The hotel industry is crucial to Singapore’s tourism sector, as it plays an important role in being a “home away from home” for tourists and international travellers alike.
While it’s known as “the business of happiness”, the easing of travel restrictions in the post-pandemic economy has led to much change in the hotel industry, as hotel chains evolved and improved their service offerings and procedures.
It’s no different for The Ascott Limited (Ascott), a Singaporean company that has grown to be one of the leading international lodging owner-operators. Locally, it conducts regular job scope reviews based on factors such as existing work processes, productivity levels, and the number of man-hours required to complete a given task.
The company’s director for Human Resources, Linda Ong shared: “Through these reviews, job roles that need to be redesigned can then be identified and discussed in greater detail for redesigning.”
What are the goals of job redesigns and why the need for reskilling?
Linda explained that for Ascott, the main objective is to reskill and grow their staff by letting them participate in training that include hands-on experience.
This serves as a foundation for their career advancement and personal development should they decide to transition and move on to a new role within the Ascott organisation.
Employees can also look forward to a higher salary based on their expanded job scope, and the possibility of meaningful career advancement.
This, in turn, allows Ascott to groom and retain high performers as well as implement a more robust succession plan with more engaged and motivated staff.
The company has redesigned three job roles in recent years:
- Guest Services: Previously only performing front desk roles, they now include engineering and housekeeping duties
- Technician, Engineer: Previously only engineering duties, this now includes security duties
- Security Officer: Previously only security duties, but now covers engineering duties
We understand, the anxiety with change is real
For Shaik Mohamad Bin Shaik Dawood, a 44-year-old supervisor for facilities and safety at Ascott, there was some anxiety mixed with excitement when he was asked to participate in a job redesign programme in 2021.
This programme identified employees from Ascott’s engineering and security departments, who would work together as a multi-skilled team through intensive on-the-job training.
The aim was to make both teams more knowledgeable and multi-skilled to perform additional tasks, allowing them to assist one another when there are multiple job requests or cover one another when facing manpower shortages.
Shaik joined Ascott in 2016 and previously had over 15 years of engineering-related experience within the hospitality industry.
Through the redesign programme, he was trained to take on security duties through on-the-job training and had completed 3 Singapore Workforce Skills Qualifications (WSQ) certified security license courses.
WSQ is a national credential system that trains, develops, assesses and certifies skills and competencies for the workforce.
The new skills will enable Shaik to carry out security patrolling and handle security incidents in addition to his usual engineering-related duties. Such Career Conversion Programmes (CCPs) would also allow him to command a higher salary and, thus, be better able to support his family.
For some context, CCPs are conversion programmes targeted at mid-career individuals here in Singapore, to undergo skills conversion and switch to new jobs or sectors that have good prospects and opportunities for progression.
Workforce Singapore (WSG) offers close to 100 CCPs across around 30 sectors to help mid-career individuals reskill and make a successful career switch.
Shaik shared: “I was also a little anxious as I was not sure if I will be able to cope upon learning that I need to attend three WSQ certified security license courses and complete on-the-job training, while concurrently performing my usual job responsibilities.
“But with the support of my wife, I was able to concentrate fully on the on-the-job training as well as attaining the certification for the three WSQ Security courses, while she takes care of our four children.
In fact, the on-the-job training that included hands-on experience has equipped me with the necessary skills and knowledge needed to perform my new role effectively!
“Ultimately, my earlier worries were unfounded, as the courses deepened my learning curve and provided me with the opportunity to acquire new skills and knowledge in security operational functions,” Shaik concluded.
Change is inevitable, but it’s a win-win ultimately
The future of work in the hotel and hospitality industry will certainly continue to change, with artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics taking an increasing role in customer service and behind-the-scenes operations. But human and local workers will still matter, and job redesign and reskilling will continue as companies evolve.
Linda shared: “The use of AI and robots has opened enormous opportunities for the hospitality industry. In the labour-strapped hospitality industry, the Ascott Robotic Intelligent Assistant (ARIA) can assist in offloading the high volume of repetitive tasks that staff must perform in a timelier manner, so that those employees may focus on providing customer-centric services or on strategic and planning work.
Ultimately, Ascott is conscious of the importance of upskilling its staff with upgrading and development opportunities.
Their staff get to enhance their skill set, add value to their respective job roles, and improve their decision-making abilities, which also enables the organisation to retain its employees for a longer period, she concluded.
(Image Credit: The Ascott Limited)
