[Sponsored Article] For the third consecutive year, DBS Hong Kong has been named the Best Employer by Kincentric 1 . This is a prestigious award given to companies committed to their employees' engagement, agility, leadership development and career advancement. "At DBS, people are always our greatest assets. Employee engagement is defined as the state of emotional and intellectual commitment to DBS," says Sharon Cheng, Managing Director and Head of Human Resources at DBS Hong Kong. "Employee engagement is all about strengthening the relationship between employees and their company. It's clear that when employees feel engaged and connected, they're more productive and less likely to leave the company," she explains. Every year, DBS Hong Kong conducts a staff engagement survey 'My Voice' to measure employees' satisfaction in the workplace, she says. The survey asks staff what they think of their managers, workload, career path and other aspects of their job. This survey allows Cheng's team to measure how satisfied, motivated, and committed employees are to their work, providing the bank with vital information about formulating the right policies and creating a collaborative work environment. Building a collaborative, healthy remote working culture During the pandemic, many employers, including DBS Hong Kong, have adopted the work-from-home (WFH) model, allowing non-client-facing employees the option to work remotely to safeguard the health and safety of their people. Soon afterwards, DBS Hong Kong has truly embraced a hybrid work model in which employees are given more flexibility to get work done proactively. Consequently, WFH measures have now been integrated into the bank's 'Future of Work' strategy, and it works just as efficiently as envisioned. "Our flexible work arrangements allow employees to devise their own schedules. With this, employees can carve out time for working and for personal commitments, such as family duties," she says, adding that the employee survey results reveal that over 80 per cent of the DBS Hong Kong employees feel satisfied with the flexible work culture. "Having said that, we think that it is important that our employees still come together in the office for collaboration and socialising. We know that this will help them grow as individuals and as a team, even working remotely. That's why our model allows employees to work from home 40 per cent of their time." On the other hand, the bank keeps investing in its people, and one of the ways is to invest in the workplace, where they spend 60 per cent of their time. Therefore, the bank's office space has been reconfigured as 'JoySpace' – with more open spaces and flexible furniture arrangements to promote co-creation and collaboration. "One of our Consumer Banking colleagues told me that the hybrid work model has allowed him to make more time for his family, giving him a better work-life balance. He also enjoys the time going back to the office to socialise with his teammates." "To strengthen the bonding and engagement of our employees when we are physically apart, we need to make sure they feel included and inspired from afar." Therefore, the bank launched the 'TOGETHER' campaign to bring its people together, ensuring everyone is taken care of even as they work remotely. With this campaign, employees are trained and coached on effective remote work practices and how to look after their health and wellbeing, including the launch of the 'iHealth' app in January last year. Comprehensive training and career development As an organisation that provides continuous learning opportunities for its employees, DBS Hong Kong encourages its employees to take charge of their personal growth by gaining exposure and experience, evaluating their performance by seeking regular feedback and acquiring new skills and knowledge as part of their learning journey. The learning and development strategies aim to improve the workforce performance and productivity and stay ahead of the exponential changes in the world’s digital, fintech and technology spaces through innovative and immersive continuous learning and development programmes. DBS Learning Hub is a one-stop curated platform for employees to improve their professional skills. This platform offers customised and recommended skills-specific learning solutions. They are created by subject domain experts and delivered with interactive sessions, practical insights and videos. The Transformational Leadership Programme is a multi-year campaign that provides holistic support to future DBS leaders. It is designed to strengthen managers’ capabilities and encourage them to practise their management and professional skills. Apart from the learning hub and leadership programme, DBS Hong Kong has also launched other training modules to help employees improve their technology skills, virtual meeting etiquette and cultural sensitivity. Digital talent recruitment and retention The traditional recruitment process is often a lengthy and complicated process that can be frustrating for both job seekers and recruiters alike. DBS Hong Kong has digitalised the recruitment process with the implementation of 'Jobs Intelligence Maestro' (JIM), a virtual recruiter. The AI-enabled recruitment platform screens, engages and responds to candidates' queries and shortlists candidates at scale, 24x7. In doing so, the system integrates with different assessment tools to generate an AI-based score to index each candidate and employs different skill assessment and psychometric tools to measure their cognitive, social and emotional traits. To retain talent, DBS Hong Kong uses predictive analytics to identify who their most likely leavers are; this information helps the bank retain employees proactively by providing insights for our people managers. This also allows the bank to continue the talent pipeline. The AI-powered DBS Match system analyses the bank's talent database then matches it to the skills and experience of its employees to find potential candidates for internal positions. "With all these initiatives, programmes and technologies, we want to demonstrate how DBS Hong Kong is a great place to work at with flexible working arrangements, a rewarding career path, a healthy work-life balance and an environment that is collaborative and inclusive," says Cheng. 1 Kincentric is a consulting group that advises corporates on employee engagement, corporate culture and leadership development to improve efficiency in HR structure and practices.
