Event: Retirement & Reemployment in Singapore, ft. Minister for Manpower Josephine Teo (2 Jul 2019)

Retirement & Reemployment in Singapore, ft. Minister for Manpower Josephine Teo

On the 2nd July 2019 the Chamber was delighted to host Minister Josephine Teo, Minister for Manpower and Second Minister for Home Affairs in a special dialogue with members on retirement and re-employment policies in Singapore. 

Prior to the main event, which was hosted by our Official Future of Work Partner Prudential and with the support of our Official Diversity & Inclusion Partner Barclays, Minister Teo participated in a roundtable with HR leads from multi-national companies in our member network to hear their latest initiatives and views on this topic.

Mr Lee Pak Sing, Divisional Director for the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) Workplace and Strategy Division, gave an overview of the Singapore working-age population and proportion of older workers, highlighting that the latter is increasing at a faster rate and with life expectancy on the increase, a tripartite working group was formed in 2018 to address the specific issues faced in managing an older working population. and protecting the interests of these employees.

Minister Teo was then joined on stage by CEO of Mercer in Singapore, Peta Latimer, who moderated a conversation featuring Professor Wei-Jun Jean Yeung, Director of the Centre for Family and Population Research at NUS and Sheela Parakkal, Chief Human Resources Officer at Prudential Singapore.

The Minister shared that creating good employment outcomes for Singaporeans requires a strong enterprise sector with dynamic and inclusive businesses. Initiatives and programmes are available for businesses to partner with MOM to protect these employees and meet the needs of businesses in the future and it is important for employers to help people to plan their retirement and think about their future early and in a positive way. 

Prudential and other companies in the room shared their initiatives such as removing retirement age within company policy to avoid barriers for those wishing to extend their careers and looking into unconscious bias and management training for those who may have to manage employees from an older generation.