- Joined
- Apr 14, 2011
- Messages
- 18,726
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- 113
Many SMEs in Singapore are CMI. Mostly unprofessional, ego-driven, illogical, bottom-feeding management style, with their obselete business model crushed under the current business transformation.
I am quite glad the end is near soon for they will be LEEPLACED by the ultra efficient suppliers running on digital technologies.
Dear Mr Gilbert,
Good day to you. My name is Silas (name changed) and I came across transitioning.org while looking for information pertaining to unemployed individual.
Here’s my story and hope that you have some time to hear me out:
I was retrenched by my previous company in Jan 2016 due to rapid expansion in Singapore, which the company feels that they are losing lots of money. Hence, the company decided to shift their main office to Kuala Lumpur from Singapore. The company has shut down their operations in Hong Kong and Australia, and cut down the staff strength to 2 person in Singapore. My colleagues and I were retrenched in this case and we were forced to write resignation letter and serve one month notice.
After being laid off before Chinese New Year, I was constantly keeping a lookout for new job opportunities. I was offered a role of HR Executive with a SME which was based in Malaysia, and their Singapore branch office was near my home. Initially I thought I can start everything from scratch all over again. However, things didn’t seems to be what it is after working for about a week or so.
This company is a family run business operating in retail line, selling luggage and winter clothing. There are only 8 employees in the main office, with all reporting to the managing director (MD). Most of the employees have a hard time working with the MD due to her temper and dominating nature. Most of the employees in the office told me that they have been verbally abused by her and they are used to it.
As a HR person, I do not believe that anyone has any right to abuse anyone in the workplace, be it verbally or physically. In fact, I have identified the disciplinary actions taken by the MD for employees who have violated the company’s policy to be against MOM regulation. Furthermore, working in the abusive environment has taken a toil on my mental health, which makes me lose my motivation to work in the company.
Everyday at work I am simply working in the office and do only what I am supposed to do. While checking the employee profiles, I’ve found out that the company has a very high turnover rate for both retail employees and office employees. Those who stayed on are mainly foreign employees holding on to work permits or passes, whereby tendering their resignation not only makes them lose their permits, but also the risk of being deported back to their respective countries.
After working for 6 weeks in the company, I tendered my resignation as I feel that the company culture is not very healthy. Not only do employees have to work under the fear that they will be abused by the MD for no apparent reason, micromanaging on the employee is one of the reason which I do not see the point of staying on.
An example: working hours. Though the official working hours is from 8.45am to 6.15pm, it is very rare for the employees to leave the office at 6.15pm sharp. Most of the time, employees leaves the office after 6.30pm, while some employees tend to leave the office latest at 9pm.
I keep track of the employee’s attendance and found out that though some employees might reach the office later due to traffic, most of the time they stayed beyond the official knock-off time. Hence when their OT hours exceeded their late-coming hours, I take a flexible approach of not penalizing them since they have worked more than the stated required working hours per week. However, the MD does not see this way and she insisted to slap a penalty fee and warning letters to employees who are constantly late for 5-10 minutes daily (while these employees are the ones who stayed till 8pm or longer). The MD told me that she insisted to penalize these employees, which serves as a warning to them not to be late for work.
As stated in the contract, I am to provide the company with one week’s notice when I tender my resignation during the probation period of three months. Hence I stated in the resignation letter that I will serve my one week’s notice. However, the MD decided that she will bring forward my last day of employment to the following day as she will be in China during my notice period. In some way, she is forcing me to leave the company immediately since we sense that we can’t work on good terms in the long run. I left the company after handling everything over to her.
I have remained unemployed since May 2016 till now. Though the recession has left me unemployed for a long period, I have not looked back since. Personally I have signed up as a volunteer with a non-profit organization which allows me to help out in events. Not only do I get to meet more people, I also feel a sense of achievement through participation in the activities and building up the connections. The committee members did spoke up to me and told me that they are more than happy to write a recommendation letter/testimonial for me to assist in securing a job during job search.
However, at the same time, I also feel that being unemployed for long term has taken a toll on the relationships with my family members as well. My mother has been constantly nagging at me and ask me to why I am still unable to secure a job. Even though I explained to her that the economy has not been doing well this year and unemployment rates are getting higher than usual, she has constantly make many unhelpful remarks.
To her, all it matters is I secure any job out there so that I can bring in some income for the family. To me, I am aiming at working out a career path in the field of Human Resource.
I have seen some officers from WSG (previously known as WDA) and e2i from NTUC, been attending job fairs regularly, sending out applications daily and secure at least 2 to 4 interviews per month. However, nothing happens in the end.
In fact, I am extremely dissatisfied with the way how some local SMEs conduct their job interviews. I have applied for HR Executive with 2 companies, which I am being called for an interview by these 2 companies on the same week. However, the first company is not interested to hear out my HR experiences. Instead, they are more interested to hire employees to sell insurance rather than employing a HR company. I told them directly that I am not interested in selling insurance and thank their time for the interview. The interviewer, in return, wanted to return my resume to me which I’ve provided for their reference. The second company is a local electric company, which the interview was disrupted by a telephone call for the interviewer and she stepped out to settle some matters. After she has settled her issue, she told me that the interview has ended.
From the way these 2 local companies handled the interview, not only do I find it insulting to the job seekers, I also find it disrespectful and a waste of time.
Hence I will like to check with you on the following:
1. Are there any counselling services I can utilize for now?
2. Are there any financial assistance I can tap on?
Looking forward to hear from you soon. Thank You.
Regards,
Silas
