By: Mrs Yu-Foo Yee Shoon, Minister of State for Community Development, Youth and Sports
9.15 AM AT THE GRAND COPTHORNE HOTEL
Distinguished Speakers and Delegates
Ladies and Gentlemen
It is my pleasure to join you this morning.
I congratulate the Asia Business Forum for organising this timely conference on how organisations can create a conducive environment for people to achieve greater success in the corporate world, and in turn harness their human resources to help the organisation scale new heights. The attraction, retention and development of talent at the workplace indeed produce win-win outcomes for both the organisation and staff.
The War for Talent
In this Information Age with global interconnectivity, people have become the prime source of competitive advantage. Talented people have better ideas, execute those ideas better and even help make others better. They uplift the entire organization. They also make the country strong.
The knowledge-based global economy, with the stress on brain rather than brawn, opens up new and greater opportunities for women. Women's communication skills and management styles are increasingly recognized as critical and relevant for enhancing the company's productivity and competitiveness. Today, we are seeing more women at the helm of traditionally male-dominated industries, such as information technology, telecommunications and logistics. For example, the current Group Chief Executive Officer of SingTel, one of Asia's largest communications company, Chua Sock Koong is a woman. The chief of public transport operator SMRT Corporation, Saw Phaik Hwa is also a woman. I am convinced that women will have many more opportunities to do well in the future. This is an unstoppable trend, just like globalization.
With greater exposure to education and training, women nowadays want to fulfill their personal aspirations at work and at home. Our female labour force participation rate has increased 8.7 percentage points from 45.6% in 1986 to 54.3% in 2006. The better educated, younger women want to be equally effective as their male counterparts in the workplace.
However, it is certainly not easy for women to harmonise their multi-variate responsibilities at home and at work. Statistics have shown that women generally spend more of their non-paid work time on family, domestic activities and elder care than men. Some subsequently drop out of the labour force to care for the family. This is not an easy decision for women to make, considering the time they have invested in education and training. The government and organizations should therefore introduce family-friendly policies and provide flexible work arrangements and family support services to retain their female talent, and attract women back to the workforce.
Work-life Harmony Makes Business Sense
To come up tops in the war for talent, it is important for an organisation to market itself as the Employer of Choice. Men and women nowadays are looking for employers that provide them with a value proposition to manage their work responsibilities, alongside their personal and family needs.
Research has shown that work-life harmony is a strategic business tool to attract and retain talent - both male and female. A recent worldwide poll of 138 recruiting firms by the Association of Executive Search Consultants found 85% had candidates who rejected an executive job offer in the past year because they couldn't get the flexibility they were seeking. The inaugural National Work-life Harmony Study jointly commissioned by my Ministry and the National Family Council also confirmed that employees with supportive employers exhibited greater job loyalty, satisfaction, engagement and performance. The companies experience lower job attrition. So work life harmony is not just an HR strategy; it is a win-win business proposition for both employees and employers.
The changing workforce demographics and expectations of employees, especially the younger workers, are affecting the ability to hire in the corporate world. The Families and Work Institute has found that, while employees today are working longer and harder in more demanding jobs than employees 25 years ago, there is a downward trend in aspirations among all employees in the US. Thirty-four percent of women and 21% of men have reduced their aspirations. They prefer not to move into jobs with more responsibilities. Sixty-seven percent of executives reduced their aspirations because of personal and family sacrifices.
Repercussions of these trends are being experienced by employers. To navigate the workforce challenges, companies are altering traditional incentive and career management programs. They are aligning their business strategy to worklife strategy to attract and retain talents, regardless of gender, age and marital status.
During my recent visit to the United States, I met up with some enlightened companies which have good work-life strategies. These companies are leaders in the field of workplace effectiveness and flexibility. Let me share some of the findings my officers and I gathered.
Ernst and Young has implemented sound family and medical leave practices which give employees strong reasons to remain with the firm. When parents choose to stop working after childbirth, the company stays in touch. They are open to a lot of possibilities if mothers want to come back sooner. Research revealed that 95% of female employees went back to work 2.2 years after childbirth. There is no professional penalty for harmonizing work and family. Men who are partners at Ernst and Young take their full paternity leave and most senior women take their full maternity leave, too. As a result, nearly all men and women at Ernst and Young who are eligible for parental leave take it.
Under Citigroup's Flexible Work Initiative, employees do not need to state their reasons for application. They need only demonstrate their ability to deliver an approved work plan. About one third of applicants have been men. Less than 10% of applicants have been turned down. Citigroup also offers childcare arrangements and an Elder Care Management System - a resource and referral service which offers six hours of free consultation each year to evaluate the needs of older family members.
Deloitte has created a mass career customisation process to retain top talent for the long-term, save on turnover costs and build a strong pipeline for the future. Mass career customisation is a systemic approach to redesigning how work gets done and how careers are built. It meets the needs of today?s knowledge workers who are clamouring for careers that move from one-size-fits-all to made-to-suit-me. Deloitte also stays in touch with employees who have left the firm or are on no-pay leave. Those on no-pay leave are eligible for training to ensure they are in touch with the industry.
What I have just shared are some of the new ways that the global companies in the US are adopting to make work ''work'' that benefit both employers and employees.
Singapore's Work-life Strategy
The promotion of work-life harmony in Singapore is spearheaded by the Tripartite Committee on Work-Life Strategy, which comprises employers, unions and the Government. First initiated by my Ministry in the year 2000, the Committee encourages employers to put in place work-life practices to help employees manage work-life demands and to optimise business performance. I am pleased to note that an increasing number of companies is embracing work-life harmony, not as something nice to have but as an important business strategy.
As Singapore's largest employer, the Public Service has implemented a number of work-life practices too. The five-day work week for the Civil Service was introduced in 2004. Many government agencies have flexi-work and tele-commuting arrangements as well as part-time schemes. The pro-family leave benefits such as paternity leave and child care sick leave for staff with children below the age of 12 years are well established. What the Civil Service seeks to do is to facilitate a range of work-life options, so that individuals and families, men and women, can make informed, viable life choices.
To further promote work-life harmony in the Public Service, every public sector agency will have a Work-life Advocate and Work-Life Ambassador. As the Work Life Advocate, the Deputy Secretary of each Ministry will champion work-life measures and ensure that work-life policies are in place and are working effectively. The Work-Life Ambassador will promote and facilitate the agency's day-to-day Work-Life programmes.
At the national level, to encourage companies to adopt work-life harmony as a business strategy, the Government has topped up the Work-Life Works! or the WoW! Fund with another $10 million to facilitate the implementation of work-life strategies.
Let me hasten to emphasize that effective work-life measures require mutual responsibility by both employees and employers. Employers' support for work-life friendly infrastructure and programmes will not be complete if individuals are not empowered to make informed decisions on their work, personal and family life. My Ministry therefore completes the equation by promoting Personal Work-life Effectiveness programmes to help individuals stay effective at work and at home, by generating awareness and equipping them with skills to integrate their multitude of responsibilities. We believe that our families, if not supported and recharged, will not be able to add productive talent to the future labour force.
Conclusion
The changing workforce and business environment have heightened the competition for top talents in a global labour force. Work-life harmony is an effective and indispensable business tool in the war for scarce talent. I urge all corporate leaders to embrace work-life harmony and create a workplace culture that supports and actively values both male and female talent. This is the way to go to enhance your business competitiveness. It is worth the investment!
On this note, I wish all of you a fruitful time of learning and sharing. Thank you.
MCYS SPEECH NO: 41/2007
DATE OF ISSUE: 24/08/2007