Companies Focus More on Career and Personal Progression of Their Staff

The Ministry of Manpower today issued its Employment Situation report for the fourth quarter of 2009 (4Q2009). With the economy firmly on the recovery track, job creation continued to rise as unemployment shrank. Total employment is estimated to have grown by 38,700 in 4Q2009, much higher than the gains of 14,000 in the earlier quarter.

For the whole of 2009, total employment jumped by 38,800 as job gains in the second half of the year more than offset the losses in the first half. With the strong employment growth, unemployment improved significantly to 2.1% in December 2009 from 3.4% in September 2009.

The bulk of employment gains came from services, which added 32,100 workers in 4Q2009. According to Robert Half Singapore, this was supported by hirings within the finance sector, boosted by increasing demand for permanent hires as companies recognise their importance in riding out a downturn. Robert Half also observes that organisations are now also looking to invest more heavily in the personal and career progression of their employees as they seek to retain their best people amid the fast-recovering job market.

The following are comments by Mr Tim Hird, Managing Director of Robert Half Singapore.

- The sentiment is one of optimism and a keen desire to gain a competitive advantage by hiring and retaining the best talent across most sectors, particularly in finance and accounting.

- Since the start of the year, the finance and accounting sector has been hiring at full speed, leading the way in hiring trends. In the past four months, several large financial institutions have announced plans for serious hiring in Asia, underscoring the brighter outlook for the sector.

- Permanent hiring has picked up more quickly now than in previous economic turnarounds. This time round, employees have really looked at their permanent hires as critical to the long-term growth and sustainability of their organisations.

- But while 2010 will see a continuation of permanent hiring, professional project staffing will also continue to grow. Many organisations are now carefully accessing the make-up of their teams, and are looking to putting a certain percentage of their overall workforce on contract labour so as to have better control over their compensation costs should there be another shift in the marketplace. Contract positions also continue to be popular in project-based roles where specific skill-sets are required.

- Despite the recently enlarged talent pool, skills shortage still exists in the finance and accounting industry. Apart from back-office positions like compliance, risk and accounting, demand is also strongest in client relationship and asset management — a business in which many banks wishes to expand to tap the growing number of increasingly wealthy Asian savers.

- Movements within the finance sector are also fast increasing in pace. However, with their expectations re-set by the downturn, many job seekers, are now no longer moving for money alone. Increasingly, they are looking at the financial stability of the organisation and for career progression (as oppose to salary progression).

- To prevent the sudden exodus of their people, organisations are starting to think harder about how they are going to provide personal and professional development to their people, especially their best talents. Key to this would be to not only identify opportunities for these people, but to continue communicating with them and empowering them.

The above commentary is contributed by Robert Half Singapore.