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Dear All, my name is Tan Kang Fun but I am better known as KF Tan in the market place. I am currently the CEO of a health trust company in Singapore. The testimonies I am sharing took place earlier in my career at a chemical company where I was the General Manager, at a high performance material manufacturing plant where I was the Managing Director, and at a healthcare company where I was the CFO & COO.
It is natural for many of us to use our own strength and knowledge to deal with issues at work. Whenever a challenge crops up, we don’t instinctively seek help from fellow colleagues, supervisors or our friends. We struggle with it and hope that the problem will resolve by itself so that we can meet deadlines or complete the task given by our supervisors. I am not a psychologist but I know that problems at work can lead an individual into a stressful work life and some may even lead to depression.
It is sad that many Bible believing Christians also fall into this trap at workplace. They may think that prayer can only take place in church, during meals time and occasionally pray before going to sleep. I want to share with you that prayer is one of the gifts from God for us to have fellowship with Him. By fellowship, I mean, we can at any time talk to God our Heavenly Father. Not just worshipping Him in church, praising Him or reading the Bible. We can pour out all our sorrows to Him and ask for His guidance to tackle issues at work and to deal with personal challenges. Of course, we must also remember to thank and praise God for all that He has done for us. As the Bible says, God answers prayers to those who pray fervently and earnestly. We don’t go to God with a laundry list but instead with our hearts to diligently seek Him for answers. Just like James 5:16 says “…..the effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.” I would like to share a few instances where I went to God for help to deal with issues at work.
The first testimony I want to share happened in middle of 1998, a year after I accepted Christ as my personal Lord and Saviour. I remember that my boss, who is a church leader and a very staunch believer of Christ, and I were in a country in this region negotiating a big contract. It was already the second day of our negotiations. Things were difficult and didn’t go the way we expected in our first day of negotiation. Everything that we proposed were rejected or partially met with more benefits to the other party. We were looking for a win-win deal. However, we kept hitting the wall and was exasperated. We needed a break to re-strategise our negotiation approach.
By late afternoon of the second day, my boss asked for the meeting to be adjourned. As we were in the other party’s office, we decided to go to the toilet to discuss. In the toilet, we started praying to ask God to grant us wisdom how to deal with the demands raised and also asking God to soften the hearts of the other party. After that, we went back to the conference room and resume our meeting. My boss started to recap where we left off and as the meeting went on, we could feel that the other party started to relent on their demands and we could also feel that the atmosphere has softened. After another hour or so of negotiations, by the power and grace of God, we ended the meeting with both sides shook hands and agreed on the new terms of the agreement. Honestly, as for me being a new babe in Christ at that time, this was truly a miracle seeing the power of prayer at workplace. I was truly encouraged by this episode and learned first-hand on the importance of prayer and that we can pray anytime and anywhere. Just like 1 Thessalonians 3:10 says “night and day praying exceedingly that we may see your face and perfect what is lacking in your faith?” All praise and glory to God our Heavenly Father for this mountain moving experience.
By the year 2000, I moved on in my career to managing a greenfield American manufacturing plant based in Singapore. I have to hire all the staff and to install a brand new high technology manufacturing plant. By middle of year 2001, I already hired about 50 staff and the plant was successfully commissioned with the help of colleagues from USA. From the start to completion of the project, God has been my guidance through prayers. I also sought prayer support from many other brethren to ensure the project can complete without any hitch. I must say that by the grace of God, the completion and commissioning of the plant went smoothly.
After running the plant for several months, there was an oil leakage problem in the manufacturing process affecting quality of the products. The engineers and maintenance crews work on the issue to locate the source of the problem. After couple of days, they still could not locate the fault and a lot of the raw materials had been contaminated. This issue was made worst by a shipment that we need to meet by end of the week. When I was informed of the crisis we were facing, immediately I went to the Lord in prayer. I asked God to help me to locate the source of the oil leakage and also to meet the shipment deadline. To be honest, I was feeling a bit stressed at that time since the bulk of the manufacturing process had been moved from USA to Singapore. Thus, there is no plan-B for me and that the issue must be resolved immediately.
After much prayer, I went down to the manufacturing plant to walk about and, in particular, along the production line. I am not an engineer nor a technically inclined person. I am just an accountant by training. While walking, I was looking for the obvious and, lo and behold, I literally saw a single oil droplet came down from the high powered exhaust onto the production line. I quickly exclaimed “thank you God and all praise to You the Almighty God for answering prayers”. The maintenance crews that were following me were taken aback by my proclamation! I immediately showed them the source of the problem. The whole team in the factory was filled with joy and relieved of the quality problem can be resolved now. Many were surprised that you don’t need an engineer to find the root cause of the problem. In fact, it was not me that found the problem but rather it was truly the Holy Spirit leading me when I went to the factory floor on the hunt. The Holy Spirit was leading me looking at the unlikely places that might cause production issues. During the post-mortem of the issues, I came to know that nobody was looking at the exhaust because it was a brand new high powered exhaust system that should not give us any problem. I am glad that the maintenance crews also learned something new that day, ie to look at all possibilities when trouble shooting and not to resolving issues by sheer elimination of probabilities.
The third power of prayer testimony that I want to share was at the height of the SARS pandemic back in 2003, our USA HQ decided to relocate the Singapore plant that I was managing to Jakarta, Indonesia. Interestingly, I was even tasked to do a feasibility study to determine whether it is cost effective to proceed with the relocation. I went to Jakarta with a team from USA for about a week. At the end of the study trip, I recommended to the HQ that it was no brainer to relocate the plant to where the source of raw material come from. After about 3 months of intense negotiations to ensure our technology is protected and that there is an exit clause should the deal goes sour, order was given to move the plant. Throughout this period, I was seeking the Lord for wisdom and guidance in prayers.
The easy part was to make that decision of relocation. The most difficult part came when I have to retrench all the 50 or so colleagues. The irony was that I hired all of them about 3 years ago and now have to retrench all of them. I went to the Lord in prayers for help in how to ensure these colleagues would be taken care off whilst we were in the process of making the move. By the grace of God, I managed to negotiate a good compensation package for all the staff. All of them stayed with me until all the equipment was moved out of the Singapore plant. Truly thank God for the support from all these colleagues.
After all of my colleagues were out of job, I came next! I was invited to move to Jakarta to run the plant but I declined. So I was out of job by early 2004, in the midst of recession. I have to look for a job. It was worrying for me as it was almost impossible to look for a management position. Companies were closing down and many workers in Singapore were being retrenched during that period. But as for me, I know that I can depend on God to provide for me. God Has promised His children that He will not let us go hungry, Proverbs 10:3. And in Philippians 4:19 it says “And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.”
As there was no management positions being advertised, I started to apply for finance role. I went to the Lord in prayer for Him to lead me to a place that He desires me to be as a vessel for Him. Within a month, I went to 4 interviews and was offered either a Financial Controller or Chief Financial Officer role by 3 companies. Truly thank God for His abundance in blessings.
I sincerely hope that what I have shared can be a source of encouragement to you in your walk with God. Always remember, you have God with you to lead and guide you at your workplace to overcome challenges. All you need is to reach out to Him in prayer.
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