NTUC & ASME collaborate to intensify engagement on re-employment with SMEs in Singapore
JOINT MEDIA RELEASE
3 August 2009
1 At a national level, about 60% of the workforce in Singapore is employed by Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). Therefore, to better prepare more companies for the re-employment legislation in 2012, NTUC is collaborating with the Association of Small and Medium Enterprises (ASME) to reach out to more SMEs and intensify their efforts on re-employment.
2 Through a Community of PREPARE Employers, NTUC and ASME will adopt an integrated approach to galvanise the efforts on re-employment so as to create a sustainable platform for companies to learn and share good practices. As SMEs have different organisation structures from larger corporations and usually have less formalised human resource policies, this community will serve as a learning platform as well as offer targeted assistance to SMEs in both the unionised and non-unionised sector to make it easier for them to implement re-employment efforts. This will be supported by five main thrusts:
(a) To maintain the momentum on re-employment for existing committed companies;
(b) To create awareness for new companies to learn and commit on re-employment;
(c) To provide participating companies with the latest initiative and update on re-employment;
(d) To support participating companies to enhance their existing policy/practice in preparation for the re-employment legislation; and
(e) To be the channel for continuous feedback on re-employment issues and challenges for the tripartite partners.
3 To drive this PREPAPRE community, NTUC and ASME will organise a series of activities such as business networking sessions, dialogues, and learning journeys that will focus on helping companies to intensify their re-employment efforts. There will also be an activity-driven online portal(www.preparecommunity.com) which will provide ground assistance on the implementation of re-employment initiatives within their organisations. Through the web portal, smaller companies will also find useful resources to address their re-employment challenges on a step-by-step basis. This assistance portal will be launched on 3 August 2009.
4 The portal will help grow the Community of PREPARE Employers by:
i) Facilitating Continuous Engagement with participating companies enabling them to stay connected to the latest updates on re-employment. Through a team of re-employment project managers, they can also offer companies ground advice and guide them through the actual implementation process.
ii) Building Re-employment Capabilities through a series of seminars, workshops and learning journeys to model companies. In addition, the NTUC four-tier framework to categorise the level of commitment of companies to re-employment will be shared with all participating companies so that they can have a more structured approach to learn from and work towards. For more details on NTUC’s re-employment framework, please refer to Annex A.
iii) Offering Practical Assistance by enabling easy access to re-employment tools. Companies can request for help on how to communicate the re-employment policy to the staff level effectively. In addition, companies can attend also programmes such as the PREPARE (Programme for Re-Employment Practices: A Roadmap for Employers) programme, and READY (Re-employment: Developing And Equipping Yourself) to build up their expertise. For details on these programmes, please refer to Annex B.
iv) Promoting Re-employment Champions who will drive networking sessions and customise events that will be more relevant for employers. This is because the re-employment champions are also employers themselves who understand the ground issues faced by management. The aim is to create events “for employers by employers”.
v) Organising Ongoing Initiatives that will benefit the community as a whole such as translating the template on Re-employment policy to a Mandarin version for the ease of Chinese-speaking management. This template is a guide suggesting steps needed to implement a re-employment system, such as essential elements in a HR policy.
5 “Recognising that small businesses have less formalised organisational structures and HR policies, an activity-driven portal has been set up to offer targeted assistance to SMEs in both the unionised and non-unionised sectors to make it easier for them to implement re-employment efforts. I would like to take this opportunity to urge all companies to utilise the resources made available through this Community.” said Mr Lawrence Leow, President, ASME.
6 NTUC Deputy Secretary-General Heng Chee How said, "NTUC is an active champion of re-employment for older workers. Today, 75% of unionised companies are committed to re-employing older workers systematically. NTUC has also collected many examples of good practices in this area. Through this partnership with ASME, we will use our expertise to help many more companies, especially SMEs, get ready for re-employment ahead of the enactment of the Re-employment Law in less than three years. The success of this Community of PREPARE Employers will significantly increase the momentum for systematic re-employment throughout the economy."
7 Looking forward, ASME and NTUC will increase its momentum to help SMEs on board the re-employment ladder, so that as many companies in Singapore can be well-prepared when the re-employment law kicks in by 2012.
ANNEX A
NTUC has developed a four-tier framework to track the commitment level of unionised companies to re-employment initiatives.
Level 1 refers to companies that are already re-employing older workers, but on an ad-hoc basis.
Level 2 refers to companies that are already re-employing older workers and have a re-employment clause in their Collective Agreement or MOU with the unions.
Level 3 refers to companies that have a formalised HR policy on re-employment.
Level 4 refers to companies that are pro-actively seeking out new initiatives to ensure that their re-employment efforts are sustainable and scalable.
ANNEX B
ABOUT PREPARE™ PROGRAMME
Designed to prepare companies for the impending re-employment legislation which will be enacted by Jan 1, 2012, PREPARE™ (Programme for Re-Employment Practices: A Roadmap for Employers) provides guidance to companies in implementing good Human Resource (HR) practices as an integral part of their HR system to facilitate the re-employment of older workers. PREPARE™ programme adopts a comprehensive and integrated approach to the implementation of re-employment by focusing on six (06) main HR practices under one strategic framework.
Programme Benefits:
a) Policies, Procedures, Tools and Templates for Company’s Re-Employment;
b) Follow-Up Advisory by Experienced HR Practitioners and Experts from the Medical Fraternity;
c) Statement of Attainment (S.O.A.) for Individual under the WDA Singapore Workforce Skills Qualification System (WSQ);
d) Health Check Equipment for Setting Up of In-Company Health Check Corner;
e) 10 Complimentary Basic Health Screening (Basic Fasting) Vouchers by Alexandra Hospital and Jurong Medical Centre; and
f) Certificate of Attendance for Participating Company that have Successfully Achieved the Required Deliverables.
ABOUT RE-EMPLOYMENT: EQUIPPING AND DEVELOPING YOURSELF (READY) PROGRAM
In collaboration with the Centre for Seniors (CFS), NTUC piloted the READY program targeted at employees who are retiring within a year. The first class kicked off on 17 Feb 09 with over 50 older workers benefiting from the 1-day programme.
The programme is open for everyone. However, only seniors who are one year away from the retirement age of 62 will receive a 90% subsidy of the course fees. Therefore, the fee payable for them is only $14. For NTUC union members, they will enjoy a further discount of $4 off the course fees.
The program aims to:
