Call for help.

Dear Reader

Sorry for the lack of updates recently.

I finally found some time off a busy schedule the past couple of months to pen (type?) down some thoughts, and I felt I needed to share what’s been on my mind.

Those people who know me personally would know that I used to be a consultant at an executive search agency. I probably represented the most mercenary of all creatures who walk the face of the corporate world, and I do admit, I was having a good time while I was still in the business, money-wise.

Up until some close friends of mine got retrenched, and then I realized I lacked the capacity to help them even though I thought I was a top biller in my industry, did it strike me that perhaps I had let the mercenary part of the business get the better of me. I could have been using my networks and contacts to be doing something more meaningful to help others, but I guess being selfish, and wanting to be comfortable myself, it didn’t occur to me that I could have used the skills that I picked up professionally to help those in need.

For the past months since March 2010 (last recorded activity here on Sponsor a Job), I joined another headhunting firm, and recently I decided to quit for good. It may sound crazy, but after 5 years of being a gun for hire, I decided to quit an industry where I was adept at and making good money—because honestly I am getting sick of what I was becoming.

I’ll be starting a new business venture in the media industry soon, and at the same time, I would like to make Sponsor a Job a more active venture than a passive cry for assistance.

Which brings me to my next point. I’m wondering if there are people out there who believe in what I hope to do and achieve with Sponsor a Job, and if anyone would be keen to join me on this little mission. Ultimately, I am a one-man band, but I think having more on board would mean we can make that little difference.

I am still pretty much a one-man crusade. I need more people to believe in what Sponsor a Job can do, and come on board to help me achieve the vision of helping those in need seek gainful employment—without asking anything in return.

Granted, I may not be able to garner a large team to help me on this, but even if it is just one or two individuals who are willing, I think it’s a good start, and I welcome anyone to join me in this.

If you are keen to be part of Sponsor a Job, please write me at roy.phang@yahoo.co.uk.

Everything else, I hope that 6 months down the road, Sponsor a Job can become a credible platform to help fellow Singaporeans in their quest for finding jobs in an increasingly crowded job market.

Sincerely,

R.P.

Job market picks up for fresh graduates: http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporelocalnews/view/1035386/1/.html

Fair enough, but if candidates are not realistic in their expectations, there’s no point talking about better opportunities. That said, would things be as optimistic for scores of experienced PMETs out there who still have problems finding work? With “competition” coming from university and polytechnic graduates (i.e. lower starting salaries), how would this affect the chances of qualified but older candidates from landing the same pool of available jobs in the market?

“They need to be a little bit more adaptable and flexible. They shouldn’t just look at the title and the pay but also look at the opportunity of where they can build a career.” – Dhiren Shantilal, SVP, Kelly Services.

CNA: Employment prospects set to become vibrant this year

SINGAPORE: According to the Hudson Report, hiring expectations have not been so high since 1998 when it first started issuing such reports.

Of the over 1,500 key employment decision makers in Asia surveyed, 51 per cent of bosses expect more hiring to take place in the first quarter of this year.

This is quite a contrast indeed from the previous quarter when the figure was 34 per cent.

Last year, employees suffered pay cuts and restructuring seemed to be the order of the day. It was even worse for graduates entering the workforce for the first time.

But now, besides better hiring prospects, employees can expect more money as well. Respondents in most industries expect to pay higher salaries to attract talent. In fact, only eight per cent said they will not be increasing wages.

According to the survey, most are planning to give out much higher bonus payments this year. In fact, about 74 per cent of them plan to pay discretionary year-end bonuses for 2009.

Even though the overall mood seems buoyant, some analysts remain cautious.

Jimmy Koh, UOB economist, said: “It is recovering and it is normalising – even the expectations of hiring is a normalisation process, but it will take a while because 70 per cent of global GDP is still struggling.”

David Ang, executive director, Singapore Human Resource Institute, said: “You’ll probably get these people on contract basis, on part-time basis, on project basis and so on.

“So, while there’s increased hiring, I think one also needs to see in what way these are the permanent employment opportunity vis-a-vis other types of employment opportunities.”

The survey said hiring expectations are very high for the banking and financial sector. Another sector reflecting major expectations of job opportunities is the media, advertising and public relations industry. – CNA/vm

Singapore banks on hiring binge: http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_475246.html

But are they a little too trigger-happy in their approach, given how the global financial sector is still “fragile” according to the chairman of the FSB?

Let’s not create a situation where we over-hire, and then let go of headcounts when things take a dip along the way, shall we?

Under-employment among older PMETs becoming an uptrend in Singapore

Source: ChannelNewsAsia

SINGAPORE: Singapore’s labour movement said tackling the issue of under-employed workers will be a big challenge in the coming year.

It said under-employment is becoming more pertinent among older Professionals, Managers, Executives and Technicians also known as (PMETs).

And efforts must be put in place to help them get jobs suited to their skills and qualifications.

PMETs were the hardest hit during the economic downturn.

Many, like those in the financial sector, were left jobless and the labour movement said they had to settle for whatever job they could get to make ends meet.

But while this brings down unemployment levels, the issue of under-employment has been on the uptrend.

Halimah Yacob, Deputy Secretary-General, NTUC, said: “He may be very qualified, very skilled, but the jobs that he wants to do and is willing to do is not available.

“He ends up doing a job that does not make full capacity, productive use of his capabilities. It also involves the case where jobs are not paying them the kind of salary or earning that they feel is commensurate with their qualifications and skills.”

Madam Halimah said she’s seen many cases where middle-aged degree-holders who lost jobs during the downturn become taxi drivers.

She said such under-employment is unavoidable as with slow economic growth, job opportunities are limited.

But as the economy recovers, the labour movement will offer targeted help to under-employed workers.

Mdm Halimah said: “We recognise that the person cannot remain underemployed in perpetuity because that is going to be very frustrating and demoralising. That is where we then need to focus help to help him to transit so that he can make better use of his skills and capabilities to move to other sectors and to retrain them and move to other sectors that require their skills and qualifications.

“Of course it may not be easy because some of them may be working in one sector for so many years. So a re-tuning is needed to acquire other skills to move to other sectors.”

The labour movement will work on job-matching assistance and training courses and Madam Halimah said workers must also actively find out more about job opportunities relevant to them. – CNA/vm

We do know for a fact that PMETs were the hardest hit in the recent economic downturn– in my line of work, I come across many PMETs who have been unemployed for up to 18 months, falling into the category of the chronic unemployed.

While efforts are being made on the part of the government, particularly with training initiatives, the fact remains that the employability of PMETs in the coming year and beyond have more to do with economic outlook and confidence more than the skills and competencies of the individual: if companies are still not optimistic in their hiring, PMETs will continue to face challenges in terms of finding and securing new jobs.

Granted, the economic outlook according to the folks in the financial sector is optimistic for 2010, but until such optimism is translated into expanding productive capabilities, particularly in the manufacturing and technology sectors, I’m not so sure if this necessarily means a lowering of the unemployment rate next year.

For now, we can only hope for the best. While the partying goes on tonight to mark the start of 2010, let us all say a little prayer in our hearts that things will indeed be better, and may those who found the going tough in 2008 and 2009 find some glimmer of hope…and a new job.

 

Labour movement gears up to go on the offensive to cut unemployment in 2010

Source: ChannelNewsAsia

SINGAPORE: It’s been a tough year on the jobs front as the global recession took its toll on Singapore’s economy.

But after a year of defensive moves designed to save jobs and prevent mass retrenchments, the labour movement is set to go on the offence next year.

It aims to reduce unemployment to below three per cent in 2010 and get to full employment as soon as possible.

