CONNECTING AND GROWING AT SINGTEL

Sustainable business success entails ensuring a strong pipeline of talent – having the right people in the right roles at the right time.

We look out for strong candidates even before they join the workforce. Through our Management Associate Programme and various scholarship programmes, we identify and coach young talent with leadership potential.

We have comprehensive processes in place to identify high-potential employees starting at the team level and rolling up to the Singtel Board Talent review. Our review process was enhanced in 2013, enabling us to double the size of talent identified in this pool.

Our flagship global executive development programmes continue to be reviewed and updated to build the leadership pipeline and talent bench strength across the company. In FY2014, our high-potential young executives from Singtel, Optus and our regional mobile associates attended the Regional Leadership in Action programme, a learning experience designed to stretch their thinking, provide new concepts and support more regional collaboration and peer learning.

PROVIDING THE RIGHT TOOLS

Our approach to learning and development takes into account that our talent pool is truly global, from diverse cultural backgrounds spanning multiple generations – from Baby Boomers all the way to Millennials.

One of the most popular events on our learning calendar is the annual Singtel Learning Fiesta (SLF), which has been growing from strength to strength since its introduction in 2008. It provides access to well-known keynote speakers and new business showcases. It also offers short courses and activities that cover a wide range of topics such as innovation, technology, health and well-being, and personal development. Held over four days, SLF 2013 covered more than 70 topics and almost 15,000 training places across Singapore, Australia and, for the first time, the US.

We further empower our people by providing the tools to plan and take charge of their own professional development. Career development is embedded into our performance management process so that employees can track their growth.

WORKING THE WAY WE LIVE

As a communications company in the digital media business, the way we work and engage with one another must reflect the ubiquity of social media and mobile technology.

A key resource for engaging and enabling our people is ESPRESSO, our internal social network that connects our global workforce. ESPRESSO provides an open and integrated forum for reading company announcements, providing feedback to leaders or just sharing information.

To help our people stay connected on the move, we developed mobile app versions of ESPRESSO, our employee directory and HR systems. Our learning and development and recruitment mobile apps provide a highly interactive participant experience that includes gamification.

CELEBRATING OUR WORKPLACE

We promote a fair, performance-based culture anchored on our five core values of Customer Focus, Challenger Spirit, Teamwork, Integrity and Personal Excellence.

We understand the importance of flexible working arrangements, and supplement our annual leave policies with other forms of family leave. We also provide paid time-off for studies and volunteer activities.

Our reward policies are competitive against industry peers with a strong focus on paying for performance. We remain relentlessly committed to a safe, healthy work environment, and foster a proactive and collaborative partnership with employees directly, as well as through the Union of Telecoms Employees of Singapore. Our Employment Partnership Agreement in Australia, a collective agreement made directly between Optus and employees since 1994, was renewed in late 2012 for another three years.

We have progressed from defining employee engagement in terms of how our people think, feel and act, to also asking if employees feel enabled and energised. In 2013, we introduced a new dimension to our employee engagement survey to understand to what degree our employees are also our advocates – for instance, if they recommend Singtel as a workplace and if they recommend our products and services to friends and family. Our goal is to instil and strengthen pride in being part of Singtel.