His Story with Cornerstone Global Partners Singapore

In 2012, the six founders established Cornerstone Global Partners (CGP) Group with the vision of "Rooting in China and expanding globally". Based on the understanding of global economic development, CGP is constantly improving its business layout in Asia Pacific and North America. Southeast Asia has experienced rapid development brought about by economic construction and social progress in the last decade, its development potential has attracted the attention of CGP.

CGP opened Singapore office in 2016. Over the past 6 years, based on success operation and exploration, it has covered various fields and functions. Along the journey, some business teams with stable high performance stood out. Corporate Service (HR, Finance and Legal) team is one of them. Chris Lui, as the director of the team, has played an important role in it.

As CGP Singapore is celebrating the 10th anniversary of CGP Group, we have a chat with Chris to look back on the days he spent with CGP Singapore, as well as the growth story of his team and himself.

Chris Lui, Director of SG Corporate Services

A Beginning without Plan

Chris has a “destined” bond with recruiting. Even before graduating from college, he had already made his mind to find a sales job, as it matched his cheerful personality and interest in communicating with people. When actively searching for a sales job, Chris received a call from a headhunter. Talking to Chris, the headhunter found him quite suitable for doing headhunting. As the company happened to have a vacancy, Chris was asked if he would like to take it. After learning about the work of headhunting, Chris felt, "This is even more interesting than the sales job!" That was how his recruiting career started.

In the beginning, Chris focused only on dispatching positions. Gradually, as he became more familiar to the operation of corporate human resources, he started to explore further and gained some experience in filling basic human resources positions. Later, a new opportunity came, which allowed Chris to focus on recruiting for HR roles, and he became more convinced that he really enjoyed working in this area, "Since then, I've been resolutely focused on this field and never looked back.”

Chris’s choice feels like a “perfect” one based on his psychology background, as it combines the science and the business of human. “In fact, I didn’t particularly consider my major when deciding my direction, but mostly followed my interests”, Chris recalled, “At a time, I found the knowledge I mastered in the past and the things I have experienced would naturally give me clear guidance. So sometimes we don’t have to think too much, having the courage to set off is much more important than finding the perfect path at the first try. The answer will come to us at the right time if we keep finding and pursuing a better self, or even just maintain a good state.”

Chris’s choice feels like a “perfect” one based on his psychology background, as it combines the science and the business of human. “In fact, I didn’t particularly consider my major when deciding my direction, but mostly followed my interests”, Chris recalled, “At a time, I found the knowledge I mastered in the past and the things I have experienced would naturally give me clear guidance. So sometimes we don’t have to think too much, having the courage to set off is much more important than finding the perfect path at the first try. The answer will come to us at the right time if we keep finding and pursuing a better self, or even just maintain a good state.”

Take Ownership

Chris is a well-deserved veteran at CGP Singapore – when he joined in 2017, there were only five colleagues in the office. Chris still remembers his motivation behind this brave move, "CW and Sean have considerable industry experience and have a very realistic vision for the company's future, and CGP's operations in China had already begun to take shape at that time, which shows that they are trustworthy leaders.” CGP’s culture of emphasizing ownership made Chris feel “it’s almost like building business for my own,” and he believed that was a great opportunity to bring his career to another level. And Chris has been truly autonomously improving the value of his work after joining CGP.

Initially, Chris's responsibilities were limited to the human resources area in CGP. Finding many companies also have demands for supporting functions such as finance, accounting, legal affairs, and customer service, he took the initiative to expand his business and covered almost all corporate support functions. "Singaporeans appreciate convenience and efficiency, so I decided to create a "one-stop shop" to help customers, especially some start-ups, reduce the burden and improve efficiency, and on the other hand, by doing that we will gain higher customer loyalty, and higher revenue of course, so it’s a win-win situation.”

Chris' team members

As a senior executive search consultant, Chris now pursues not only finding candidates who match the positions, but also providing clients with practical and effective advice to solve their problems in human resources operations.

After 2020, under the continuous impact of the epidemic, the phenomenon of Great Resignation has emerged in various industries, generating a large number of recruitments needs that have to be fulfilled in a short period of time, thus led to a “price war”, in which companies are tackling their talent shortage by offering salaries higher than the typical market rate, while candidates are feeling the shift of power in their favor, and many are exercising this power with very clear demands. In Chris's view, this is not a good phenomenon, "Relying on salary alone to attract talent is clearly unsustainable, because unreasonable price rise does not generate any new value, yet might undermine a company’s favorable system and culture. Hence, me and my team are proactively stepping up to be the crucial mediator to advise both ends on practices / solutions that truly matter, such as gains other than salary at work, other ways to improve employee engagement and job satisfaction.”

A leader’s self-cultivation

While touching base with CGP, Chris met Sean Ng, Co-founder and Managing Director of CGP SEA Region, whose leadership style impressed Chris a lot. “He is a visionary, sincere and easy-going leader who makes me feel that working with him must be enjoyable and secure. I want to be a leader just like him.” With an appreciation of his leader, Chris leads his team with the same values as Sean and other co-founders have been striving to build.

Chris firmly believes that every single person in his team matters, so he always encourages them to take ownership. “It enables them to build a strong sense of responsibility so they can be independent, and they are assured that you trust them too.” Chris remembers CW (Chris Watkins, Co-founder and CEO of CGP) sharing the concepts of Servant-Leadership and Abundance Mindset, and has implemented them in his team. “A sales environment can get really challenging and lonely when one is feeling unmotivated, so I’m always ready to help my team, and I also encourage my guys to try and support other teams if they can, as you never know one day, we will need help from others too.”

Chris (first on the left) and his team

Apart from that, Chris has paid much attention to help his team master the method of goal management. "The recruiting journey is a long and not an easy one, and it always helps to have a long-term goal and break it down further to short-term ones, so it becomes easier to accomplish, and brings more confidence." Chris also works closely with Tricia Liverpool, General Manager of CGP Singapore, to tailor the goals of his team. “In this way we record every milestone that we have unlocked, and we will always be inspired when we look back on them.” In addition to completing goals, Chris is also generous about celebrating every small achievement of the team, as “recognition fosters positive energy, drives away toxic mindsets, and helps build good rapport and team spirit.”

In a pleasant atmosphere, the interview with Chris came to an end. Talking to him, it’s easy to sense his affinity, humor, and energy, which usually make people secretly surprised by the extraordinary vitality he shows (and of course curious about his recipe for staying a young appearance) when they know Chris's age; but on second thought, the maturity displayed in his words is the hint to his seniority. A young appearance never bothers a mature mind, and only a solid cornerstone can carry endless vitality. This is Chris’s story with Cornerstone Global Partners.