Currently the unemployment rate in the third quarter of 2009 stands at 3.4 per cent.

Labour Chief Lim Swee Say said that Singapore has still performed comparably better than other parts of the world as it cut costs to save jobs and introduced schemes like Jobs Credit and Spur training.

Through the Employment and Employability Institute, about three in five jobseekers, or about 16,000, were placed in jobs and of these more than 60 per cent moved across industries.

Looking forward to the end of the year, the labour movement is hopeful that retrenchment figures will round up at 20,000 which is lower then the figures for the two previous downturns of 26,000 in 2001 and almost 30,000 in 1998.

Going forward, the labour movement also hopes to focus on three areas to boost employment next year, including among professionals, managers, executives and technicians or PMETs.

Mr Lim said: “At the end of the day, we hope re-employment rate in Singapore can be further increased, the structural employment can be further reduced and under-employment among the middle aged PMETs can be further avoided through re-skilling, re-training.”

One issue next year for firms used to getting help in keeping jobs is the withdrawal of the Jobs Credit scheme by June.

Mr Lim said the scheme is not a sustainable long-term solution and that businesses need to transform themselves to become more productive.

Still, he was hopeful that the Economic Strategies Committee or ESC report, due next month, would offer targetted help.

He added: “In the case of Jobs Credit, it applies to all companies big and small, all industries. In the case of ESC, we will expect that some of the incentive programmes will be targeted at companies that are committed to upgrade their abilities, to expand capacity.”

The Jobs Credit Scheme had previously been criticised as being too blunt a tool.

The Spur training scheme though, will remain in place for the year as Mr Lim said the bottleneck for next year is more likely to be skills development rather than job creation. – CNA/vm

2010 job market outlook remains bleak

Massive recovery of employment market not expected next year
[Source: ChannelNewsAsia]

SINGAPORE: It has been one of the worst recessions Singapore has faced since independence and the nation has taken several approaches to tackle it.

The government, employers and workers have made a collective effort to cut costs and save jobs. And for the first time, Singapore has drawn on its past reserves to fund a major resilience package.

The economic downturn started in the middle of 2008 and the economic situation worsened as it spilled over into the new year. The government responded by bringing the Budget forward to January 2009, announcing a S$20 billion resilience package.

Liang Eng Hwa, deputy chair, Government Parliamentary Committee (Finance and Trade and Industry), said: “We need to build more resilience in the economy so that in the event there is another downturn of this magnitude, Singapore will not be that badly affected. Secondly, this crisis also drives home the point that we need to maintain high reserves and have a strong fiscal position.”

With the use of past reserves, the Jobs Credit scheme was launched to help companies reduce labour costs and save jobs through cash grants. The scheme has been extended for six months till June 2010.

More than S$3.6 billion of Jobs Credit would have been paid out by the government after its fourth payment on December 24. Another two, stepped-down payments in March and June 2010 will cost the government another S$675 million.

“The six months, hopefully, will be helpful to companies as they start to build new orders for the businesses, find new markets and if need be, further restructure the business so that they can stay viable for the long term,” said Mr Liang.

Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office and NTUC’s secretary-general, Lim Swee Say, said: “For Singapore, we are already looking beyond Jobs Credit because we know Jobs Credit is not here to stay. So the tripartite partners are now working very closely… asking ourselves how we can be cheaper, better and faster.

“Being cheaper means enhancing our productivity so that every piece of equipment and worker can produce more output, so that we can reduce the costs of doing business and enhance our competitiveness.

“The good news is that many countries are thinking along the same way, but in Singapore, we are one step ahead of them. That’s because the trust and unity among the tripartite partners during the downturn were not weakened but in fact, further strengthened. As a result, come 2010, the tripartite partners are able to run together, ahead of the competition elsewhere.”

The Economic Strategies Committee was formed earlier this year to focus on developing and recommending strategies to grow Singapore’s future as a leading global city in the heart of Asia. Its report is expected to be released at the end of January 2010.

