In the last few years, I have gone for some interviews every now
and then, and even got job offer out of some of the interviews.
While the remuneration and the influx of foreigners have continued
to be the hottest topics among working ppl and employers, I notice
a very worrying trend for the employees and that is: employers are
now only giving term contract to staff, instead of permanent
position. In the past, I used to think only a few companies do that
and they probably did so for some special reason (ie company
policy, corporate decision etc). But these days, it seems that no
employer will offer a permanent position, although some will
convert the contract staff to permanent. I myself was one of them
who got converted even before the expiry of my contract. At first,
I thought nothing of it. But some times later, I have colleagues
who didn’t get converted but had their contracts renewed for
another 2 years and they got perplexed over it. At the same time, I
have gone for a few interviews lately and every one of them is
offering a 1-yr, 2-yrs or 3 yrs contract. Even People’s Association
is offering only 3-yr contract which the HR indicated that at the
end of the 3rd year, they may or may not renew you, subject to
whether they need you or not (they didn’t phrase it like that, but
that’s how I interpreted when I went for their interview).
In where I worked, I was with the Cost Management Committee and
read some of their old notes where I chanced upon this part on HR’s
initiatives on cost management. It said that they would only offer
2-yr contract to staff to save cost and somewhere along the line,
it further elaborated that in the event, the company needed to
downsize, these “contract staff” will be the first to go and the
company would do so by not renewing their contract when expired.
The rationale is to not let the company incur payment of
retrenchment.
I find this trend is very worrying esp we are still importing
cheaper labours whom our govt like to call them foreign talents. It
seems that the govts are bo chup about this, cuz I don’t think they
are not in the know of this situation, esp when their good friend
PA is also doing it.
What do you think?
