Monday, February 8, 2010

Joint effort by one and all

Do you agree with the Economic Strategies Committee's strategies and recommendations for transforming Singapore's economy?



Ray Ferguson
Regional CEO, Singapore and Southeast Asia, Standard Chartered Bank


STANDARD Chartered welcomes the proposals put forth by the Economic Strategies Committee (ESC), in particular, to boost productivity, to further promote Singapore as a Global-Asia hub and to grow SMEs in Singapore.

On productivity driven growth:
I believe the proposition to raise productivity through increasing continuous education and training of the workforce has strong merit.

At Standard Chartered, we have always maintained a keen emphasis on training. To support our growth, we have had not only to build our capacity but our capability as well. Hence, it has been important that our employees develop their skills and depth of knowledge.

To build broad-based skills in our employees - akin to the need for 'T-shaped professionals' - we have developed a Learning Centre to build leadership and specialist capabilities in employees.
On Singapore as a Global-Asia hub:

Singapore, with its pro-business policies, clear regulation, robust infrastructure, well educated workforce and excellent connectivity to the region already has much to offer as a hub.

The presence of a number of our group functions in Singapore is testament to this. Singapore is home to our global Consumer Banking and Wholesale Banking business, The Standard Chartered Private Bank, and is also the nerve centre for our global technology and operations functions.

The new propositions would serve to increase attractiveness of Singapore to companies looking to expand beyond their home markets.


Suresh Narayanan
Managing Director, Nestle Singapore (Pte) Ltd


THE recommendations of the ESC, especially in respect of Focus on Productivity gains, development and nurturing of SME's and leveraging the business and habitation advantages of Singapore for MNCs' (both Global and Asian) continue to be relevant and this indicates the 'opportunities' that lie in them.

The rubber hits the road, for success of policy, only when recommendations crystallise into entrepreneurial actions and are sustained over many years. The fact that the three themes mentioned are recurring and have found aa place in earlier economic transformation or competitiveness reports only signals the seminal nature of the ideas therein. I firmly believe that the centrepiece of the transformation that Singapore can look forward to lies in continuous gains in productivity and irrespective of the economic debates that we can have on methodology of measurement, enhancing Productivity questions the input-output processes, re-calibrates competitive advantages and introduces new and robust work practices,skills upgradation and preparedness for newer and more persistent economic challenges. In effect the other key recommendations around SMEs and locational leverage draw their sustenance from the upsides to productivity that corporates and other organisations enable.

The premise that sustained productivity gains will go together with relatively more 'modest' GDP growth of between 3-5% is pragmatic and will set the expectations right in business and society on the quest for 'Quality' growth vs 'Numeric achievements'. The most important signal that business can take out of the ESC is the unimpeachable fact that productivity lies at the 'core' of economic enterprise, and with margin structures becoming wafer thin in a whole host of industries, a vital recipe for sustainable business organisations,(in relative macro economic flux) is the gains that they can make per unit of resource vs alternate locations or business models.

At Nestle,the heartbeat of the organisation is around continuous innovation & renovation and a strong focus on 'productivity' defined on an enterprise wide spectrum. Indeed our Four Pillars of Organisation competitiveness are 'Innovation & Renovation' and 'Operational Excellence' with 'Availability' and 'Relevant Communication' completing the key enablers in our RoadMap for the future. As the world's largest food & nutrition company with a global footprint and a repertoire of household brands, we seek to be the reference company for nutrition, health and wellness which clearly hinges on achieving both innovation excellence and operational competence of a high order. We have embarked upon the 'Nestle Continuous Excellence' initiative globally and this seeks to re-align,re-calibrate and re-focus many aspects of our operations, both manufacturing related and also extending to commercial competence and leadership.

For us in Nestle Singapore continuous innovation and productivity gains have been at the core of our professional lives with highly respected brands like Nestle Milo, Maggi, Nescafe and Kitkat among others continuously evolving as products and propositions in step with the needs and aspirations of the Singaporean consumer.It is also a matter of great pride for us that our factory in Jurong is a 'global facility' for the manufacture of our proprietary Malt Extract that goes to make Nestle Milo. This achievement is clearly not possible without the quantum improvements in productivity through improved manufacturing practices, work methods,technology, work force skills and leadership development that Nestle and our employees have invested in over the last 40 years! It is an example of what 'Cheaper, Better, Faster' is in an actual commercial operation and what is possible in Singapore.

To us therefore the ESC focus on Innovation and Productivity clearly hits the sweet spot as it gives us impetus to carry forward with greater conviction what we have been striving for in Singapore as a commercial entity that will be almost 100 years young soon!

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