Eric Teo, 44, is a member of the Executive Leadership team (ELT) in SYFC and he helms the Support Teaching and Engagement Ministries (STEM).
When did you join SYFC and how has your role changed over the years?
I joined SYFC as a staff on 1st April 2005. Since then, I have served in the Preteens Ministry, ITE Ministry, Secondary School and Junior College Ministry, EDGE Ministry and now STEM. In 2019, I joined the ELT.
How has taking on different roles brought growth in you?
Serving in different ministries and taking on different roles over 19 years has trained me in versatility. I grew to respond to change and adapt to a new environment quickly. Based on the need of the hour, I had to move from ministry to ministry in as short a time as within one year to as long as six years later. Every time a transition took place, I had to restart getting to know the staff and volunteers whom I was working with and develop new strategies to reach that particular group of young people. When I kept having to do that, I started to be able to identify very speedily what were common and distinctively different among our ministries and saw how each ministry fitted into the whole of SYFC in fulfilling our mission to reach young people. I thank God that over the years, I have grown to be less and less resistant to change in my ministry and life.
What do you enjoy most and least in your current ministry? How do you overcome doing things you do not like?
One of my tasks in STEM is to streamline our work processes. When I see how changes we implement benefit the users, I am most glad. However, to maintain and debug automations are the most painful for me. Yet, I continue to do it seeing how the automations benefit the organisation.
With many roles in SYFC, do you have time for church and family?
While work in SYFC takes up much time, it is not a reason to shrink away from my responsibilities at home and in church. Thank God, the arrangement to work from home (since COVID) on some days gives me more flexibility to manage work, family and church at the same time.
In church, I serve as the leader of a small group of 18 working adults and their children. At home, my wife Beverly and I care for our son, Ezra. We make it a point to visit both Beverly and my parents’ homes every week. During the holidays, I plan short trips with my parents and siblings.
How can Reach readers pray for you?
Please pray for patience with God’s timing in sending more staff to STEM and for trust in God’s provision for SYFC; for the Lord’s leading for Beverly and me as we make arrangements and care for Ezra; and for faithfulness to be God’s light in leading my unbelieving parents and siblings to know Him.
