Philosophy and understanding of Singapore Airlines employment relation

Employment Relation BUSM4769 – Semester 1, 2021 Assignment - ER Portfolio Company: Singapore Airlines Student ID: S3863912 Student name: Nguyen Truong An Subject name: Employment Relation Subject code: BUSM4769 Lecturer name: Mr Alex Arokiasamy Word count: 2025 words I Introduction Personal details My name is Being learning and working as a Human Resources manager for five years, I am currently building my intention to apply for the Singapore Airlines Chief Human Resources Officer to devote more to the prosperity of the company in the future Besides, I recently finished the employment relation course and achieved a Bachelor of Human Resources Management at RMIT University, which is vast regarding this position This portfolio below represents the overview reflection of Singapore Airline’s operation base on employment relation knowledge, demonstrating my practical skills and abilities that totally suitable with my aimed job Philosophy and understanding of Singapore Airlines employment relation [Org commitment] Our success as one of the world's leading airlines is a consequence of employee's passion and commitment Singapore Airlines understand that recruiting and maintaining people is critical to developing a thriving organization We make significant investments in each individual to keep them motivated and give numerous chances for personal and professional growth Being a potential manager, I have well-informed about the employment relation concept and Singapore Airlines' employment practice [Employment relation concept] Firstly, employment relations considered a domain of all aspects of the union-management relationship, encompassing the establishment of union bargaining rights, the negotiation process, and the administration of a collective agreement (Larry Suffield and Gary L Gannon, 2012) Maintaining a valuable and effective employee relationship is one of the critical aspects that vastly contribute to the company's success Individuals who have better commitment, trust, and confidence will enhance productivity, motivation, and employee loyalty company itself (Sridhar & Nayak 2013) [Employment relations practices] Secondly, as the most attractive employer in Singapore, named by Randstad for the fourth time, Singapore Airlines believed that employee's well-being, engagement, and development with the meaningful are the core value in employment practice (Singapore Airlines sustainability report FY2019-2020) In reality, Singapore Airlines has been running numerous terms and welfare that respond to the employee's demand of work-life integration, healthcare, career development In addition, during the global covid pandemic, medical insurance and transportation are fully supported to ensure employees can work in the safest environment Goal and objective for effective employment relation of Singapore Airlines [Goal and objectives in general with scope of employment relations] Standing on the scope of employment relations, the greatest goal and objective are to improve the relationship between employer, employee, and union by adjusting many employment terms that bring essential benefits for Singapore Airlines in the future [Personal objective] Firstly, my objective mainly concentrates on how to develop the collective agreement in the most effective way The effective collective agreement will help the management gain more flexibility and labour peace and vastly improve productivity Likewise, as the employee representative, the union also increases stability and skill and has a more powerful voice to deliver more effective employment decision-making (Welss, 1990) [Portfolio's goal] Secondly, this portfolio's goal is to better compare and adjust the international employment terms based on the comparative employment relation to extending the market share into new potential markets According to ALVEXO, increasing the market shares pushes a company at an advantage point, which ultimately increases its competitive advantage, reputation, performance, and profitability II Legal obligations, the Fair Work Act, policies, standards, and relevant award/s for Singapore Airlines [Employment law for equal power distribution] According to Corporate Services, employment laws (also referred as "labor laws") are intended to create a formal framework for the relationship between employers and employees in the organization Most nations, including Singapore, presume that the employer-employee relationship has an unbalanced power distribution, with employers having greater authority These laws were established to protect the rights of employees [Org’s employment Act, specifical terms, evidence] The Employment Act is Singapore's primary labour law It provides for the essential terms and conditions at work covered by the Act include all types of employees working under a contract of service with an employer As a sustainability report by Singapore Airlines, the employee code of conduct and employment relation is in accordance with the Ministry of Manpower's Employment Act Singapore Airlines has been implementing these laws effectively and proves numerous evidence-based on each year's sustainability report criteria For example, in the 2019-2020 period, the employee reported based on employee category and age group gave us a comprehensive perspective about employee age working in Singapore Airlines meets the Minimum age term in Employment Act which is not recruit employee under 16 years old Firgure 1: Employee estimating table and chart by Sustainabilty Report FY2019-2020 III Organizing and Unions Organising When taking into Singapore Airlines's organizing, our success totally arises