Speech at 2010 Asian Human Capital Award Presentation Ceremony

Mr Gan Kim Yong, Minister for Manpower, Resorts World Sentosa, Compass Ballroom

1. I am very pleased to join you this morning for the presentation of the 2nd Asian Human Capital Award.
   
   Objective and Relevance of the Award in Current Business Landscape
2. Established by my Ministry, INSEAD and CNBC Asia Pacific two years ago, the prestigious Asian Human Capital Award recognises innovative people practices in Asia which had created significant impact in driving business results.
3. 2009 was an extremely challenging year for companies in Asia but some organisations had the vision to harness their most valuable asset – their people – to overcome the business challenges, and pave the way to be at the forefront of competition when the economy recovers. This award recognises such winning people practices which became instructive case studies that other organisations in Asia can emulate.
   
   Overview of 2010 Entries & Introduction of Special Commendation Prize
4. This year, we received 50 entries from various industries across Asia. The entries were of better quality and covered a diverse range of people practices – from change management, talent & leadership development, to harnessing technology and corporate sustainability. This diversity and quality of the entries are a strong indication that organisations across Asia are increasingly tailoring their people strategies to be more Asian-centric, to strengthen their competitive advantage in the markets they operate in.
5. The Award judging panel was hard-pressed to select the winners. To give the high quality entries due recognition, I am happy to share that in addition to the two overall Award winners, we will also be honouring three deserving organisations with a special commendation prize to showcase more exemplary people practices annually. We hope this will inspire more organisations to invest in human capital development.
   
   2010 Asian Human Capital Award Winners
6. It gives me great pleasure to confer the 2010 Asian Human Capital Award to Procter and Gamble (P&G), Asia and The Ritz-Carlton, Millenia Singapore. The judges commended P&G Asia’s Employee Value Proposition Programme as a best-in-class case study for effective and sustainable employee engagement strategy. P&G Asia creatively adapts its business value proposition for external customers and applies it internally to engage its employees. They achieved an effective balance between performance and reward. They developed customised all-round plans to groom and retain employees. As a global organisation, P&G’s strength in people development is well known throughout the industry and their employees are highly sought after. Despite the intense competition for talent, the Employee Value Proposition Programme enabled P&G Asia to successfully build a strong sense of organisation pride amongst its staff, develop robust succession pipelines and retain its top talent. In 2009, when most companies observed adverse impact on their employee morale due to the economic downturn, P&G Asia’s employee survey registered almost 75% favourable responses, an overall improvement of 4% from the previous survey.
7. The Ritz-Carlton, Millenia Singapore is another deserving organisation which has done exceptionally well in people development and management. During the downturn, the senior management team stood by their people and sent a clear message that there would be no retrenchment. They committed more resources to roll out programmes internally and tapped on government initiatives to retrain and enhance the skills of their workers. The Ritz-Carlton, Millenia Singapore’s commitment to people development boosted employees’ morale and the new skills their employees acquired translated into even better customer service. In the 2009 Customer Satisfaction Index of Singapore, The Ritz-Carlton, Millenia Singapore sets the benchmark with the highest score across all industry sectors in Singapore. It achieved a score of 78 points, 10 points higher than the national average. At the same time, the hotel has one of the highest employee engagement scores across the chain of Ritz-Carlton hotels worldwide.
   
   2010 Special Commendation Prize Recipients
8. I would also like to congratulate National Parks Board (NParks), Standard Chartered Bank and Wipro Limited, as the inaugural recipients of the Asian Human Capital Award – Special Commendation Prize. The judges commended NParks for its strong culture of learning and effective skills training and development programs. NParks was able to enhance staff competencies with professional skills training to achieve its aspiration of transforming Singapore into a "City in a Garden". Over the last few years, NParks expanded significantly from 600 to almost 900 employees. They successfully attracted quality talent into a niche industry and retained them with meaningful and rewarding careers.
9. Standard Chartered Bank also deserves recognition for its suite of holistic and integrated talent and leadership practices which benefit staff at all levels and across all job functions. Their top management displayed strong ownership in talent development by being personally involved in many training programs. Standard Chartered Bank’s strong commitment and foresight in leadership and talent development led to the setting up of its Singapore Learning Centre. This centre will facilitate the bank’s expansion in Singapore and Asia by developing innovative HR programs to train their leaders, and adapting their global best-practices for application in their Asian markets to strengthen their competitive advantage.
10. Last but not least, the judges were impressed by Wipro Limited’s Eco-Eye sustainability movement as an inspiring approach to corporate sustainability. Wipro’s leadership team provides a supportive environment where employees are motivated to create and drive sustainability initiatives without financial incentives or directives from the top. The Eco-Eye initiatives helped Wipro achieve significant operational cost savings and generated new businesses in eco-energy. Eco-Eye has also helped Wipro attract Gen-Y workers who now constitute the majority of its workforce, and who increasingly want to work for organisations that are not just profit-driven but also socially responsible. You will hear first-hand from the CEOs of these five organisations as they share their winning people practices at the Summit today.
    
    Conclusion
11. On behalf of the Ministry of Manpower, INSEAD and CNBC Asia Pacific, I would like to thank our publicity partners, the dedicated short-listing panellists, esteemed judges and all participating organisations who helped to push the boundaries of human capital development in Asia. Through the Asian Human Capital Award, we will continue to uncover and celebrate organisations in Asia who have achieved success with world-class people practices and inspire more leading edge human capital practices. On this note, I wish you an enjoyable and fruitful day ahead.