Learn how to improve worker productivity in this challenging economic outlook in this video!
At Workforce Singapore’s recent Career Health Summit, keynote speaker Professor Joseph Fuller, from Harvard Business School, revealed that Singapore’s worker productivity has fared poorer in recent years.
Held at the Suntec Singapore Convention and Exhibition Centre, the event was attended by more than 500 business leaders and HR practitioners.
He shared this insight during the Summit’s launch of Career Health SG, a new national initiative to support both employers and employees in career and workforce planning.
Manpower Minister Tan See Leng said during the event that employers are crucial in building up Singapore’s workforce, as they will know best what skills are worth investing in for employees.
How Career Health SG works for both workers and employers
For employers
- Companies can tap on initiatives, such as WSG’s Career Conversion Programme to reskill mid-career workers into growth job roles, and the SkillsFuture Enterprise Credit (SFEC) to offset up to 90% of out-of-pocket expenses incurred for SkillsFuture-supported programmes and courses.
- They can also consider joining the NTUC. Members have an entire slew of events under their Company Training Committees that will be available for companies and employers.
- MOM and SSG have partnered major job portals like JobStreet and FastJobs to help employers find the right candidates for their vacancies easier and faster.
- By linking government-verified employment and skills data via the Careers & Skills Passport with these portals, they can hire with greater speed and confidence. This is in addition to WSG’s MyCareersFuture, a national job portal that currently enables employers to better assess candidates’ job fit.
- Later in 2025, there will also be more resources launched to help employers assess the skills readiness of their workforce, identify suitable training interventions, as well as opportunities for job redesign to optimise the skills of their employees.
For workers
- Workers can visit the portal to explore the wide suite of available career-related programmes.
- Workers can connect with career coaches under WSG’s Polaris to chart their career journeys, or pursue a substantive skills reboot by tapping on resources like the SkillsFuture Level-Up Programme.
Going all-in on skills-first
He also advocated a skills-first perspective in recognising and using local workers, rather than focusing on hiring and promoting based on formal credentials.
“This will allow businesses to unlock even wider talent pools to stay ahead of the competition,” he said. He added that recent MOM studies showed employers who adopted skills-first practices hired quicker, had greater diversity with their hires, and showed improved worker performance.
Minister Tan concluded: “I want to humbly suggest to you that we cannot afford to wait until problems arise.”
“If we want our people and businesses to thrive, we need to be proactive and pre-emptive about career health and the entire journey that comes with it.”
Responding to a participant’s follow-up question in our “Ask Me Anything” video series, Professor Fuller further explained at the Summit the following:
- Why the statistics show a decline;
- What can employers do to improve productivity in this artificial intelligence (AI) driven age;
- Why productivity is inextricably linked to employee career health
Watch and learn more!
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