A total of 68 hotel employees were awarded the Employee of the Year award for their excellent performance and commendable service at the Productivity Seminar cum Awards Presentation Ceremony jointly organised by the Food, Drinks and Allied Workers Union (FDAWU), National Trades Union Congress (NTUC), and Singapore Hotel Association (SHA).
Into its 34th year, the ceremony was held on 14 July 2016 at Four Points by Sheraton Singapore.
In his speech as guest-of-honour, NTUC Deputy Secretary-General (DSG) Heng Chee How said: “Because of globalisation, easy air travel and technological advancements, customers today have a whole range of choices and have very high expectations.
“Customers and reputation can be lost if poor service is rendered and visitors go away dissatisfied or with unpleasant memories. Hence, a dynamic and service-oriented industry is imperative.”
To continue providing excellent service, hotels must invest in the training and skills upgrading of their employees, he added.
One award winner, Village Hotel Katong by Far East Hospitality Guest Service Executive Trezor Yew, said: “I represent not only myself but the hotel I work for. When I provide good service, and the customers are happy, my hotel gets a good name too. And this is why I always strive to give my best. I love my job and I want to see the industry improve in the area of guest service.”
Productivity Idea Award
In addition, Marina Bay Sands (MBS) and RC Hotels (Fairmont Singapore & Swissotel the Stamford) were honoured with the Productivity Idea Award for implementing productivity initiatives at the workplace.
Inaugurated in 2010, the award aims to encourage hotels to innovate and implement productivity initiatives by streamlining work processes, redesigning jobs and leveraging technology.
MBS set up a housekeeping taskforce comprising 12 team members across the front office guest relations, guest services, and housekeeping teams in January 2015.
The task force set out to achieve a reduction in the number of guests waiting for their rooms at the official check-in time of 3pm as well as reduce the number of rooms that have to be made-up by 4pm
“Prior to implementing the productivity model, we were not able to effectively forecast hotel room demand or cross-deploy resources whenever demands peaked. There was also a great amount of manual reporting on hotel room statuses, which is a process that is being automated via data triangulation.
“Today, our room scheduling reports are updated in real time and refreshed every 15 minutes, thereby allowing efficient room assignment,” said an MBS spokesperson.
Inaugural Award
The ceremony also saw the presentation of the inaugural NTUC’s e2i (Employment and Employability Institute) Productivity Awards to 11 hotels for championing productivity initiatives in the industry.
“e2i has been working closely with FDAWU and SHA in the areas of equipping organisations with the right tools to create better jobs, raise productivity and skill up workers. The awards aim to recognise companies for their continuous commitment and achievements in improving productivity and creating higher efficiency jobs.
“We commend the efforts of these outstanding companies for being proactive in the implementation of productivity initiatives to streamline and improve businesses operations,” said e2i CEO Gilbert Tan.
