In light of the changing business environment in the competitive chemicals manufacturing industry, the Chemical Industries Employees’ Union (CIEU) has been actively engaging tripartite partners to explore new ways of helping both workers and employers adapt.
One such engagement was the recent CIEU Tripartite HR Dialogue. Held on 25 April 2019, it was attended by CIEU union leaders, Ministry of Manpower (MOM) representatives and management partners from 22 unionised companies.
The dialogue’s agenda was focused on how the parties could better collaborate to help workers pick up new skills and knowledge to adapt to challenges in the work place. At the same time, the dialogue gave the tripartite partners an opportunity to interact and build a common understanding.
Management partners got to share how their businesses are being impacted and challenges they face in the workplace. CIEU shared their efforts in developing accessible bite-sized courses together with institutes of higher learning like Singapore Polytechnic. There was also the opportunity to explain the win-win potential of the company training committees for both employers and workers. For the MOM representatives, the dialogue was an opportunity for them to get ground feedback from companies and share updates to policy, such as amendments to the Employment Act, and the available support the Government has for employers.
A common thread that ran through the dialogue was the collective intentions of all parties to collaborate and ready themselves for a more digital workplace.
CIEU Executive Secretary James Tan shared that CIEU is committed to work with employers to deal with the ever-changing work environment. He also urged companies to give their workers some time to adapt to the changes and iterated that the tripartite partners work together to achieve the collective goal of doing better.
