What legacy are you building?
Dear Friends,
Thank you so much for your support over the years. I hope that you have enjoyed reading “Lim Siong Guan: The Best is Yet to Be”, “Winning with Honour”, “The Leader, The Teacher & You”, as well as "Can Singapore Fall?"!
As it has been almost a year since President Tharman Shanmugaratnam launched my memoirs, “Lim Siong Guan: The Best is Yet to Be”, on 10 November 2025, I thought I would start this blog to share my views and observations on an ongoing basis. Through this blog, I hope that I can help enlighten and lighten your days. We all need to lead our lives in ways that give us hope that the best is yet to be!
A few weeks ago, I had the privilege to be the guest of honour at a Great Eastern Life event, where I was interviewed in a fireside chat. The theme of the event was "The Art of Legacy".
Very often, when someone speaks of "legacy", the immediate thought is that of passing on money and assets to the following generation or generations. I focused on the point that to keep the success story going from generation to generation, it is much more important to focus on the values and virtues (the "engines" for survivability and sustainability) that created the success in the first place, rather than just the outputs!
An ancient Chinese proverb states that “富贵传家，不过三代" - translated as “ A legacy of wealth and status does not last three generations". A former professor in the Chinese University of Hong Kong once explained to me the truth of it as follows: "The first generation is the patriarch, the one who created the wealth.
“The second generation is a generation of siblings - brothers and sisters who grew up in the same household. So while they could have disagreements on the best way to manage the family’s wealth, chances are they can eventually come to an agreed position because they imbibed the same values and convictions as they grew up together in a similar environment.
“The third generation is a generation of cousins where they have fathers and mothers from different households. Often, they would not be able to agree on the ways to move forward because of clashes in values and beliefs that are foundational to their views and decisions. This explains the break-down of the family’s wealth and the break-up of families from the third generation."
However, we should keep in mind that the proverb from which “富贵传家，不过三代" comes from starts with the saying "道德传家，十代以上", translated as "A family legacy built upon morality and virtue lasts for over 10 generations".
This wisdom of concentrating on values and beliefs applies to the survivability of nations and businesses as much as it applies to families. It is a truism often expressed in the West as "Culture creates the future" or "Culture eats strategy for breakfast", where culture refers to the collection of values and beliefs that permeates among the people in any enterprise, and yields behaviours that strengthen the survivability and sustainability of the enterprise.
Many of you would be familiar with Stephen Covey’s book, “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People”; the second habit he lists is "Begin with the end in mind". I thus pose to you three questions below for you to do a similar exercise with respect to your life, your work, and your family.
The best is yet to be!
💡 Actionable Reflection for This Week
Take a moment with yourself, your team and/or your family to evaluate your desired direction:
How would you describe your successful self, your team and/or your family in 5, 10, 20 years?
What are the most important values and virtues that you would need to cultivate within yourself, your team and/or your family to reach your desired outcome?
How can you instil the belief within yourself, your team and/or your family that regardless of past achievements or failures, the best is yet to be?
What are the values and virtues that are keeping you, your team and/or your family future-ready? Share your thoughts with us at Hello@LimSiongGuan.sg.
Text edited and image generated by Joanne H. Lim.