Transformation. Transitioning.
These are not just corporate buzzwords to unionist David Teo; he has lived through them.
Flashback to when the social media revolution was in full swing, and many people were pivoting from print to online news.
Mr Teo, then the president of the Singapore Press Holdings Employees’ Union (SPHEU), realised that the media and publishing industry had a tough road ahead. The union had to expand its representation beyond SPH to the wider printing, publishing, and journalism sectors to support its members more effectively.
His sentiments were echoed by the Singapore National Union of Journalists (SNUJ) leaders.
Both unions agreed to merge SPHEU and SNUJ to set up an industry union to represent more workers. The Creative Media and Publishing Union (CMPU) was formed in January 2015.
Mr Teo recounted: “I had to convince SPHEU’s executive committee [exco] leaders, branch officials, as well as union members on this desired vision and the way forward to amalgamate SPHEU with SNUJ.
“The unions needed to restructure its exco leadership to be reflective of the actual representation of the various sectors. I had to get buy-in from existing leaders to co-opt leaders from other new branches … I held many briefing sessions with the union leaders to explain the intent of this amalgamation and the impact on our members in terms of membership benefits and union representation.
“It was not easy, but we did our very best to cover all grounds, hear concerns from our members and address [these concerns] to give them assurances.”
The 59-year-old is today CMPU’s president. He recently received the Comrade of Labour (Star) award at the NTUC May Day Awards 2023.
Once CMPU was established, Mr Teo and the exco leaders had the arduous task of organising new branches to make it a full-fledged industry union.
He shared: “With the support from the NTUC, CMPU had our own union constitution to represent sectors beyond printing, publishing, and journalism.
“We were able to partner with companies in the creative media, digital gaming, advertising and e-commerce sectors, thereby achieving membership growth through outreach to a wider worker segment.”
Today, eight years on, CMPU has seen its membership grow more than threefold since its inception.
Between 2016 and 2021, SPH held a series of restructuring exercises that impacted many members.
When retrenchments were inevitable, the union sprang into action to help affected members.
Mr Teo elaborated: “We partnered with NTUC’s e2i (Employment and Employability Institute) [to provide] on-site career counselling during the retrenchment exercises.
“CMPU also supported them with a complimentary six-month union membership so they could use the Union Training Assistance Programme [UTAP] for personal skills upgrading.”
He built on his good labour-management relationship with SPH to ensure that members were fairly treated.
He said: “We had to look through the list of affected union members to ensure that the selection criteria were fair, avoid retrenchment exercises near festive periods, and take care of staff in special situations.
“Through years of good labour management relations, the union was able to ensure that the exercises were conducted properly and in a fair and dignified manner.
“It wasn’t easy to see my fellow colleagues, many of whom had worked in SPH for many years, some working alongside me, all leaving one by one on the last day.”
CMPU was to face another battle a few years later. SPH hived off its media business into a privately managed company known as SPH Media Trust in 2021 due to readership stagnation caused by the trend towards online content consumption.
The union stepped in once again to help affected employees.
Mr Teo elaborated: “Before SPH Media Trust was formed, the company had engaged the union and shared with us the sequence of events.
“We obtained direct recognition of the union from the new management to ensure our members continued to be represented, and we walked the ground to gather any concerns from our members during the various townhall briefings by the company.
“Union and management discussed these concerns, and we worked together to address them.”
CMPU also worked with the new management to harmonise the collective agreement by ensuring that terms would not be worse off for all groups of employees.
Mr Teo shared that members are currently concerned about their employability due to the industry's ongoing business and workforce transformation.
The union has formed NTUC Company Training Committees (CTC) with several branches to look into members’ reskilling and upskilling needs to boost their employability.
CMPU has also been holding dialogues with various management partners at the union and NTUC infocomm and media cluster levels.
Mr Teo said: “These would enable our companies to learn from each other and exchange pointers in areas of business transformation and human capital development.”
He also urges members to keep up with the changes by embracing lifelong learning.
He said: “It may not be an easy journey, but I would like to encourage you to take that step forward if you haven’t.
“CMPU will continue to reach out to more companies and partner with them in terms of training and human capital development.
“Our objective is simple – the outcome we want to achieve is for companies to do well through the support of the union and NTUC, and workers are rewarded fairly.”
Mr Teo reflected on his union journey and believes it to be tough but rewarding.
He elaborated: “Being a union leader requires you to be empathetic and patient when hearing members out.
“It wasn’t easy juggling between union work and fulfilling my obligations as an employee.
“[I learnt to] never take things for granted. I will always make it a point to engage our members on the ground, not taking any feedback from them lightly. Union leaders must constantly be on the ground to connect with our members and management partners.
“What’s rewarding for me is to see our members, my fellow colleagues, live a better life and enjoy good career prospects through the work that the union has done.”
Here is the list of all 128 individuals receiving the May Day Awards 2023.
