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October 2020 Issue: Co-operator Newsletter Quarterly Issue
Know Our Co-ops Series: SPEC - A Co-operative for PMETS and Beyond
Know Our Co-ops series
Co-operatives have been an integral part of shaping Singapore, touching the lives of more than 1.4 million members. Co-operatives were birthed out of shared needs, responsibility and commitment to each other and to the society, and were amongst the earliest community self-help organisations to take root in Singapore.
The Know Our Co-ops series aims to let our affiliates to get to know each other better; appreciate each other's good work; and encourage conversations which can lead to collaborations. After all, we are in the same business to make a difference.
The role that the Singapore Professionals’ and Executives’ Co-operative (SPEC) plays in helping members adapt to the challenges in the new economy is more timely now than ever.
Established in the year 2000 by the Singapore Human Resource Institute, SPEC then had the immediate task of helping professionals, managers, executives, businessmen and the self-employed (PMEBS) who were displaced from their jobs during the 1998 Asian financial crisis to seek gainful economic activities.
Today, with several waves of restructuring hitting the workforce due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the co-operative gears itself up to extend meaningful and practical support to its members through its re-employment services, such as, corporate placement, talent matching, career coaching and social networking opportunities.
On another front, much of its work is in helping members overcome psychological barriers. For the workplace today is a very different one. It is perpetually undergoing changes at an unprecedented rate. Technology is changing the nature of jobs.
An industry that has been around for decades can disappear, or be transformed. A professional who has been displaced would go knocking on door after door, attempting to re-enter the trade on the same terms he had enjoyed previously, and he is likely to be disappointed. The co-operative helps nudge him towards thinking differently about expectations and shows him possible pathways that are better suited to current realities.
New opportunities are presenting themselves such as flexible work arrangements. For example, working for only one employer, a norm of the past, is being replaced by working for a range of organisations who need the professional’s services and expertise.
SPEC collaborates with trade and business associations, employers, unions and the government to co-create new opportunities including job openings, business ventures and more. The co-operative also runs professional conversion programmes for senior Singapore Citizen Professionals, Managers, Executives and Technicians (PMETs) to acquire new skills to move to the next station of their career.
| Courses such as Solving Performance Problem Coaching and Counselling; Relationship Building-Communication and Motivation, and RMC Management Consulting were organised recently to upskill the PMETs and help them enhance performance and value add to the team. To help its members ride over unforeseen transitions in their working life, SPEC offers insurance schemes with portable benefits. The insurance is ideal for those who are on contractual, part-time and portfolio status; employed; self-employed and those in career transition or not in any employment. Purchased as an individual, the insurance plan is not only portable; its premiums are kept low; and the benefits are comprehensive. |
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A new economy co-operative, SPEC is constantly evolving so as to be a dynamic and efficient source of help for its members to thrive and seek gainful economic activities, including employment. Its vision is to achieve connectivity with its members, thus enhancing and enriching social capital in Singapore for the progress and prosperity of their family and at the workplace.
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