not only from employee's effort but also solid collaborative partnership with unions As a diverse cultural organization, union leadership plays a vital role where taking a progressive approach and negotiating with employers to launch many appropriate terms, initiatives, and programs that ensure our employees have equal opportunities to achieve their full potential Enable our workforce to be better prepared for the future Unions Singapore Airlines have been approving a collaborative partnership approach with the Airline Pilots Association Singapore (ALPA-S), Air Transport Executive Staff Union (AESU), Singapore Airline Staff Union (SIASU) to create the committing collective agreement which provides and executes appropriate employment terms and conditions of service for the employment relationship Regular monthly meetings are held between management and the unions to address staff, operational issues as well as share updates on initiatives aimed at developing our employee's careers and competencies • ALPA-S: This department represents airline pilots in Singapore includes 94 percent of the pilot population in the organization • AESU: The staff in SIA companies who are executives and above belong to AESU, and it contains 50 percent of the population • SIASU: Junior staff and cabin crew in SIA companies directly under this representative body About 65 percent of them are members of SIASU IV Individual Contracts and Collective Bargaining Individual contracts [Contract definition + Legal effectiveness] According to Employment Newzealand, Individual employment agreements are negotiated between an employer and an employee; the terms and conditions of employment should be precisely discussed and included in the employment agreement before the employee begins work An individual employment agreement should be signed by both the employee and the employer to demonstrate that they both agree on it Therefore, many employment terms and benefits will be activated to manage employment relations Suppose an employee is dissatisfied with something in the intended agreement In that case, they should notify their employer as soon as possible and attempt to discuss the matter because there is no intervention with third parties such as the union to solve the unfair working terms 2 Collective bargaining [Definition + its importance] Different from the individual contract, the collective agreement is a legal agreement between an employer and a union representing a group of employees regarding terms and working conditions The collective agreement is fundamental because it directly impacts company performance, the union, the employees, and the general public (Larry Suffield and Gary L Gannon, 2012) [Union ft Org in collective bargaining] As one top main unions, Singapore Airline Staff Union (SIASU) has been effectively bargaining with Singapore Airlines about the collective agreement in previous years [Highlight terms] For instance, these are the summary of many highlight terms that will be changed after taking up office in June 2015, including in the collective contract in 2016: o Salary ranges: Singapore Airlines will ensure a percent increase to the maximum point of salary ranges, providing headroom for future built-in service increments o Rationalization of shift allowances: The meal allowances for ground staff members have been repackaged in adjustments (increase) to the monthly and daily shift allowances o Improvements to promotional increase allowances: Salary Increase on Promotional and Upgrading Acting Responsibility Allowance and other Apron Driving Allowance Flight and Route Planning Functions Allowance o Incentive attendance payment (IAP): Change the IAP payment to stop losing $50/$70 deducted once employee takes their 5th – 7th MC o Once-off Lumpsum payment for union member: Recommend Staff who are Union members in service as of 31 March 2016 and who remain as SIASU members until 31 December 2018 (expiry of the CA) shall be eligible for a once-off lumpsum payment V Equal employment opportunities for staff As reported by Workable, In the legal sense of the equal employment opportunities (EEO) definition, “same chances” or “equal opportunity” means that employers cannot use a particular view as reasons to hire or reject an employee or make other employment decisions In other words, there is no discrimination against in the employment relation Specifically, it includes:  Race / color  National origin / ethnicity  Religion  Age  Sex / gender / sexual orientation  Physical or mental disability As a diverse cultural organization, equal employment opportunities are built into one of the core principles in Singapore Airlines policies Remarkably, both staff regulations and employee code of conduct covered non-discrimination policies Moreover, other labour practices like diversity and equal opportunities are approved based on the Manpower’s Employment Act and other Singapore laws Ministry of VI Unfair dismissal – approaches and ways to mitigate According to Fair Work Act, Unfair dismissal is the case when the employee has been unfairly dismissed or forced to resign because of something your employer did The dismissal may be considered unfair if: • was harsh, unjust, or unreasonable, and • was not consistent with the Small Business Fair Dismissal Code (in the case of employees of a small business) • As a was not a case of genuine redundancy manager at Singapore Airlines, I state that strengthen communication with the employee and discuss the source of the issue is the best mitigating solution for unfair dismissal After identifying the origin of the problem, we should arrange for training and development, which provides an advisory with a clear