To help the unemployed professionals get back to work, the Government of Singapore has partnered with two private-sector employment agencies, announced Manpower Minister Lim Swee Say in Parliament yesterday.
Speaking at the Ministry’s Committee of Supply Debate Mr. Lim said these two agencies have been working with the government in UK and Australia. They have been chosen because of their focus on active, rather than passive job seekers.
During the latest announcement of Budget 2017, Finance Minister Heng Swee Keat said the Government will work with private placement firms to deliver better job matching services for professionals.
Due to talent-skill mismatch being a common problem for the unemployed to find jobs, this move by the Government is aimed at helping jobseekers, who can find jobs that are most suited for their skills, qualifications, interests and requirements.
The Government will partner with these two agencies to help PMEs who are redundant without jobs for 3 months or more. This new partnership will be launched in Q2 2017.
See: Long-Term Unemployment Woes Continue to Increase in Singapore
To support this trend, major enhancements will be made to the National Jobs Bank to transform it as an “one-stop, non-stop online marketplace.” This will enable various groups of job seekers to search for the kind of jobs they are looking for.
“The online marketplace will be linked up with the Individual Learning Portfolio portal to be launched by SkillsFuture Singapore. This is so they can provide seamless access between the two: from skills to jobs, and from jobs to skills,” Mr. Lim added.
These enhancements will be rolled out progressively during the year. In the meanwhile, the Government has already improved the user friendliness of the National Jobs Bank to provide better search functions. Job seekers are also better updated of their application status, Channel News Asia reports.
Also read: 20 Percent Rise in Workers Landing New Jobs through Professional Conversion Programmes in 2016
Image credit: channelnewsasia.com
