{"id":4865,"date":"2018-10-01T04:40:52","date_gmt":"2018-10-01T04:40:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dev-alumn-nus.pantheonsite.io\/alumnus\/?p=4865"},"modified":"2025-07-15T16:08:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-15T08:08:12","slug":"going-against-the-grain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/2018\/10\/01\/going-against-the-grain\/","title":{"rendered":"Going Against the Grain"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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While Ms Jamie Lim is best known today as the Regional Marketing Director of furniture brand Scanteak, her initial career was a world away \u2014 both literally and figuratively \u2014 from what she is doing now. As a teenager, she had set her sights on Hollywood, and enrolled in Loyola Marymount University to study film. Though also offered a place at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA), Ms Lim chose the small Christian college because of its value system and the opportunities it afforded students. \u201cProducers like Ralph Winter (Star Trek, X-Men) would come and talk to us in a small class setting,\u201d she says of her time at Loyola.<\/p>\n

At university, she also discovered her love for marketing, and directed her energy towards marketing films. After graduating, Ms Lim interned with Universal Studios for a year, before being hired by Walden Media. \u201cI handled publicity, arranging press junkets and getting the word out about the films.\u201d Films that Ms Lim marketed included Mulholland Drive, the Chronicles Of Narnia series and Ray, which won Jamie Foxx an Oscar for Best Actor. For Ms Lim, whatever she found was worth her effort to do, she would pull out all the stops to be the best at it. \u201cAt Walden, the president asked me where I saw myself in a few years \u2014 I saw myself becoming my boss, to be honest.\u201d Indeed, things did turn out that way \u2014 only not where she expected.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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THE CALL HOME<\/strong><\/p>\n

In 2004, two years into her career in movie marketing, Ms Lim received a call from her father, Mr Lim Pok Chin, managing director of Scanteak, who had started the business in the 1970s with his wife, Ms Catherine Foo, Scanteak\u2019s executive director. \u201cHe said, \u2018I heard you are coming home. Come visit me in Taiwan.\u2019\u201d Her suspicions were aroused when her father picked her from the airport in his Mercedes, and took her to Taipei\u2019s best Japanese restaurant. \u201cHe asked me, \u2018Are you making an impact yet? Why not do your own business? You can have flexible time.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Even at that point, Ms Lim was no stranger to the family business. As a youngster, she was enlisted by her parents to provide \u201ccustomer service\u201d to the children of shoppers, till their parents had made the purchase. She also would draw up \u201cpress advertisements\u201d for the latest furniture, and follow her mother to meetings.<\/p>\n

Her father\u2019s is suggestion came at the right point in Ms Lim\u2019s life. She had just read Robert Kiyosaki\u2019s Rich Dad, Poor Dad, which proposes that a person should not work for money, but make money work for him, by way of businesses and investments. \u201cI decided that the opportunity made sense,\u201d says Ms Lim, who accepted the offer, so that she would also be able to spend time with her sister Julie, who was only three at the\u202ftime.<\/p>\n

However, she jokingly adds that \u201cmy father conned me. Life wasn\u2019t as easy as he said. I lost 17kg in my first six months!\u201d Mr Lim did not actually have a clear plan for his daughter. When Ms Lim asked him what he wanted her to do, he told her, \u201cGo and learn sales. You\u2019ll get out only when you have hit top sales for the month.\u201d Ms Lim met that target easily within six months. \u201cThey didn\u2019t know what to do with me,\u201d she says with a laugh.<\/p>\n

