The business community in Singapore, learning from the challenges and some positive outcomes of 2022, say they are more committed to improving business outcomes, with fair and equitable employee pay and rewards, and increased recruitment among their initiatives.

The Singapore Business Federation released its 2022/2023 National Business Survey, which found that the top challenges businesses reported were those related to wages as companies compete to attract and retail talent, mentioned by 79% of respondents

Other major challenges businesses faced were rising manpower costs mentioned by 75% of respondents, logistical costs at 52% and attracting or retaining younger workers at 51%. Companies also reported rising costs in new foreign manpower policies at 48%, the limited pool of foreign skilled labour at 47%, and stricter policies that limit the supply of foreign workers at 43%.

According to the Business Federation, to manage these challenges, a large number of businesses at 81% plan to adopt strategies to improve their salaries and benefits packages, 46% plan to implement schemes to attract and/or retain staff into key leadership positions.

Nearly two-thirds of businesses experienced challenges in recruiting foreign manpower, the survey found, with changes to the S Pass qualifying salary and to the Employment Pass qualifying salary. The S Pass allows mid-level skilled staff to work in Singapore. The Employment Pass allows foreign professionals, managers and executives to work in Singapore.

To cope with these challenges, 48% of businesses have adopted increasing wages to attract locals and 43% have expanded recruitment efforts to hire more locals, the survey noted.