Mr Liang said: “I have spoken to many business people and they have told me that they prefer to have a more steady growth, even though the growth may be at a lower rate, as opposed to high growth where there will be volatility.

“Businesses want to have some stability and certainty so that they can plan for the longer term. Excessive volatility tends to attract a risk premium to the business and thereby increasing overall costs.

“I would hope that the next phase of growth would be smart growth. In the last three to four years, we have seen strong growth in our economy. While it is good to have strong growth, it has also caused other problems. We have seen bottlenecks in certain segments of the economy, we have seen costs risen and that has led to inflationary pressures, eroding our competitiveness.

“I think we have to be careful where our bottlenecks and constraints are, and identify our comparative advantages, play on our niches so that we can have targeted growth where there is potential.”

Also witnessing its fair share of ups and downs is Singapore’s labour market, which has seen some improvements in the past few months.

Even though Singapore’s economy appears to be recovering, the Ministry of Manpower said it will take some time before its employment situation stabilises.

Manpower Minister Gan Kim Yong said: “One main reason is that many of the employers have held on to excess workers in the recession because of the various measures we have put in. Therefore, as the economy recovers, many of these employers will tap on the excess manpower and capacity that they have before they start to expand and recruit new workers.

“Recruitment and employment opportunities will typically lag behind economic recovery and therefore it is important for us to take that into account while the economy recovers. Over the next twelve months, we expect the employment market to remain more or less stable, but we do not see a massive recovery of the employment market.

“It is important for us to continue to help workers who are affected as it will take some time for them to get back to the job market. It is important for us to continue to train them and give them skills.

“It is also important to remember that many of the new opportunities that are coming along after the recovery will be new investments and they will have new skill sets. So we have to prepare our workers, train them and upgrade them so that they will be able to tap the new opportunities.”

Asked about some of his key concerns for workers as Singapore recovers from the global downturn, Mr Gan explained that he is always worried about the employment of workers.

He said: “At the moment, we have some 20,000 jobs which are immediately available on our database. We have 14,000 job-seekers on our register and this has come down significantly from the peak.

“Theoretically, they should match each other and we should have excess jobs short of workers. But we could not match them because of a variety of reasons. Skills mismatch is one – therefore training is one – and expectation is another factor.

“We need to send some of these workers for career counselling so that they would have a realistic expectation as to what kind of jobs they can do. It is also important to enhance their basic employability skills.

“Some of them have not worked in a big company before, so interpersonal skills, how to deal with your superior and peers are important employment skills… We have done much better in this recession than in the previous one because we have paid a lot of attention to helping the workers prepare themselves for employment rather than just simply job matching.”

For 2010, Singapore’s Trade and Industry Ministry has forecast economic growth of between 3 and 5 per cent.

Fancy job titles can raise workers’ morale

[Source: mypaper, 21 Dec 2009]

I REFER to Mr Jeffrey Law Lee Beng’s letter, “Dump fancy, meaningless job titles” (my paper, Dec 18).

It has long been acknowledged that many Singaporeans shun certain jobs because of poor pay, drudgery and lowly status.

Many who hold such jobs would not be keen to share their designations with friends and family, as they bear negative connotations.

While a fixation on status has led to an increase in the number of fancy job titles, such as “sanitation officer” for toilet cleaners and “customer- service executive” for sales staff in shops, there is really no harm in conferring such titles on employee

As Mr Law admitted, such designations could instil a sense of dignity in workers and spur them to provide better service.

After all, if such titles could alter employees’ mindsets, they would perform better than if they had no pride in their jobs.

And using fancy titles, though a small gesture, is a painless effort that could reap significant dividends if Singaporeans become more accepting of such jobs and do them well.

The salaries for such positions are low and there are few rewards and benefits.

Let us not begrudge those who take them up their fancy titles.