So she found her own place. \u201cTeak is old-fashioned. Coming from Hollywood, where everything is so edgy, I thought it needed a change. I told my dad, \u2018We are marketing to an old audience.\u2019 He said, \u2018But they are the ones with the money.\u2019 I said, \u2018Tell you what, I\u2019ll go and shoot a TV commercial. Give me some money.\u2019 He gave me $20,000! What can you do with $20,000?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Ms Lim went to her mother and pitched the idea of a rebranding exercise for Scanteak. Ms Foo asked for favours from friends, and Ms Lim hired a creative agency. They crafted a story about a family\u2019s life over decades, with Scanteak\u2019s furniture in the background. Ms Lim used the money her father gave her to buy airtime on Mediacorp TV. When the commercial \u201cTable\u201d was completed, Mr Lim asked, \u201cWhat are you trying to say?\u201d She replied, \u201cThat Scanteak is a lifestyle, not just a\u202fproduct.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scanteak\u2019s first TVC was a hit with viewers. At the Viewer\u2019s Choice Awards that year, \u201cTable\u201d was among the top 10 most popular TV commercials. That success helped fortify the change in branding for Scanteak. \u201cBuying is based on passion. I have to want to buy the furniture myself. So, I redesigned some pieces. My father couldn\u2019t see why we had to do it, but I said, \u2018Try lah.\u2019 They sold very well.\u201d<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t

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BIT BY BIT<\/strong><\/p>\n

Emboldened, Ms Lim started tweaking more designs. And more changes were to come. \u201cI told my dad, \u2018Now that the product is so nice, can we change the stores?\u2019\u201d. In\u202f2012, Mr Lim agreed to let his daughter set up Scanteak Signature, a series of concept stores which carry two ranges, Holm and Prologue, created in collaboration with famed design collective Outofstock Design. Prologue, which appeals to younger buyers, scooped up a number of top awards including the prestigious President\u2019s Design Award 2015. It was like this \u2014 step by step \u2014 that Ms Lim reckons the brand has come to where it is today. She says that steering the company into a new, young market \u201cwas a fun process\u201d. \u201cFun\u201d has taken them to145 stores across the world, and a global staff count of nearly 400.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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If I\u2019m given opportunities and talents, I have to utilise them wisely. Every breath we have is a\u202fmiracle.<\/span><\/div>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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LEARNING BY DOING<\/strong><\/p>\n

In 2014, Ms Lim decided to embark on her Executive MBA as part of the 10th intake of the UCLA-NUS programme. \u201cI wanted a more hands-on approach \u2014 not all exams and memorising!\u201d she says. NUS had a place in her heart, as she had applied to as a teen: \u201cI was admitted to NUS but couldn\u2019t get into Business.\u201d The ever-ambitious Ms Lim opted for a double-degree course. She completed her UCLA degree in 2014 and started her NUS year in 2015. She had actually put her downpayment for UCLA when she discovered she was pregnant, and delayed the start of her EMBA by a year. It was a brave choice, but Ms Lim is not one to back down from a challenge, even if it meant having to study and look after a baby at the same time.<\/p>\n

She remembers her EMBA experience with fondness: \u201cI\u202flearned a lot from Associate Professor Prem\u202fShamdasani (Business \u201984), who taught Marketing and also from my peers. This was a regional programme so we visited companies across the region. \u201cOne memorable incident was when our Entrepreneurship Professor George Abe presented a case study about a US lawyer who went to Shanghai and started a chain of In-N-Out Burgers \u2014 he pirated the whole concept! Prof Abe asked us what we thought, and of course, we all said it was really unethical etc. And then, Prof Abe introduced the lawyer we had all just been badmouthing! He came out and told us, \u2018If you want to expand your brand, watch out for people like me.\u2019 After listening to him, I was much more careful with my trademarking,\u201d says Ms Lim.<\/p>\n

Given her schedule and role as wife and mother to three children under eight, it is a surprise that Ms Lim still makes time to serve on the Future Economy Council. \u201cI\u2019m very honoured to be a part of it. I felt I could contribute and be a good sounding board for this generation,\u201d she says. It all ties in with Ms Lim\u2019s outlook on life. \u201cI\u2019ve always tried to make a difference in all that I do,\u201d she says. \u201cIf I\u2019m given opportunities and talents, I have to utilise them wisely. Every\u202fbreath we have is a miracle.\u201d<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From working in Hollywood to running her family’s furniture business, Scanteak, Ms Jamie Lim (UCLA-NUS EMBA’15) has reached new career heights by thinking differently and being willing to learn.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6029,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"elementor_theme","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4865","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-leadership"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4865","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4865"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4865\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6140,"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4865\/revisions\/6140"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6029"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alumni.nus.edu.sg\/thealumnus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}