"What does great-uncle do on the Board of Willing Hearts?" my daughter asked.

Well - most of the time, if you're on the board of a non-profit, you're raising money.

"What is a non-profit?" she asks.

Oh my goodness, have I failed as a VC if my 9 year old doesn't know what profit is? I hastily explained the waterfall from revenue, to COGS, Opex, and finally profit.

"Ok, but then how does a non-profit work?"

People can do things for non-profit oriented reasons. Charities can run at breakeven, and even at a loss, if they are able to raise to cover the shortfall. Not everything has to have a profit motive, in fact many things that we value in society are not necessarily driven by profit. Art, music, community spirit, etc.

We spent the morning of Dec 31st at Willing Hearts, a local charity organization that delivers 10k meals a day to low-income, vulnerable Singaporeans. When I told my helper where we were going, she was incredulous, "There are people without food, in Singapore?" It's a fair question. We've built a city where poverty is mostly invisible—no tent encampments, no obvious homelessness. But 10,000 meals a day tells a different story.

The kids were immediately put to work opening instant noodle packets and peeling potatoes. K and I were led into the kitchen where we began scrubbing industrial-sized pots, pans and serving trays. Then we were handed eight legs of lamb and instructed to slice them up so they could be turned into satay. I love satay but have never actually made them from scratch before - it's harder than it looks to thread the meat onto sticks! Before you knew it, we'd prepared and packed 300 meals. "Willing Hearts is hard work" said the 6 year old. The kids lasted about 2.5 hours, and were taken to an early lunch by my uncle and parents while K and I finished packing meals.

It's a pretty impressive operation they have running, with <20 FTEs and most of the food donated. The cooks are FTEs and they use volunteers for chopping, packing, and delivery. They get pretty creative with the meals. At one point I saw a stack of chorizo and dry saucisson and wondered how it would be served. Fried rice, of course! We wandered past boxes of scones, rice, baby formula. All neatly organized and waiting to be transformed into delicious meals.

I used to think it was probably more effective for me to give money than spend 4 hours chopping vegetables, but I've come to believe it's a "yes, and..." situation. Those of us who can afford to give money should definitely do it, AND we should roll up our sleeves. We have to push ourselves to get out of our bubbles. Willing Hearts is non-denominational—we passed symbols of multiple religions around the facility. There's something fitting about that: feeding people is universal.

With so many causes one can give to, how do we narrow the list? For our family, it starts with values—what do we want to model for the kids? Food security felt tangible, local, and easy to explain. Then there's the boring-but-important question: is this organization well-run? Willing Hearts operates on fewer than 20 staff, most food is donated, and their financials are public. That matters. You can see the financials for all IPCs at https://www.charities.gov.sg/ which gives a sense of expense ratio, headcount, and how the government rates their operations.

If you're interested in volunteering, details here: https://willinghearts.org.sg/. Also consider donating to them, they are a registered IPC and eligible for the tax-deduction. We will definitely be back - the 9 year old wanted to return the very next day, for the 5am shift. I told her that was going to be challenging for her parents, given that it would be New Year's Day.

"What does great-uncle do on the Board of Willing Hearts?" my daughter asked.

Well - most of the time, if you're on the board of a non-profit, you're raising money.

"What is a non-profit?" she asks.

Oh my goodness, have I failed as a VC if my 9 year old doesn't know what profit is? I hastily explained the waterfall from revenue, to COGS, Opex, and finally profit.

"Ok, but then how does a non-profit work?"

People can do things for non-profit oriented reasons. Charities can run at breakeven, and even at a loss, if they are able to raise to cover the shortfall. Not everything has to have a profit motive, in fact many things that we value in society are not necessarily driven by profit. Art, music, community spirit, etc.

We spent the morning of Dec 31st at Willing Hearts, a local charity organization that delivers 10k meals a day to low-income, vulnerable Singaporeans. When I told my helper where we were going, she was incredulous, "There are people without food, in Singapore?" It's a fair question. We've built a city where poverty is mostly invisible—no tent encampments, no obvious homelessness. But 10,000 meals a day tells a different story.

The kids were immediately put to work opening instant noodle packets and peeling potatoes. K and I were led into the kitchen where we began scrubbing industrial-sized pots, pans and serving trays. Then we were handed eight legs of lamb and instructed to slice them up so they could be turned into satay. I love satay but have never actually made them from scratch before - it's harder than it looks to thread the meat onto sticks! Before you knew it, we'd prepared and packed 300 meals. "Willing Hearts is hard work" said the 6 year old. The kids lasted about 2.5 hours, and were taken to an early lunch by my uncle and parents while K and I finished packing meals.

It's a pretty impressive operation they have running, with <20 FTEs and most of the food donated. The cooks are FTEs and they use volunteers for chopping, packing, and delivery. They get pretty creative with the meals. At one point I saw a stack of chorizo and dry saucisson and wondered how it would be served. Fried rice, of course! We wandered past boxes of scones, rice, baby formula. All neatly organized and waiting to be transformed into delicious meals.

I used to think it was probably more effective for me to give money than spend 4 hours chopping vegetables, but I've come to believe it's a "yes, and..." situation. Those of us who can afford to give money should definitely do it, AND we should roll up our sleeves. We have to push ourselves to get out of our bubbles. Willing Hearts is non-denominational—we passed symbols of multiple religions around the facility. There's something fitting about that: feeding people is universal.

With so many causes one can give to, how do we narrow the list? For our family, it starts with values—what do we want to model for the kids? Food security felt tangible, local, and easy to explain. Then there's the boring-but-important question: is this organization well-run? Willing Hearts operates on fewer than 20 staff, most food is donated, and their financials are public. That matters. You can see the financials for all IPCs at https://www.charities.gov.sg/ which gives a sense of expense ratio, headcount, and how the government rates their operations.

If you're interested in volunteering, details here: https://willinghearts.org.sg/. Also consider donating to them, they are a registered IPC and eligible for the tax-deduction. We will definitely be back - the 9 year old wanted to return the very next day, for the 5am shift. I told her that was going to be challenging for her parents, given that it would be New Year's Day.