Elaine Yew is a Senior Partner in Egon Zehnder and the Global Co-Head for our Family Business and Family Office Practice. She is also the Asia lead of our Global Board Practice and a founding leader of our Global Leadership Advisory Practice. She serves private and public companies on succession planning for CEO, other C-level positions and Non-Executive positions and advises clients on CEO development, top team effectiveness, organizational culture and board effectiveness. Elaine is a trained Coach and Fellow of the Institute of Coaching, McLean, affiliated to the Harvard Medical School. She is also a certified Mediator and uses some of the principles in helping people work better together.
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Elaine joined the firm in 2000 and spent the first nine years in the London office developing the Private Equity Practice in Europe. She moved to Singapore to lead the office there as Managing Partner until 2016. She was also a member of the firm’s Global Executive Committee for eight years. Before joining the firm, Elaine helped to lead an industry change program while at Global Freight Exchange, the world’s first Internet-based global marketplace for air cargo. Prior to that, she was Executive Director with Goldman Sachs in the European Equities Division, based in London. Earlier, she was a Consultant with Monitor Company, working across Europe with clients in diverse sectors. She started her career with the Singapore Economic Development Board, where she was at the center of early regionalization work, helping Singapore companies develop their presence in Indochina and Myanmar in the early 1990s.
Elaine’s first passion was the Theatre, and she has a BA with Honours in English and Drama from the University of Kent and an MBA from INSEAD in Fontainebleau, France. Education is a big area of interest for Elaine and where most of her community work is centered. She is a member of the Industry Advisory Board of NUS’s School of Continuing and Lifelong Education (SCALE), after serving nine years on the Board of Trustees of the National University of Singapore.
Elaine’s other focus in her community work is in the area of leadership and workforce development in Singapore. She sat on the Board of Workforce Singapore, and is on the Advisory Board of Women’s Forum Singapore. She sits on the board of The Majurity Trust, a philanthropic foundation, and chairs their Tangent Initiative. In addition, Elaine is a Director on the Board of SPH Media Holdings, on the independent Nominating Committee of BW Offshore, BW Energy, BW LPG, Hafnia and Cadeler AS, listed on the Norwegian Stock Exchange; and is a member of the Asia Advisory Board of Allianz. She is also a board member of the Singapore International Mediation Centre and is a Justice of the Peace. She is recently appointed as a Director of MOH Holdings, the holding company of Singapore’s public healthcare clusters.
