Employees Feel Companies Not Doing Enough to Upskill Them to Full Potential, More Can Be Done: NTUC LearningHub Survey

SINGAPORE – Media OutReach – 19 January
2021 – Despite more than half of employers (52%) reporting
insufficient employees with the right skill sets to achieve current business
goals, not enough is being done to upskill or reskill employees. Only one third
of employees (32%) agree or strongly agree that their company provide them with
the right training opportunities to enhance work performance, and almost half
(47%) are not confident that their current job will be able to support them in
their career growth.

These are some key findings
from NTUC LearningHub’s (NTUC LHUB) The New Normal of Sector Skills report. The
report gathered perspectives of 367 business leaders (senior managers or
directors and above) and 567 full-time employees working in Singapore with the
aim to assess the adequacy of training and employment opportunities for
employees across six major industry clusters.

In response to the lack of
training opportunities to enhance work performance, only one in four employees
(27%) agree that their potential is maximised at their workplace, and a large
majority of employees (71%) wish that their company provided more support to
help with the upgrading of skills.

Additionally, according to
employees the ‘lack of initiative from a company’ is one of the top reasons that they do not upskill (34%). The other
reasons include lack of time for training (55%), unsure of the skills to
upgrade in (42%), unsure
of the types of training resources (36%), as well as not knowing where
to begin (33%).

On the other hand, while
majority of employers (84%) indicate that it was necessary for the employees to
learn new skills due to changes brought about by COVID-19 to the business, only
65% say they have been training their employees since the pandemic hit.

Commenting on the findings,
NTUC LHUB’s Chairman, Eugene Wong says, “The pandemic has made the upskilling
imperative more pressing hence providing the right training opportunities for
employees would strengthen companies’ competitiveness in the face of future
disruptions. Companies must transform through new business models but in order
to make strides, their employees must be equipped with the relevant skill sets
to deliver their new roles and responsibilities. Employers must act now to
elevate their workforce competencies so that they will be well-poised to
persevere and prosper in the New Normal.”

In addition, NTUC LHUB’s Director
Institute Of Business Excellence And Healthcare Academy, Jenaline Low adds, “For
those who are looking to jumpstart the upskilling of their workforce, it is key
to invest in learning and development capabilities to assess and align the
workforce skills requirement to the organisation’s strategic business goals. Using a Design Thinking
approach to identify skills gaps will help decision-makers succinctly identify
areas for skills upgrading and discover employees’ strengths to optimise their
full potential. To add, we urge companies to leverage training support and
subsidies available to them such as the Enhanced Training Support Package and Enhanced
Absentee Payroll, which are helpful to defray the training investment cost with
course fee and absentee
payroll subsidies.”

To download The New Normal of Sector Skill report,
visit https://www.ntuclearninghub.com/sector-skills-report-2020