Eddie Eng built Cadence Culture on a simple observation. Workplace culture, good or bad, does not stay inside the office. It follows people home. When an unhealthy culture takes almost everything a person has to give, they return to their families with only the “leftovers.” Eddie is convinced that people should be able to show up fully for their work and for the people they love.
“I’m an accidental entrepreneur,” he admits. “I never set out to start a company.” For Eddie, starting Cadence Culture was about being faithful to who he is.
Responding to the Call
After 14 years as Head of Training, Curriculum Design, and Coaching at his previous company, Eddie sensed it was time for a new season. With his CEO’s blessing, he began exploring other opportunities. Yet he soon realised that none of those roles would let him fulfil his calling: helping organisations build culture and transform leaders.
What settled the decision was the knowledge that Singapore has one of the most disengaged workforces in the world. Eddie co-founded Cadence Culture with Calvin Yeo to help companies rediscover the “unforced rhythms” of work, ways of working that let both people and businesses thrive sustainably.
Today, the Cadence Culture team co-creates bespoke culture and leadership transformation journeys with organisations. Diagnostic tools give leaders a clear, evidence-based picture of their culture. From there, the team works with them on quality conversations, polarity thinking, tension management, emotional intelligence, and psychological safety. “Strategy and capital only bear fruit through people,” Eddie says. “The real resource is the culture that empowers people to form alignment, execute well, and grow into who they are capable of being.”
From Burnout to Breathing
Eddie grew up in a typical Singaporean family that valued hard, honest work. His younger years were also marked by financial struggles, and he watched his father push himself relentlessly at work, and only come home with leftovers.
That environment shaped Eddie into someone who had to win at all costs. In time, he recognised that he had been projecting confidence to cover a sense of inferiority. The striving built resilience, but it was also building towards a breaking point.
At the peak of his advertising career, Eddie burned out. He quit without knowing what came next, or who he was without the facade of striving. Just as depression threatened to overwhelm him, he encountered God, and for the first time in a long while, he felt he could breathe.
That breath of life transformed his worldview. Performance and accolades gave way to character and values. Eddie also saw that many leaders and employees were caught in the same cycle of striving and burnout, and needed what he had found: a way back to life.
Stewarding a Gift
That realisation led Eddie into the training space, where a natural talent for creating psychologically safe environments began to emerge. He came to see this talent as something entrusted to him, to be stewarded faithfully. Although he had never considered himself academic, he went on to complete a Master of Science in Industrial/Organizational Psychology at the City University of New York.
Through burnout, depression, and the grace that steadied him, one truth from the Bible anchored Eddie: apart from God, he can do nothing. Out of it came the conviction that would define his leadership, to lead from brokenness. For Eddie, that means walking in humility and never fully arriving, while staying confident in the work because the ability to do it well is God-given.
Starting Lean and Staying Faithful
Launching Cadence Culture meant facing the financial realities head on. Eddie chose not to take on investors, and starting out required a significant pay cut. The fears were real, but so was his clarity about what he was called to do and why. Before launching, he spent weeks in reflection, went on spiritual retreats, and sought counsel from mentors about the vision, the impact he hoped to have on clients, and the culture he wanted to build.
The early seasons tested that conviction. The client work was energising, but everything around it, from administration and human resources to finance and business development, meant long hours with no financial cushion.
One night, Eddie’s 10-year-old son woke at 3 AM and found his father still at his desk. Worried, the boy told him it was late, that he had not been resting enough, and that the laptop needed to shut down. Then he took Eddie’s hand. “Dad, come,” he
said, walking his father to bed and waiting until he was settled before going back to sleep himself.
“That moment made it clear,” Eddie recalls. “We needed to watch our own rhythms, or risk burning out completely.” Cadence Culture chose to grow organically, at a pace that matched what it was building.
People at the Heart of It
That patience shaped how the team grew too. “We’re only as strong as our people, and that’s a principle we keep choosing,” Eddie says. Each new team member joined because they believed in the vision and wanted to be part of a culture that helps people flourish. If the culture could do that for its own team, Eddie reasoned, it was something to share with clients.
The company also holds itself to the same standards it teaches. Eddie has learnt to choose vulnerability over pride, owning his mistakes openly and asking for forgiveness when he gets things wrong. If the team could not build openness, honesty, and humility among themselves first, he asks, what chance would they have of helping others build it?
Meaningful Results
Two years on, the vision is taking shape. “The speed of growth often outpaces the speed of trust,” Eddie says. “Trust between leaders takes time to build. But when leaders are intentional about it, that process speeds up.”
One client had scaled from 400 to 1,000 people, with around 80 middle managers suddenly leading a much larger organisation. Attrition was starting to climb. Cadence Culture worked alongside them to build a culture that supported their growth, training leaders to build trust, manage tension, and align on what counted most. A year later, attrition among those 80 managers was zero, and the company kept scaling with its leaders and team growing together.
The Cadence Way
All of these experiences reflect what the company calls The Cadence Way: Friendship first, Purpose for greater impact, Stewardship for the future, Peacemaking to restore, and Rested in change and challenges.
Eddie imagines workplaces where people are genuinely fulfilled, businesses flourish, and people head home carrying joy rather than leftovers. He believes the same is possible in homes, classrooms, and communities. Culture is being built or broken in each of them every day, and where it is broken, it can be restored. The next ten years, he hopes, will be spent building that playbook alongside the people who live it.
A Legacy of Faithfulness
For Eddie, it all comes back to the conviction he first learnt: to lead from brokenness, never in spite of it. Asked what he hopes to be remembered for, his answer is humble. “I hope, when I’m done, I hear God saying to me, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.'”
Website: https://cadenceculture.sg/
AUTHOR BIO
ALAN KOH
Alan Koh is the Founder and CEO of Impossible Marketing, a group of companies renowned for hyperlocal marketing strategies tailored to businesses in Singapore. His professional journey began in the banking sector, where he quickly rose through the ranks, garnering eight industry awards in just four years.
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