Lacklustre 1H14 hiring activities hit by stricter rules and rising costs

Are firms starting to leave for cheaper coasts?

The country is teeming with quality talent, but Singapore still saw a decline in recruitment processes in the first half of 2014.

According to Ambition’s Market Trends and Salary Report, hiring activities shrank in the first half of the year because of stricter government rules and the rising operational costs for businesses.

The report noted that some companies are beginning to redeploy roles from Singapore to other markets, as organisations strive to control their cost base in a rapidly growing region.

“However, whilst the demand for talent remains high, recruitment processes have certainly slowed in 2014 versus previous years. This can be put down to a number of factors. The Fair Consideration Framework is certainly one, and a clear focus on ensuring the local Singaporean talent pool is fully considered before appointments are made. The second is the cost of running operations and putting or keeping roles in Singapore. This means that when a role comes up in Singapore, there needs to be sufficient reasons for that position to be located in Singapore and going through that justification means that the process takes longer,” stated Ambition Managing Director Paul Endacott.

Here’s more from the report:
Our view is that Singapore will still continue to see demand for high quality talent as, despite the cost, it is still the location of choice for a company to headquarter its’ regional operations and is strategically, economically and politically well positioned to capitalise on the evolution of the
SE Asia markets.

Client On Boarding (COB), Customer Due Diligence (CDD), and Know Your Customer (KYC) form a large portion of recruitment activities. Many banks and financial institutions remain focused on developing their teams to ensure the three main pieces of information being collected fulfil the onboarding and regulatory compliance obligations - jurisdiction; role; products.

The demand for candidates within this specialist domain spreads across all levels from Junior Analyst (with 1 to 3 years’ experience) to Senior Director hires. Due to a shortage of local talent, more banks are now
opening up to conducting global searches for such skilled professionals.

With the pressure to tighten controls, Internal Audit candidates continue to be in strong demand. More banks are now deploying Auditors to particular departments within their business rather than having cross-functional teams. To fill such specialist roles, clients are becoming more flexible in hiring candidates with control/risk mindsets to train them in Internal Audit.