Address at Best Workplaces Singapore Awards 2026
Foo Cexiang, Minister of State for Manpower, Pan Pacific Singapore
Mr Roland Wee, Board Chair, Great Place To Work ASEAN & ANZ
Ms Evelyn Kwek, Managing Director, Great Place To Work ASEAN & ANZ
Ms Joni Ong, Managing Director of Great Place To Work ASEAN & ANZ
Ladies and gentlemen,
Good evening. It is my pleasure to join you for this year's Best Workplaces Singapore event.
2 As some of you may know, I took on my portfolio at the Ministry of Manpower as well as the Ministry of Energy, Trade and Industry, at the start of September. So it’s only about two months, and much of my two months has been spent engaging business leaders, HR professionals, unions and workers. Two months is really not a long time. But long enough to learn a great deal, and importantly, know that there is much more to learn.
3 One topic comes up again and again: AI. How will AI change our jobs? How will it change the skills we need? How will we redesign work? How should companies use AI? Many people have given answers to these questions, and I will not attempt to give a fresh take on it.
4 But tonight, in a room filled with some of Singapore's best workplaces, voted for by the employees yourselves, I want to look at AI through a slightly different lens and talk about: What will AI do to trust at work?
5 Because if AI is going to become part of our "New Business as Usual", the test should not be whether it makes our workplaces more productive. It should be about whether it makes our workplaces more trustworthy.
6 Trust has always been and will always be at the heart of a great workplace. Employees want to know that they will be treated fairly. That their contribution will be recognised. That their managers will listen to them. And that decisions affecting their careers will be made fairly and responsibly.
7 AI does not change those expectations. But it does make us think harder about how we uphold them. Take recruitment as an example.
8 Today, AI can assist HR teams at various points in the recruitment process. There are good reasons for companies to explore these tools. AI can help employers process information, spot potential matches and reduce administrative work.
9 But take a step back, let us now imagine the experience from the candidate's perspective. Imagine applying for a job and never meaningfully meeting anyone from the organisation. Technology processes your application. A chatbot interacts with you. An AI tool assesses you. Eventually, an automated message tells you the outcome.
10 That may be efficient. But would it feel like a great place to work? Certainly not.
11 Hiring is not simply a matching process. It is often the beginning of a relationship. The interview allows the employer to understand the person behind the CV. But it also allows the candidate to understand the people behind the company. What are they like? What do they value? Is this somewhere I can contribute? Is this somewhere I can grow? And most of all, do they care about me? These are difficult questions that will never be answered through any algorithm.
12 So as companies adopt AI, I hope we hold on to a simple principle: We can let AI remove friction from recruitment. But let us never let it remove relationships from recruitment.
13 And in the spirit of this, allow me to suggest three principles on how our employers can consider the use of AI in working with people.
14 The first is: Tell me. If AI is going to influence an important decision about me, let me have appropriate transparency about this role. Candidates should not have to wonder whether they are dealing with a person or a machine, and we should not be left guessing about how technology is being used in decisions that affect us.
15 But, transparency does not mean explaining every line of code. It means being able to explain, in terms people can understand: where are we using AI, what are we using it for, and where does human judgement come in?
16 The second principle is: See me. The more technology we introduce into work, the more important it is to decide where human interaction matters. AI may assist us. But there are many important moments in working life when we need meaningful human engagement.
17 An interview. A conversation about performance. An opportunity for advancement. A difficult conversation about my future and your future. In these critical moments, people do not simply want an outcome. We want to be heard and understood. So while AI can give us a second pair of eyes, it should never become the only pair of eyes.
18 The third and final principle to all employers is: Own it. AI can help you decide. But ultimately, employers have to take responsibility for the decisions we make about our people, especially decisions that are going to impact their livelihoods.
19 If a candidate asks why they were unsuccessful in the interview, we cannot be telling them, "it’s because the algorithm decided so". Similarly, if a worker asks why they were not promoted. We can delegate some of the tasks to AI, but we cannot delegate accountability.
20 I have focused on risks to trust. But lest you go away thinking that AI is going to be detrimental for trust. Let me also share how AI can give opportunity to build trust. There are several things that workers count very important: consistency, information that is used to make decisions, patterns that otherwise may be missed. We often fear the boss is always promoting the same person because the boss only has eyes for him or her. But with AI, we may be able to put some of these concerns at rest because it allows us to look at data consistently and more comprehensively.
21 Used responsibly, AI can support greater consistency, widen the information available to decision-makers, and help us identify patterns that may otherwise be missed. AI can give us a second pair of eyes, while people continue to exercise judgement and take responsibility.
22 AI can also change what supervisors, managers, and professionals do. We often ask: what can AI replace? But the question should be: what should AI take over, so that humans have more time to do the things we are good at?
23 Listen. Coach. Exercise judgement. Have difficult conversations. Develop people. Build relationships. Build trust. And that ultimately is what is going to be the most important. So tonight, as we celebrate our theme, "The New Business as Usual". We can recognise AI is new and may soon become business as usual, but trust will always be business as usual, forever.
24 To all our award winners tonight, a very big congratulations. You have already shown that great workplaces are the result of deliberate decisions, made over and over again, to build trust in the organisations.
25 Thank you, and have a wonderful evening.