Commencement Guest Speaker: Mr. Chin Chi Leong

Speech by Mr Chin Chi Leong, Deputy Chief Executive Officer, BUILDING AND CONSTRUCTION AUTHORITY at the National University of Singapore, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering Commencement Cermony on 29 June 2021

Prof Aaron Thian, Dean of Engineering, Prof Richard Liew, Head, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering,Distinguished Guests,Parents and Graduates

I am honoured to have been invited to speak to you on this important day of your lives.  Congratulations to all of you.  Well done!

Let us take a moment to acknowledge the people who have worked with you and supported you to make this possible.  The faculty and staff who have created the conducive learning atmosphere for you to get here.  And, also, your loved ones who have supported you through these past years.  Do show them your appreciation.

I would like to cover two areas in my speech, which I think would be relevant for you.  Firstly, the Built Environment Landscape and Opportunities in the industry.  The past year has been challenging for all.  The construction sector was hard hit as a large proportion of the sectors’ workers were unable to work, impeding progress at many sites. Even as the sector recovers, it will have to adjust to working in a new norm.  While we will have to bite the bullet and ride through tough times, the challenges will also bring new opportunities to speed up transformation in the sector, which in turn will be opportunities for you.  Let me elaborate in the areas of technology adoption & evolving engineering landscapes.

The BE sector has seen great strides in the use of new technology in making our work more efficient.  It has embraced Design for Manufacturing and Assembly in the past few years, where our HDB flats and Condominiums are being assembled like Lego blocks, with many of the preparatory and finishing works done in factories.  We are also pushing our buildings to be more environmentally sustainable, through the Green Mark recognition scheme for buildings and through more Super Low Energy buildings in Singapore.  The sector has also embraced Building Information Modelling, a tool that helps us visualize the entire building process and plan better. These are just some of the exciting technological innovations that await you.

In this new norm, we will need better tech tools, data and video analytics tools, that will help us better manage our manpower deployment.  The CEE graduates that work in the sector today, therefore cannot look upon yourselves as going about our work in the traditional way.  We will have to continually look at smarter ways to improve our work.  The graduating class is definitely a more tech savvy group as compared to my peers and me.  Therefore, I urge you to rise to the challenge of transforming our BE sector, and change the way we build!

Our graduates, today, will face a different engineering landscape as Singapore develops and matures.  Singapore is already a densely built up city.  As we continue to plan for our live, work and play areas, we will find that we will have to go higher and deeper and explore how we can make better use of our waterways.  Even as we build more MRT lines, our tunnels are getting closer to each other.  In addition, our engineers will also have to tackle the issues of ageing infrastructure and resilience of our buildings against climate change.  Coastal protection has been a hot topic of late.  And, making buildings more energy efficient alongside advancing our water sustainability will continue to be important considerations.  To tackle all these challenges, we will need a strong engineering core and future graduates, like you, will enjoy different challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.

Let me move on to the second area I wish to share.  You as an engineer.   It is worthwhile to consider your ambitions and path in the next 5 years. I encourage all of you to develop deeper engineering knowledge in the early years of your working life.  It would stand you in good stead, whatever path you may take in the future.  For some, you may want to be a Professional Engineer or Specialist Professional Engineer and go deeper in your craft.  In this regard, I would encourage you to keep your options open and do pursue the Professional Engineers Board’s FEE examinations if you have yet to do so!  This is a no regret move, even if you do branch off into other areas of work.

As engineers, it is also important for you to keep abreast of developments in the field and continue to upgrade yourselves through the many continuing professional development courses offered by the Universities and the technical bodies, including the IES Academy and BCA Academy.  Oftentimes, we always put this aside as we find ourselves caught up in our work, I would say to our detriment.  I have found that my engineering colleagues who continue to hone their knowledge through learning or research projects have come up better in terms of their performance as they progress in their careers.

Before I end, I would like to share a quote by the 31^st President of the United States, Herbert Hoover.  “There is the fascination of watching a figment of the imagination emerge through the aid of science to a plan on paper.  Then it moves to the realization in stone or metal or energy.  Then it brings jobs and homes to men.  Then it elevates the standards of living and adds to the comforts of life.  That is the engineer’s high privilege.”  Your skillset as an engineer, to actualize the design of buildings and systems, is invaluable.  It’s the engineer’s honour to bring about great positivity to society through his or her good work.  And that is the tall order for all of you, civil and environmental graduates, sitting here today, to fill.

And with that, I would like to once again congratulate the class of 2020 & 2021 on your graduation today.

Thank you.