MR ADAM LEO ISIDORE TAN

Step out of your comfort zones, Singaporeans!

Refer to the following letter from Mr Jeffrey Law in today’s MyPaper (Dec 11)

I REFER to the letter, “Pay too paltry in those jobs Singaporeans shun” (my paper,Dec 10).

Various reasons have been given for why Singaporeans are leery of certain jobs, and we should determine if they are valid.

A monthly salary of $1,000 is meagre in Singapore, where the cost of living is high, but, then, one should also consider the nature of the particular job.

It is not cost-effective to pay,say, a general worker in a coffee shop more than that amount.Ditto for a pump attendant at a petrol station.

Salaries are usually commensurate with the work and one’s skills, experience and qualifications

While it may sound cliched, a respectable company would not want to pay peanuts to get monkeys. Money aside, many Singaporeans dislike working shifts and irregular hours.

In our vibrant business environment,most companies such as banks and retail outlets operate long hours and even on weekends.

Gone are the days when most people worked from 9am to 5pm. As Singapore has progressed from Third World to First World, our mindsets should move in tandem with the rapid changes, lest we get left behind.

It is ludicrous to decline a job offer just because one has to travel to a remote area to work and travelling from one end of the island to the other should not be considered a bugbear.

Besides a good public-transport system, many companies also provide free transport for employees to and from work.
In neigbouring countries, it is common for workers and students to travel for two hours to their workplaces and schools. In other words, they leave home before dawn breaks and return home late.

The corporate world is becoming increasingly competitive and, unless Singaporeans emerge from their comfort zone, they will find it difficult to compete with foreigners for jobs.

MR JEFFREY LAW LEE BENG

Mr Law brought up some rather valid points in my opinion, and I have to agree to some of the views he brought up, while disagreeing with others. Incidentally, I don’t really like the use of the words “First World” and “Third World” to describe developed and emerging economies — the terms smack of colonialist prejudices, in my opinion.

That aside, I have to say that in my line of work, I am amazed sometimes when candidates tell me they reject a job offer because (as Mr Law points out) of the need to travel from, say Sengkang to Jurong East– some of these people drive, for goodness sakes, and it makes you wonder about the sincerity and commitment of these candidates. I also had candidates (both male and female) who tell me they don’t want to work in an environment that requires them to go out in the sun too often, and these are people who are supposed to be engineers!

However, I do disagree with viewpoints that perhaps people should be less fussy about salaries. Yes, most companies pay reasonably and commensurate with job expertise, experience and qualifications, but there is a huge difference between taking a 10-20% paycut, and a job that demands you do the exact same thing but only compensates the person 40% (or in excess) less than what they were paid previously. Case to highlight: I once had a candidate who was paid about $8,000 a month as a plant manager in a factory, but following the closure of his plant due to the economic downturn and bad business, decided to take up a position as an operations manager in another company that paid him $5,000 a month. When I presented him to a client, a renowned multi-national corporation, I was surprised that they overlooked his credentials and achievements and assessed him to be “worth” only $6,000 a month. I had thought that surely being an MNC, and in recognition of his contributions at his first company (he stayed there for close to 10 years), he would be offered something closer to his original $8,000 a month salary, but instead someone must have decided the pay-cut he took was an opportunity to pay “peanuts” to get a golden goose.

I would, however like to reiterate one point that Mr Law brought up to my fellow Singaporeans: foreign competition. Law Minister Mr K. Shanmugam commented in today’s Straits Times that “Singapore’s openness to foreigners enables the economy to thrive” [link here] and he was talking about how Singapore should join the “war for talent” to attract more talents into Singapore. What this means is that if Singaporeans do not step out of their “comfort zones” when it comes to jobs, there will always be that one foreign talent who will– and it would be a mistake to think these foreigners are necessarily less qualified or less experienced to want the jobs that Singaporeans shun.

[this post can also be found on my blog at http://sgheadhunter.wordpress.com]