1. How have your core values—Transparency, Collaboration, Efficiency, Inclusion, Iteration shaped the way you transform organizations?
[Khang]: we are living in a time with organisational transformation piling one after the other. It is mentally draining for people. But the reality is that the world will keep changing, at a faster pace than what we experienced during the past decades. Helping teams to understand that transformation is actually going to happen and switch into a mindset of iteration changes the perspective. And as we move into uncertain times, leading with transparency also helps strengthen trust across teams along with an approach based on collaboration and inclusion.
2. As a strong advocate of Agile Leadership Practices, how do you adapt these approaches for large-scale organizations?
[Khang]: this is a challenge for large-scale organisations as the transmission of information tends to take more time, fade away or be distorted. In my experience, Agile Leadership in large-scale organisations starts at C-level first. There must be a real step back looking at the DNA of the company, how it operates and why it operates like this. From there, identifying what a more agile functioning organisation would look like – what the C-Suite is ready to fight for or not. And I think that adoption of OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) can be a great leverage for large-scale organisations in their journey to becoming more agile… but not more agitated.
3. You’ve executed agendas from C-level strategy to operational execution. What’s the most common pitfall companies face when trying to bridge that gap?
[Khang]: the most common pitfall is the lack of continued ownership at a C-level part. After deciding on an initiative at a strategic level, execution is rightly delegated at C-level but with two most things missing: 1/ a continued involvement of C-level as real sponsor (and not just attending a Steering Committee once in a while) and 2/ the right leaders to execute and be able to talk with enough seniority to C-level to have real conversations when situation requires it.
4. You’re passionate about fostering an intrapreneurial mindset. What’s your formula for sparking that culture shift?
[Khang]: Formula has to take into account the DNA of the company and the industry it operates in to draw the playing field that every individual can play within. From there, identify few people across the organisation, across functions, who also have this intrapreneurial mindset and start with them within the playing field defined. And iterate to progressively grow the pool of intrapreneurial people.
5. What makes Singapore a uniquely valuable hub for driving large-scale digital transformation across Asia-Pacific?
[Khang]: First, its infrastructure and hub connectivity. Large scale digital transformation require significant change management with teams, fluidity and options to travel as needed remove a needless pain point which can become a bottleneck. Second, the diversity of cultures in Singapore and at the workplace, where you can leverage on this diversity to better address the different markets. And Third, many individuals with strong international experience in headquarters in Singapore who can bring their skill in ensuring proper rollout of of such transformation.
6. At Tech Week Singapore 2025, what key message do you hope to leave with fellow tech leaders?
[Khang]: we are living a revolution with AI. Technology is now Power, not just a commodity to run business. There is a high probability of this power to be concentrated in the hands of just a few. As tech leaders, we need to think both about how to harness this power but also how to use it to create positive impact for people at work, for companies, for the society and the planet. “With power comes responsibility”.
- About Khang Nguyen Trieu
- About The Way Forward
Khang Nguyen Trieu is a Singapore-based fractional CIO/CTO and the founder of The Way Forward, helping Travel & Hospitality organizations use systems, AI, and people to deliver measurable business outcomes. He serves on the Board of the International French School of Singapore, chairs the Robotics Task Force within the Singapore Hotel Association’s Hotel Innovation Committee, is a member of the Singapore Tourism Board’s Tcube innovation workgroup and is advisor to companies in Travel and Hospitality.
Over more than 25 years in technology, Khang has held leadership roles spanning strategy and delivery across Europe and Asia. In France, he worked in leading consultancies, co-founded a startup, and spent twelve years in tech leadership at voyages-sncf.com (now SNCF Connect), one of Europe’s largest online rail travel platforms. He moved to Singapore in 2016, where he held senior roles including APAC CIO and later Group Chief Technology Architect at Accor, one of the world’s largest hospitality groups (40+ brands including Raffles, Fairmont, Pullman, Novotel, Ibis; 5,500+ hotels).
A French of Vietnamese origins living in Singapore, Khang speaks on tech enablement in service industries, safe and ethical AI adoption, tech sustainability and on building multicultural engineering cultures that speak the language of business and can span across countries and time zones.
The Way Forward is a Singapore-based advisory that helps Travel & Hospitality organizations across APAC turn technology into a visible business driver. We align Systems × AI × Tech People to deliver outcomes executives care about: lower cost-to-serve, faster time-to-market, greater resilience and sustainability, and better (value, safety, ethics) AI adoption – while elevating the perceived value of engineering. The typical “Business impact through Tech” lanes of focus at The Way Forward are:
- Fit-to-Business Cost-Out & Investment — rationalize application and technology portfolios, retire duplicative tools, right-size licenses/vendors, and identify where new technology will create outsized sustainable business value.
- Cloud Agility & Resilience: improve business time-to-market and reliability while keeping run-rate costs and carbon footprint under control with FinOps and GreenOps levers.
- AI Readiness & Activation: assess organizational maturity, design governance, act as catalyst for successful AI adoption with proper integration into the company’s tech ecosystem.
Each “Business impact through Tech” lane is coupled with a skills-based capability program called “from Geek to Star” which uplifts the company’s tech people involved in the projects to grow them into trusted partners to the business teams.
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