You are right... I agree with you, we should not call it a pay
hike, but a pay that was previously theirs and is only fair they
retain their pay.
And I also agree with you, that in the fight for talent, singapore
companies, ESPECIALLY government-linked companies, usually lose.
This is coz our GLCs are stuck with the govt's mentality of 'CHEAP
AND GOOD', which often results in them losing out to many other
companies from other countries. Yet they continue to behave as if
losing talent is a normal thing, and usually replace the positions
with new people whom are cheaper.
The reason why we cannot compete with others, as in the case of
SIA, may be that we may be focusing too much on cutting costs, and
not on how to expand and reach out to a larger market.
Just look at what happened to our local companies, HDB and the govt
authority LTA. When a project is up for tender, the 1st and
foremost thing they consider is costs. The company that tenders the
lowest project cost wins. And then what happens next are the
following:
1) Delay in schedule due to limited manpower (low project cost),
resulting in additional costs
2) Bankruptcy of contractors, coz they tender too low, and go out
of business, resulting in delay of projects. Just look at some of
the upgrade flat projects
3) Accidents happen, people die, just look at the Circle Line
case
4) Higher maintenance costs. Things break easily coz the initial
low project costs results in the contractor usually cutting
corners, and getting inferior stuff to use in the project.
While the initial project cost looks good coz they squeezed it low,
the long term implications are for all to see. That's why I think
we CANNOT compete on the international arena, if we continue to
remain myopic and focus only on 'CHEAP and GOOD' (In that order,
and usually you can't get GOOD)
Just ask me, I just left a local MNC, and I am really peeved with
the way they treat people. To them, no one is indispensable, and
they lead you to believe that your low pay is already a good pay,
coz no one will pay high pay to Singaporeans. That is untrue, coz I
moved to a foreign MNC and they value me substantially higher than
what the local MNC valued me.
