If you haven’t already heard, households and businesses can now buy electricity directly from retailers as part of the Open Electricity Market. What this means is that we can buy electricity based on what best suits our individual needs, just like how we choose our mobile plans.
The development is testament to just how quickly the energy and power sector is evolving, with technology and climate change among the key drivers. For example, users of the SP mobile app can now submit their own meter readings for more accurate billing. When smart meters get installed in the near future, it will even automate the process of collecting meter readings.
In anticipation of these changes, a Skills Framework for the energy and power sector has been launched with the purpose of translating these developments into skills and job opportunities for workers. It was announced by Minister for Trade and Industry Chan Chun Sing on 30 October 2018 at the Singapore International Energy Week (SIEW).
A Tripartite Effort
The framework was co-developed by the Energy Market Authority, SkillsFuture Singapore and Workforce Singapore in close collaboration with industry partners, institutes of higher learning and the Union of Power and Gas Employees (UPAGE).
With the framework, workers will be able to reference over 122 job roles across 11 tracks, including power generation, energy trading and portfolio management, electricity transmission and distribution and energy retail.
A total of 136 technical skills and competencies and 18 generic skills and competencies were identified in the framework. Some of the critical emerging skills and competencies include demand management operations, operational technology, security design, Internet-of-Things management and digital marketing management.
For more information, on the Skills Framework for Energy and Power, click here.
Workers Already Benefitting
While the Skills Framework for Energy and Power might have just taken flight, companies like SP Group have already been collaborating with UPAGE to help workers keep ahead of disruptions to their business.
Dubbed Project Fusion, workers in the company have been gradually undergoing training and upgrading to enhance their employability and even take on new work opportunities within the company.
One example is the progressive redeployment of meter readers like 34-year-old Asadullah Khalid (pictured) whose job is at risk of obsolescence when smart meters capable of remotely updating meter records are implemented. With sponsorship from the company, he upgraded his qualifications with a Nitec certificate in electrical engineering and has now taken on a new role as a smart meter technician. The company is also hoping to progressively redeploy its remaining team of meter readers in a similar fashion.
Elsewhere within the company, customer relations officers like 42-year-old Pearly Ha (pictured) are also in the midst of taking up new knowledge and skills as the company leverages technology to better attend to the needs of customers.
Building on its existing customer service capabilities, contact centre staff are being trained to work with a digital chatbot module that will act as an additional channel of communication between the company and its customers when it is launched.
“The job of a union is to ensure the progress of its workers. Project Fusion is part of the transformation where workers are being readied for new jobs that we are required to do by providing them with the necessary training. This is being done for all groups of the workforce from technicians to engineers…
“As the energy sector is increasingly being digitalised, decentralised and decarbonised, the Skills Framework for Energy and Power is a timely initiative that provides clarity on the pathways and competencies for our workforce. This complements the Government’s national SkillsFuture movement to build a strong culture of lifelong learning and skills mastery. This will enable Singapore to transform into an innovation-driven economy,” said UPAGE General Secretary Abdul Samad Abdul Wahab.
Click here to read how Asadullah and Pearly are taking steps to prepare themselves for transformation in their jobs.
