Kay had a very busy and successful first six months as the director of arts in the British Council Singapore. She created a strategic plan, built strong partnerships, exceeded targets for audience numbers and income, and ensured projects utilized digital media. Her networking skills, grasp of financials, and intuitive understanding of opportunities have been invaluable. She is a strong self-starter who delivers excellent results through accountability, flexibility, and identifying and addressing barriers to success.

1. Reference for Kay Vasey
2011- 12
Kay had a very busy six months before her maternity leave. Of course her most important deliverable
was her new baby!
Key achievements last year included the signing of an MoU with Singapore International Foundation,
which has allowed us to create a new platform for exchanges between artists from the UK and
Singapore. In addition, we have won an award which was presented by former Senior Minister Goh
Chock Tong in recognition of our work promoting cultural relations between the UK and Singapore.
Kay has worked very closely with the High Commission which has allowed us to make more impact
through the use of Eden Hall for more arts related events. This has included arranging for more art by
young UK artists to be showcased there.
The biggest event this year was the Future Memory pavilion. This was a very complex project which
involved a lot of detailed co-ordination with a wide range of partners. Kay was fundamental in the
success of this project and the impact was excellent. Our wider work in the arts had a major impact for
cultural relations and this was shown in the results with a solid net promoter score and good audience
figures achieved: over 800 T2 arts influencers have been reached directly as at the end of Oct 2011.
Final year targets were all exceeded. Kay worked with artists who have journeyed to Australia and
Malaysia for their core activities and invited them to Singapore for additional opportunities to connect
with the audience here.
Kay also successfully managed a range of internal staff as we moved to a more flexible model of
staffing based on short term project managers as well as full time admin. The results in both efficiency
and effectiveness have been impressive
Kay is a strong self starter who has really got up to speed on her job, the British Council and the wider
arts scene in Singapore. She has demonstrated that she can connect with others and find common
ground to build relationships and connections to support British Council goals. This was most evident
in the range of partners involved in the future memory project and the excellent feedback that we got.
Kay also show accountability and commitment to the British Council and is very good at holding the
artists that we are working with to the same level of accountability - not always an easy task. She is
someone that delivers excellent results - she is flexible when necessary but is able to identify barriers
to success and tackle them before they become an issue
Kay will be coming back after maternity leave and will need to ease herself back into the job. She will
ensure that there is a smooth handover from the acting director arts and will need to get herself up to
speed on any developments in the arts both within the British Council and outside. Getting the right
work life balance will also be important.
I would like to thank Kay for all her hard work and look forward to working with her again after the
summer.
The United Kingdom’s international organisation for cultural relations and educational opportunities. A registered charity: 209131 (England and Wales) SC037733 (Scotland).

2. 2010- 11
Kay joined part way through the reporting year but has quickly got up to speed on the job and has
made an excellent start. Her first task was to take stock of the activities from the previous couple of
years and to begin to shape a strategy for the arts in the British Council Singapore. I was impressed
with how quickly she grasped the objectives of our work and also understood the constraints and
challenges. She put together a very good three year strategic plan which she presented to the local
management team and to the regional arts team. In many ways here work was important in helping to
shape some of the thinking at regional level and in this way she showed that she is able to shape the
future in her work.
A key part of her role is in building and maintaining our relationships with key partners. She is an
excellent networker and has ensured that the handover from the previous director has gone smoothly
for our partners. Particular examples are the extension of the agreement with NAC for writing the city
and also the memorandum of understanding which has been set up with the Singapore International
Foundation. She is knowledgeable and confident when dealing with key stakeholders, and she has
quickly identified who the key players are.
Kay has overseen a successful year for the arts team in Singapore. The audience numbers have been
very impressive, particularly for T3 audience. The income targets exceeded plan and Kay was able to
make sure that the budget spend was well managed and that there were no surprises. She has a good
grasp of the financial targets and processes and has got up to speed with the sometimes bewildering
planning processes that we have to go through.
She has an intuitive understanding of the opportunities that digital offer us. She has ensured that the
arts project build on the success with the Civic Life web site and has built digital into the project plans
for the future. She has also been invaluable in giving ideas to other departments on how to fully exploit
digital media.
Kay has had a very good first six months. I am confident that she will build on this as she starts to
implement the projects that she has been involved in planning. She is a real asset to the office and has
brought a valuable new perspective to the work that we do and how we go about doing it. I have
appreciated her ideas and her support over this first six months.
Page 2 of 2