NGOs partners, head over to Time Auction website.

Interviewed & written by Leo Chick | Edited by Emma Lascelles