Singapore Budget 2016: Foreign worker levy increase deferred in marine and process sectors

It has been announced during the Singapore Budget 2016 for the amendments to the Work Permit Holders Levy Schedule. 

It should be noted that all of the sectors have an increase in the Levy Rates except for the Marine, Process and Manufacturing Sectors. This reflects the government’s stance towards encouraging companies to hire more Singaporeans and to reduce their dependence on foreign labour. The decision to strengthen the “Singaporean Core” is still very much emphasized. 

It is more interesting to understand the reasons why foreign worker levy increment in Marine and Process Sectors are deferred. The reason that was provided is because of “reduction of Work Permit holders and this sector’s challenging business conditions” 

All employers should take note that the effective date of change of Levy Rates are on 1st July, 2016 and should account for this into their hiring practices. The Construction Sector should note that there is a further increase in the levy rates on 1st July, 2017. 

To encourage companies to retain experienced workers to enhance productivity in the Construction and Process Industries from the Non-traditional sources, the minimum experience requirement for man-year entitlements (MYE)-waiver workers will be increased from two to three years, effectively from 1st July 2017.

Source:
http://www.straitstimes.com/business/economy/singapore-budget-2016-foreign-worker-levy-increase-deferred-in-marine-and-process

5 Ways to Never Burn Bridges

You have finally submitted your resignation letter and heave a sigh of relief. Your next concern should be how to leave on a good note – positively and professionally; regardless of your reasons for leaving the company.

Inform your Superior in Advance

Arrange a meeting with your superior to inform your resignation. Do it discreetly and never share with anyone else before your superior. (You do not want words to spread even before she knows it from you.)  It is a good gesture that superiors will appreciate if they have sufficient time to source for replacement, most of the time. Be tactful when you are informing your superiors. You’ll want to leave on a good note. Remind yourself who will be the one writing your testimonials to secure your next employment.

Fulfill your Responsibilities Till the Last Lap

With limited time, do your best to fulfil your exiting responsibilities and proper handover. Stay accountable for the work that you have on hand even before you even hand over to the next colleague taking charge. You want the transition to be orderly and positive. Check with your superior on how you should tie up the loose ends. Stay a little later at work if you need to, just to assist the team in clearing the loose ends. Remember the one who is hit the hardest is your replacement.

Give Guidance to your Replacement

Help your superior by guiding your replacement well. No else knows your work processes and job responsibilities better than you do. Your superiors and replacement will be thankful to you because training employees are time-consuming and costly. If you do not have sufficient time to guide your replacement, spend some time to script your daily tasks and processes as a handover and remain contactable even after you’ve left. Keep the lasting impression going even when you have left. 

Participate in the Exit Interview

Some organisations will conduct exit interviews to seek opinions on a few components. The components can include the intensity of your role, your overall view of the organisation and to even evaluate your superior. Be sure that you are ready to be tactful during the exit interview process. Never go in with the mentality to speak negatively.

Keep Good Connections

Always offer to assist in any ways. Keep good connections with your ex-colleagues. Ultimately, you would also have forged friendships over the course of your employment. These connections might be useful for you in future. Make this easier by using a free platform commonly known as LinkedIn.

How to get a "YES" from the right candidate?

It is really no point attracting the right candidates, only to be rejected later. Not only do we understand how long it takes to nurse that broken heart – we also understand how much resources you have wasted such as your precious time. 

Over-Promise

Funny getting this as a reminder from a Recruitment Company? This is the fundamentals and we practise this daily in our course of work. Do not oversell your company’s expansion plans or company’s profile, or the amount of exposure or professional development plans you have for the right candidate. You might be able to get the right candidate to say YES for now, but definitely not for later when the right candidate is in your employment. You do not also want to be known as the workplace without integrity. 

It is fundamental for both the hiring manager, as well as the Candidate to have clarity on the roles and responsibilities and value of the roles and responsibilities. 

Understand your Competitors

Do your homework. You should understand not just competitors who are selling similar products or services, but other companies offering a similar position. To get your right candidate to say YES, you will need to understand his value first. Providing a low salary package would mean you do not appreciate his value, while providing a high salary package would mean you are overstating his value. 

Understand your RIGHT Candidate

What do your right candidate value? Through engaging your right candidate and understanding this, you can have this position closed not only now, but later. Employers need to understand what candidates value – and it is always not just the name of the position, or salary – but personal and professional growth. 

Every point of engagement would then represent an opportunity to share what you can offer, and to reinforce your employer branding and values. Convince them your workplace is the ideal choice. The best time to share this is during your orientation where they feel a part of your organization and is embraced into the culture. Provide opportunities for your new entrant to share about their challenges, and always provide an open communication between the reporting superior and the right employee. 

Respecting your Candidates

This means no last-minute cancellations, or having interviews with candidates after their interview time scheduled. You might have the bargaining power now – but not at the expense of your reputation. Letting candidates wait for you do not reflect candidate’s commitment and interest to the position, but it shows how your companies “respect” people.  

The emphasis of interview questions should be related to work instead of personal questions. Good candidates are more interested in sharing how they can contribute, and share what they have learnt over their past experiences. This also means you are transparent with your Candidates so as to clarify their expectations. 

Interviews are a two-way process. In this age, you are not just evaluating your candidates but candidates are evaluating you. Give a chance for your good candidates to ask questions. 

Short Response Time

Once you are done with the interview, please keep your response time short. You should inform candidates 2 days after their application or their interview if they have been shortlisted or selected. Candidates, especially good candidates will not wait for too long. 
You do not want to be the one crying over spilt milk. 

