Are Singapore companies wising up to attract top Talent?

Ten years ago, no one gave much consideration to Employer Branding but a simple search for the phrase ‘Employer Brand’ today brings up around 4.3 million hits on Google. As the war for Talent intensifies, organisations now realise that they can’t just rely on their consumer brand to recruit Talent – they have to do more. HR today is tasked to find bright minds that will give their company ‘the competitive edge’.

Moving from third world to join the league of first world cities in a matter of decades, Singapore has become a major commercial hub and financial centre to the world today. When it comes to attracting the world’s finest brains, Singapore definitely has what it takes to be a global Talent magnet… but, are Singapore companies matching up to promote themselves as the company of choice for the world’s best Talent?

In 2013, we conducted an in-house study of the top 30 companies on the Straits Times Index (STI) to see how they fare in terms of Employer Branding. After a series of website and job application evaluations based on factors that are most likely to influence a job seeker’s impression of a company, we found that the top companies were not taking hiring seriously enough.

One year on, we conducted a similar study in June 2014 to see what improvements had been made for 2014, and the results indicate that Singapore is on the right track but still not hitting the mark. 

Some of the statistics that stood out in the study included:

• Only 20% of Singapore’s leading companies have mobile-ready career websites. Webpage experience on the other 80% of companies is extremely poor.
• Fresh grads are increasingly in demand yet only 23% of companies have a section dedicated to graduate recruiting.
• 62% of Singaporeans have turned down jobs due to concerns with work-life balance but 53% of companies are not promoting their company culture effectively.

With the Fair Consideration Framework already in full force, Singapore-registered businesses will have to factor in an extra 14 days into the hiring process due to the new advertising rule on the National Jobs Bank administered by the WDA.

In addition to the increased administrative cost of processing Employment Passes (EP) as well as the qualifying salary of EP holders raised, these new regulations will negatively impact cost-per-hire and time-to-fill for organisations.

Employers tend to think that salary is the key determinant in attracting and recruiting talent but since 2012, the ‘people & culture’ attributes of an employer – such as ‘a friendly work environment’ - have been growing in significance. Remuneration and advancement opportunities today are considered as hygiene factors, according to Universum. 

Take a look at Google, Disney, McDonald’s, and Microsoft, every job seeker wants to be on their team. Get ranked as a top employer, and it’s considered half the battle won. It all starts with crafting a good Employee Value Proposition (EVP) that differentiates and attracts the right candidate suited for your company and culture.

Leverage on the Cloud-based recruiting platforms which have the capabilities to strengthen and deliver your Employer Brand across communication channels to help attract, engage, and hire Talent quickly and effectively.

Singapore’s climate for recruiting is only set to intensify in light of tightening foreign labour laws and increased mobility of local Talent lured by better opportunities overseas – who knows what’s in it for the future of Employer Branding in Singapore? In the fight for brainpower, it’s high time organisations learn to tell a compelling story of what it’s like to work for them and speak to fulfil the career desires of prospective candidates.

A copy of the complete report of the study can be downloaded here.