By Shukry Rashid
Small- and medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) play a very big part in the Singapore economy. They make up 99 per cent of Singapore’s enterprises, contribute to nearly half the gross domestic product and employ 70 per cent of Singapore’s workforce.
With the current tight labour market situation, how do SMEs cope with the lack of manpower? One of the initiatives by the Government is the Lean Enterprise Development (LED) Scheme launched in 2015 to help SMEs transform and grow in the new manpower-lean landscape. The Labour Movement has also been calling for SMEs to tap on technology and automate job processes, and at the same time move workers to value-added roles.
There’s a catch –not everything can be automated, according to BusAds Pte Ltd Director Alvin Yapp, 47, as he described the nature of his business as “labour-intensive”.
He said: “We can have a much faster printer, but at the end of the day, it is the human factor that makes the decision. For example, you can’t automate looking at the colour when you print a poster. We also don’t have the technology yet to automate the process of sticking a poster to a bus.”
BusAds, an NTUC U SME partner, is an advertising agency which started in 1983. As the name suggests, they started out on bus advertisement projects, mainly advertising on bus panels. Today, BusAds’ advertising services include banners and posters on buses, MRT trains, bus stops and aeroplanes.
Insourcing
So how did the company of 40 staff manage to achieve zero turnover and never had to turn down a project because of the lack of manpower in the past two years? Mr Yapp called his solution “insourcing”.
He explained: “We incentivise our staff for doing more. Instead of outsourcing to a third party, we pay our staff extra for doing things faster.”
For example, it took five men to paste posters on three buses. Now, they have three men for five buses – all while working the same amount of hours per day.
He added that this initiative allows his staff to be paid more than their usual overtime rate while costing him less than what he would have had to pay for a sub-contractor.
“It’s a win-win for everybody. Because they are paid extra, our staff take ownership of their income,” said Mr Yapp.
Technology Still Important
While he shared that technology can only play a marginal role for everyday tasks in his business, it has also enabled his company to be innovative in the advertising market.
He said: “Technology can not only make us do things faster, but also make us more creative.”
For example, the public can blow bubbles out of the light box advertisement at bus stops set up by BusAds. Their advertisements can also be interactive such as having a touch-screen for the public to use.
Recently, BusAds did a campaign for NTUC Health, which dispensed healthy nuts and raisins whenever the public did a yoga pose in front of a light box at a bus stop fitted with a camera. BusAds is also the first company in the world that is able to paste posters underwater without having to remove the water first.
Partnership with U SME
For the past year, Mr Yapp has been a valuable partner to U SME. He regularly meets other U SME partners to share best practices and exchange ideas. He was also one of the panellists during the recent SME Symposium 2017.
Looking forward, he plans to partner U SME to send his staff for upgrading courses for roles such as supervisory, sales and customer service.
Insider’s Guide
BusAds Pte Ltd
Established: 1983
Became an NTUC U SME partner in: May 2016
Did You Know: BusAds is the first company in the world that is able to paste posters underwater without having to remove the water first.
For more information, visit busads.com.sg.
Source: NTUC This Week
