The Public Service: Seeking diversity

SINGAPORE (Nov 5): In the 1980s, with the first two decades of frantic economy-building behind it, the Singapore government turned to fine-tuning its human resource policies. It tapped what Royal Dutch Shell, the multinational oil company, was already doing. The Civil Service adapted concepts such as the CEP, or current estimated potential, to assess how far individuals could progress within the bureaucracy.

“You have developed your systems since then, we have evolved our systems since then, but it was a fruitful criss-crossing of ideas,” said Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong at a 2016 event marking Shell Singapore’s 125th anniversary.

Changes are indeed underway. On Oct 31, the recently appointed Public Service Commission chairman Lee Tzu Yang announced that the selection criteria of recipients of the prestigious PSC scholarship would be refined. Notably, the search would be widened to include candidates with achievements beyond academia. “We are working to widen and sharpen the process upstream, so that candidates who appear before us possess the diversity of qualities desired in the Public Service,” says Lee, in an open letter marking his 100th day as PSC chairman.

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