Behind the locked door that houses SGAG, the hub of Singaporean internet humour, the first thing that greets a visitor is an orderly arrangement of shoes. Stepping into SGAG’s office is an experience intended to evoke the ease of coming home, and this shoes-off policy is the first step (pardon the pun) in fostering a comfortable working culture.
Much has been made of the female experience at work, with accounts that range from unsavoury experiences with family-unfriendly policies to outright sexism at the workplace.
Fortunately, the women at SGAG have a far brighter story to share, and not least because they work at a company known for its spot-on local humour.
Annette Lee, Cassi Yang and Michelle Tan took time to share their insights into working at SGAG. They put to rest the debate as to which gender is funnier, and tell us what female empowerment means to them as working women in Singapore.
Number Crunching
When asked about the male-female ratio at SGAG, Michelle revealed that 11 out of SGAG’s 26 employees are women. “There was a period when there were more,” she says. She divulges that in the company’s first year, the majority of its employees were female.
Michelle, who works as part of SGAG’s account servicing team.
“The latest hires are all men,” Cassi adds, “but it fluctuates.”
Cassi and Michelle both work in accounts servicing at SGAG, while Annette is part of the company’s creative department.
SGAG’s videography department is comprised largely of men, but Annette mentions, “We have a female director of photography who carries the cameras. She’s really strong.”
“At the beginning, most people didn’t know that we function like a company. They think it’s just one ah beng behind the computer.”
“Not many people know that SGAG’s cast members do more than just acting,” Cassi shares. “They all have skills beyond acting that we put to good use for content creation and direction. Everyone has to know how to produce content, because we’re ultimately still a very content-based platform.”
The women also share that SGAG keeps its employees’ senses of humour sharp by conducting regular meme challenges, with each employee having to create their own meme for submission. The creator of the funniest meme is then awarded a prize, so being witty does in fact pay.
Are Women Funnier?
Inevitably, the question arises, and it is impossible not to ask the women if they think females are the funnier sex. Equitably, Annette says that it depends on the individual.
“Everyone in the office has a different sense of humour,” Cassi says. “Women can bring a different angle to funny content.”
The creation of humorous content was precisely how Annette came to work at SGAG. “I was running a funny illustrated blog when I was in school,” she says. “It was a passion project, because I wanted to write content that wasn’t school-related. One of my stories went viral and people were sharing it on Facebook, which is how they found me.”
Annette, who works in SGAG’s creative department.
Michelle says that her story is far more straightforward. Her background in advertising and experience with account servicing garnered her the opportunity to be one of SGAG’s early hires, working in a small team for over a year before the company expanded further.
Like Michelle, Cassi was also hired early. Having worked closely with SGAG to promote an advertising campaign as part of her Final Year Project, she mentions that she greatly enjoyed working with the company’s co-founders back when they were a two-man team.
“They appreciated that we understood their content and offered jobs to my schoolmate and I,” Cassi says. “I’m in accounts servicing now, but I used to be in both content creation and business because we previously had so few people.”
Perks At Work
As one might expect, working at SGAG comes with more than its fair share of laughs, with regular foosball games after lunch.
“You can hear the team screaming from downstairs,” Michelle adds. “It’s a very casual environment.”
“Everyone is dressed quite casually,” Cassi says. “We’re not a place where you have to wear heels everywhere. When we were in our old office, we didn’t hire a cleaner, so the best way was to make the office feel like home so that people would help to keep it clean.”
Cassi, a member of the accounts servicing team at SGAG.
SGAG’s office is designed to foster a more cosy working environment where employees feel comfortable and relaxed. The company’s meeting room features beanbags and comfortable seating, and sitting on the floor is common. The informal atmosphere at SGAG, the women concur, is what makes it a great place to work.
“Because of the nature of our business, we need to hire people who are very funny. So there’s never a dull day at work.”
When asked about the strangest things she’s seen in the office, Annette mentions that she regularly sees people coming and going from SGAG’s studio dressed in bizarre costumes. “Usually this is for a campaign or video shoot,” Annette says, “and they always have some mascot costume on.”
“We don’t really feel the Monday blues,” Cassi adds, “and it’s fun because we’re not always doing the same thing. The content is always changing, the things we do are always changing and we’re forced to look at everything unconventionally.”
“From a creative perspective,” Annette shares, “ideation is one of the funniest things. Different people all think differently, and the magic really happens when everyone’s crazy ideas come together. I think that’s really cool, bouncing ideas off each other and making something really special, as if we’re creating some kind of magical unicorn.”
“And then you pass the unicorn to us to try and make it presentable,” laughs Michelle in response.
It’s A Woman’s World Too
In the context of working at SGAG, the women share that the office environment is friendly to both genders and free of strict hierarchies. “There’s no gender bias to the point that we didn’t realise that most of the people in leadership roles here are women,” Michelle says.
When asked what female empowerment means to them, the women all advocate for uplifting other women in the workforce. “Some women tend to be a lot more soft-spoken and don’t often go forward to raise issues,” Michelle says. “To me it’s more about encouraging other ladies in the office to take that step and lead others.”
“It’s about knowing that you have just as much potential as the other gender,” adds Cassi. “It’s knowing that you can do the same job equally well, to have the motivation and self-confidence to know the value of your work and push yourself.”
“Generally, we’ve grown up in an environment where we are quite fortunate that there isn’t such a strong patriarchal bias compared to other places,” Annette says. “Growing up, both genders tend to be treated more fairly in a meritocratic nation. It’s about believing in that and believing in what we can do, and not viewing ourselves as any less.”
“There’s still a general fear that if you’re a woman and you take up a leadership role at work, you have to compromise on other personal commitments,” Michelle adds. “The change that I would like to see eventually is women being able to be leaders without having to give up other aspects of their lives. It has to come with supportive company policies, or a shift in perceptions.”
“We have a working mother here, and she’s in a managerial position,” Annette shares. “We don’t usually have crazy hours, and we can always go home to our families.”
“There’s a lot of emphasis on work-life balance so we don’t burn out,” Cassi finishes. “To be funny, you have to be happy, right?”