performance objective, and give the person a chance to improve the agreed-upon dates of reintegration Besides, we should encourage the employee to use the Grievance Mechanism to report possible unfair things that lead to unreasonable dismissal VII Managing conflict in Singapore Airlines “Conflict is the perception of differences of interests among people” (Thompson, 1998, p 4) Therefore, when two or more social entities (i.e., individuals, groups, organizations, and nations) operating together to achieve the general objective, their relationships may become incompatible or inconsistent This conflict originated from the different exclusive behavioral preferences of each person based on attitudes, values, beliefs, and skills Recognized the conflicting issue, Singapore Airlines has established conflicting interest policies to prevent and direct all employee stick into the whole values and principles The policy allow employee to report the matter immediately the situation which could potentially lead to a conflict of interest Besides, this policy also requires all employees to report any real or potential conflicts of interest to the Human Resources Division on an annual basis VIII Future of ER and casualisation Technological advancements are significantly altering the nature of work and employment relations in the future (Augustin Lee, 2018) Disruptive innovations have made the coordination of work components more seamless, timely, and convenient, thereby allowing work tasks to be unbundled This change resulted in more jobs being displaced directly leads to employee's involuntary unemployment Due to the faster change mentioned above, the casualization of traditional employment relations will come from the status that employees are more likely than before to work for multiple employers or unemployed because technological development will replace maximum their working ability Therefore, many employment terms will have to change to adapt and provide newly applicable terms to maintain the effective employment relationship between many related stakeholders IX Key elements of international and comparative ER that will be beneficial for Singapore Airlines National employment relation is the essential thing we should concentrate on, which includes all about unions, state regulation, strikes, labor standards, collective bargaining Compared our international employment and the aiming countries airline employment relation to figure out what is the similar and difference terms we can maintain and change to perfectly fit with their policies Besides their laws, discovering the foreign culture also gains a vast of benefits when meeting the customer demand As a result, it is crucial to consider and develop an employment relationship base on foreign employment law country as well as exploit the culture, like Singapore Airlines, as it helps when we open the office in a foreign country X Conclusion In conclusion, through this portfolio, I have analyzed and provided some noticeable information based on my ability I hope this will give a broad of directors have an overview of our organization  The I paragraph offers personal detail as well as understanding about the employment relation concept and the Singapore Airlines employment status Along with this, I also present my goal and objective for better improving our employment relation  The II and III are the notice of the primary labor law in Singapore, how we successfully adapt it, and inform how our Singapore organizing and three central unions are operating  The IV to VII paragraphs figure out two main kinds of employment contracts, and many essential terms were applied to protect the employee  The VIII and IV paragraph provides the future of employment relationship and how we can extend our market XI References: Singapore Airlines, Sustainability report FY2019/20, company report, Singapore Airlines, viewed 26 May 2021, Sridhar, R & Nayak, A 2013, ‘Employment Relations’, Management and Labour Studies, vol 38, no 4, pp 411-423 Singapore Airlines, Sustainability report FY2018/2019, company report, Singapore Airlines, viewed 26 May 2021, Singapore Airlines, Sustainability report FY2016/2017, company report, Singapore Airlines, viewed 26 May 2021, International Labour Office Gevena, National employment policies: A guide for workers’ organisations, International Labour Office Gevena, Switzerland Coporate Service, Singapore Employment Law, viewed 26 May 2021, Ministry of Manpower, Employment Act: who it covers, viewed 27 May 2021, Employment Newzealand, Types of employment agreements, viewed 27 May 2021, HR TOOLKIT n.d., ’What is EEO?’, HR TOOLKIT, blog post, viewed 29 May 2021, Lee, A 2018, ’Trends and Shifts in Employment: Singapore’s Workforce’, Civil Service College, 12 Jan, viewed 29 May 2021, Rahim, M 2001, Managing Conflict in Organizations, viewed 29 May 2021, Rathakrishnan, S 2016, Re: SINGAPORE AIRLINES LIMITED STAFF MEMBERS’ COLLECTIVE AGREEMENT 2016’, SIASU, viewed 29 May 2021, Trade The Difference n.d., How Companies Can Increase Their Market Shares, Trade The Difference, viewed 29 May 2021,  ... of Singapore Airlines employment relation [Org commitment] Our success as one of the world's leading airlines is a consequence of employee's passion and commitment Singapore Airlines understand... as understanding about the employment relation concept and the Singapore Airlines employment status Along with this, I also present my goal and objective for better improving our employment relation. .. professional growth Being a potential manager, I have well-informed about the employment relation concept and Singapore Airlines' employment practice [Employment relation concept] Firstly, employment