Ease Your Mind with Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO)

Some organizations have come to understand the significant importance of outsourcing the recruitment needs to recruitment firms. These days, HR are moving into the strategic roles and will want to reduce as much administration as they could, in order to focus on the planning and executing of strategic directions.

With RPO, HR can now finally let go of administrative works from their shoulders. Recruitment can really be a timeless and boundless process within the department. This process will repeat itself and HR practitioners will not like such monotonous nature in job. In fact, albeit spending time with administrative matters, HR practitioner always understands that efficiency in the key in delivery solutions. How much have these administrative matters tie you down and you realized that you were unable to sit down to resolve the key and prioritized matters?
Look for the right firms in supporting RPO, they are present to ensure that it lightens your loads in many areas of work such as scanning through resumes, communicating of job scopes, coordinating of interview arrangements and even offering and signing contracts with selected candidates.

While RPO firms help reduce the burden on administration, organizations can also further leverage on the pool of candidates. RPO firms will also have the eagerness and selfless plan to observe analytic trends and results. Not only does RPO firms provide administrative services, they may even help you on analytical data. RPO might even provide you wages and benefits comparison among different industries.

RPO firms would also want to position themselves as strategic partners. RPO would want to allow organizations see the importance needs for future growth. Having integrated both services would help organizations achieve great clarity in recruitment, administration and management affairs. It continuously builds the connections that can produce greater productivity.

Changes from MOM (Itemized Pay slip and Employee’s Records)

It is a good practice for employers to issue Itemized Payslip, then. It is now a must for all employers to issue an itemized pay slip, effective from 1st April 2016. 

This is a good practice to have an effective communication between both employers and employees. This reduces confusions and misunderstandings, and if your employees understand their itemized pay slip – it would lead to less calls and time spent on clarifying. With that time saved, you could spend more time strategizing about your other HR related matters. 

Employers are expected to issue your pay slip together with the payment of your employee’s salary, if not at most three working days later. In the case of dismissal or termination, it must be issued together with the outstanding salary. 

It is expected for employers to keep a detailed record of all your employees and their pay slips – whether hard or soft copy for a minimum of 2 years, regardless of whether the employee is still in employment. 

Having an Itemized pay slip would prevent confusions and misunderstandings. Details that are required in the Itemized pay slip that are legally complying to the employment act are:

•    Full name of Employer
•    Full name of employee.
•    Date of payment
•    Basic salary
      o    For hourly, daily or piece-rated workers, indicate all of the following:
            -    Basic rate of pay
            -    Total number of hours or days worked or pieces produced.
•    Start and end date of salary period.
•    Allowances, including but not limited to fixed and ad-hoc allowances. 
•    Any other additional payment for each salary period, such as:
      o    Bonuses
      o    Rest day pay
      o    Public holiday pay
•    Deductions made for each salary period, such as:
      o    All fixed deductions (e.g. employee’s CPF contribution).
      o    All ad-hoc deductions (e.g. deductions for no-pay leave)
•    Overtime hours worked.
•    Overtime pay.
•    Start and end date of overtime payment period
•    Net salary paid in total.

For Employees records, you are expected to keep the following information:

•    Address
•    NRIC Number (Singaporeans)
•    For Non-Singaporeans, work pass number and expiry date
•    Date of Birth
•    Gender
•    Start of Employment
•    End of employment
•    Working Hours, including duration of meals and tea breaks.
•    Date and other details of public holidays and leave taken. 

This arrangement, although tedious, is able to both help you and your employee. Blank Pay slip can be found on MOM page.

Source: 
http://www.straitstimes.com/singapore/manpower/firms-to-issue-itemised-payslips-from-april-1-as-changes-to-employment-act-kick
http://www.mom.gov.sg/employment-practices/salary/itemised-payslips
http://www.mom.gov.sg/employment-practices/employment-records

Attracting the Right Candidates

You could have posted a job advertisement recently and have seen a steady stream of applicants. In our years of experience as being a recruiter, number of candidate do not necessarily equate to how effective your posting really is. In fact, the more number of applicants you have, the longer time is needed to filter candidates who really meet your requirements. 

To evaluate your effectiveness, you should think of how many RIGHT candidates the job posting really attracts. The following are tips for you to attract the right candidates, and you got it right – we’re sharing our little secrets of success to you. 

Concise Job Description

There is an indirect relationship to the length of your Job Description and how effective you really are. In addition, state your salary range upfront. Candidates will self-select their own applications, and this means a step lesser for you. Candidates who are on the lookout for jobs do not just apply for one company – but many companies. With that in mind, how much time do you think they will set aside to read your lengthy job description? 
Think about the number of quality candidates you will lose – and I mean the candidates who would really read through every job description before applying for the job with your lengthy job description with complex languages.

Streamline Application Process

Application process with steps A – Z would make candidates lose interest in it if it is too much hassle and time-consuming. You are only allowed to have a very complex application process when you can have an unbeatable employer branding. To simplify the process, you could allow candidates to easily upload their resume which they have already spend their time and effort doing. 

Usage of Job Portals

Think about who is your right candidate, and then act on it. Talk to your sales representative from different portals to understand which target audience are the portals attracting, and how effective their job portals are in attracting your RIGHT candidate. 

Be Worthy

Be concerned about your employer branding. Be very concerned. Employer branding does not equate to sky-high salary and awesome benefits and big organizations with operations in different countries – but proper management, opportunities for personal and professional growth as well as to feel recognized.  
That’s what good candidates are looking for anyway.