Food from the Heart’s digital transformation Journey: Change strategy and leadership

• Main Authors: WANG, Heli, SU, Millie, LIM, Caroline
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2023
• Subjects: Digital Transformation; social entrepreneurship; stakeholder relations; change management; leadership; management styles; Leadership Studies; Strategic Management Policy
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/cases_coll_all/477; https://cmp.smu.edu.sg/case/5946
• Institution: Singapore Management University

Established in 2003 with 120 volunteers, Food from the Heart (FFTH) is a Singapore-based charity organisation founded to alleviate hunger by providing reliable, consistent, and sustainable food support to the less fortunate through food distribution programmes. FFTH’s digital transformation journey began in the middle of 2018 and it went through an overhaul in 2019. Among several digitalisation projects rolling out in early 2020, one was about distributing beneficiary cards with a Quick Response (QR) code to its beneficiaries. Having no direct access to beneficiaries and needing to rely on its community partners, the beneficiary card could be a game-changer for FFTH, yet implementing these cards through its community partners would be a challenge. The case requires students to analyse the managerial capabilities of a charity organisation and discuss how change management and change leadership could digitally transform an organisation. At the end of the discussion, students will recommend a stakeholder management strategy for FFTH to continue its digitalisation initiatives with its community partners. Students will be able to 1) recognise the types of managerial capabilities required in charity organisations; 2) appraise the connection between organisational mission and vision, and how it translates into actionable outcomes and impact; 3) apply change management and change leadership to digital transformation; 4) recommend stakeholder management strategies for FFTH to continue its digitalisation initiatives.