Re: On SIA management: Start afresh and earn staff's trust
By Zuraidah Ibrahim – Straits Times, 6 Jan 2004
Senior Minister Lee, in the role of “nice cop”, following a good gallop as “bad cop”, came up with a number of what, on the face of them, looked to be reasonable and even conciliatory remarks during interview. Perhaps I am allowed to pass comment on this forum? I most certainly couldn’t do so safely anywhere in Singapore!
LKY - 'Look, I'm not here to defend the human relations side of SIA’
– Good, well perhaps you’d like to move PAP MP Loh Meng See from his position as Senior Vice President Human Resources, SIA. Mr Loh is obviously more talented in serving PAP full time than he is in serving SIA Human Resources Division. As readers will remember, it was Mr Loh’s signature which graced the clumsy letter of 30 Sept 2003, kindly informing us all, out of the blue, that the SIA Provident Fund was to be frozen with effect from 1 Nov 2003 as a “cost saving measure” (OK if I stop paying Income Tax – I need to find a few “cost saving measures” myself?). Nice handling Mr Loh – straight from the Do It Yourself HR handbook! We all thought your actions perfectly reasonable and we all thought it was such a refreshing departure from boring old convention when you saved us the bother of consultation and negotiation – all we had to do was sit there and mutely accept the situation! Oh and you were so quick off the mark that you didn’t fully explore the equally boring legal ramifications of your panicky actions, did you?
LKY - It (the government) also announced its intention to tighten the law to stop the pilots’ union leadership having to go back to members for their final say on any negotiations with management.
– Oh very nice, Senior Minister! Do you now imagine that the Alpa-S Exco will henceforth cut cozy deals in smoke filled rooms with your cronies following the agenda and figures that you kindly map out for everyone? I think not, SM! Even if a vote becomes illegal (what price democracy in Singapore and how do you explain this latest move to your “freedom loving” American protectors?), the Exco will return to the members for consultation. What next? - A law to add to the plethora of such laws in Singapore, this time banning consultation?!
LKY - 'For positive relations, you need trust. The employee must know the employer has his interest at heart. He's not just out to squeeze him and show profits and be done with it and he gets big bonuses. In other words, there must be confidence.'
- Senior Minister: the atmosphere on planet Lee must be exceptionally rare and conducive to light-headedness and cloudy perception. What you describe above is precisely the behavior of SIA. The airline is and has been for decades, an inhuman, rapacious consumer of employees, sucking the energy, enthusiasm and talent from the individual, “nickel and diming” them at every turn and contemptuously flicking them onto the garbage heap when their usefulness is deemed to be over. Please therefore explain to your interested audience, precisely how we should all go about trusting your much vaunted “management” of Singapore Airlines?
LKY - He noted that confidence can be built over time if management shares information with workers on the challenges ahead. As it is, with listed companies having to file their returns quarterly, information is already made public in a more timely fashion.
– Senior Minister: surely you are aware that, outside perhaps North Korea, Singapore Airlines has one of the most secretive cultures in the world – a culture not built by employees but built by a “management” operating in your shadow and fearful of your every criticism and punishment. Until there is a change of heart from the very top – that is you – there will be no change of culture, so don’t hold your breath about the effectiveness of some new cipher you’ve put in as latest CEO of your airline.
LKY – ‘The same approach (as NTUC) can be taken with SIA pilots, but union leaders need to be people who can be trusted and be told the facts without those facts being leaked to competitors’.
– Nice one Senior Minister. So the guys who can be trusted to fly the zillion dollar jets crammed chock full of your fare payers including Mrs Lee on her unscheduled return from the clutches of the (free) British health service which you so readily criticized, are the same guys who, on the ground, are now the worthless degenerates incapable of maturely evaluating the true facts of the matter and confidentially negotiating an equable settlement between airline and association membership? In the context of releasing confidential information, please see my comment above, re: North Korea. Maybe you should examine your own approach to the matter?
LKY - 'Well, there's Chew Choon Seng. Let's start afresh... I've already spoken to him that this is a chance to close the ledger and start afresh.'
– Well that’s OK then. Problem solved! We’ll just do it your way!