Human Capital

Human Rights

CapitaLand has an integrated human capital strategy to recruit, develop and motivate employees. KPIs, both for the business as well as for people development, are in place to ensure that employees’ performance goals are aligned with the Group’s business objectives. Employees are provided with appropriate development opportunities to perform well in their job.

CapitaLand was voted winner for the Property and Real Estate Sector, Randstad Award 2016. The Randstad Awards¹¹ are based on the results of the largest employment survey of employer branding research in 25 countries globally.

Anti-child Labour and Anti-forced Labour

With a global workforce of more than 12,700 employees, CapitaLand is committed to be a workplace of choice for its employees.

CapitaLand upholds the spirit of international human rights conventions, such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Conventions, against coerced labour and discrimination in any form. To date, Singapore has ratified 20 ILO Conventions covering four key areas of employment standards: child labour, forced labour, collective bargaining, and equal remuneration. CapitaLand has aligned its policies with these four key areas in Singapore and overseas. This includes the signing of the Employers Pledge for Fair Employment Practices with The Tripartite Alliance for Fair Employment Practices (TAFEP¹²) and a commitment to the five key principles of fair employment as follows:

• Recruit and select employees based on merit, such as skills, experience and ability, regardless of age, race, gender, religion or family status.
• Treat employees fairly and with respect and implement progressive human resource management systems.
• Provide employees with equal opportunities for training and development based on their strengths and needs, to help them achieve their full potential.
• Reward employees fairly based on their ability, performance, contribution and experience.
• Abide by labour laws and adopt Tripartite Guidelines which promote fair employment practices.

In 2016, there was no reported incident relating to discrimination, child labour or forced labour in CapitaLand.

Promoting Fairness and Diversity

As an international company, CapitaLand embraces diversity in various aspects including different cultures, nationalities and languages. There are more than 80 nationalities working within the Group. CapitaLand believes that regardless of ethnicity, age or gender, employees can make a significant contribution based on their talent, expertise and experience.

CapitaLand propagates a localisation strategy for its overseas operations. This ensures that the teams on the ground have a good grasp of local socio-political and cultural sensitivities to help deliver targeted business outcomes for the Group. In 2016, locals accounted for about 83% of the employees based in Singapore and 98% of employees based in China. Of these locals, 40% were holding managerial and senior management positions in Singapore and 14% in China.

CapitaLand identifies talent internally and externally to build bench strength as well as talent pipeline for leadership succession planning. CapitaLand recruits talent through a network of local and overseas universities, and also attracts young talent early through scholarship programmes such as the CapitaLand-Building and Construction Authority Singapore Scholarship. Apart from fresh graduates, CapitaLand also employs experienced and mid-career professionals as well as industry veterans. New hires represented 23% of the total headcount in 2016¹³.

CapitaLand’s vibrant, motivated and qualified workforce has given the Group a competitive edge. About 68% of CapitaLand’s global workforce is aged 30 to 50. In 2016, CapitaLand had no employee below the age of 16. About 80% of new hires in 2016 were born from 1978 onwards, commonly known as Generation-Y. Over 75% of its employees hold tertiary qualifications and above (this includes holders of diploma, and bachelor’s and master’s degree qualifications).

CapitaLand’s global workforce comprises an almost equal proportion of males and females, at a ratio of 47:53 (In Singapore, the proportion of male to female employees is 40:60; in China, the ratio is 47:53).

The company’s female employees are well represented at the middle and senior management level. For the past three years, about 50% of the managerial employees were female. In 2016, about 32% of senior management were female with three¹⁴ of them holding C-Suite appointments within the Group.

The gender pay gap is between 2-21% for male and females with no clear trend of gender gap at all levels except senior management which was at 21% variance. An analysis of comparable roles showed that CapitaLand rewards men and women fairly for similar work and that the gap reflects the lower representation of women at senior levels within the organization.

Re-employment Opportunities

The Singapore government implemented the reemployment legislation in 2012 to enable more people to work beyond the current statutory retirement age of 62, up to 65 in the first instance and subsequently, up to 67 years old. Before the legislation, CapitaLand already had a reemployment policy of extending employment to employees who have reached the mandatory retirement age but are still able and willing to continue contributing to CapitaLand. The reemployment will continue at full pay, although it is permissible by the law to reduce pay upon reemployment as more companies move away from seniority-based wage system for reemployed workers. This policy is applicable to all staff globally. In 2016, a total of 107 staff were above retirement age¹⁵.

Respect for Freedom of Association

CapitaLand is committed to maintaining harmonious labour relations. It respects all employees’ right to freedom of association and the right to be members of trade unions. In Singapore, CapitaLand is guided by the Industrial Relations Act that allows representation of staff by trade unions for collective bargaining, thus providing them with an avenue to seek redress for any industrial disputes. CapitaLand and the union enjoy a cordial working relationship, promoting positive working conditions and improving productivity for the mutual benefit of employees and the company. Currently, 40% of the bargainable workforce and junior executives in Singapore are union members. Globally, 12% of its workforce is covered by collective agreements*. During the year, the union did not express any concerns on employee health and safety issues as the OHS management system is externally audited.

Talent Management

CapitaLand seeks innovative, dynamic and talented employees to take the company into its next phase of growth. It also adopts a multi-pronged approach to manpower planning, i.e. developing internal talent and hiring young talent, mid-career and industry veterans. CapitaLand continuously builds its management bench strength through the identification of high potential talent as part of the regular succession planning process. Talent management decisions are driven by a set of organisational core competencies as well as position-specific competencies. CapitaLand’s performance management and talent development programmes provide developmental opportunities to nurture employees’ capability and personal traits, underpinned by its core values, through formal classroom trainings, on-the-job exposure, job rotation and mentoring/coaching.

The Board’s Executive Resource and Compensation Committee (ERCC) regularly reviews the succession plans for the key positions in the company including President & Group CEO and other key management personnel in CapitaLand.

On an annual basis, CapitaLand identifies and reviews suitably qualified candidates from both within and outside of the Group who could be considered for key positions when the need arises in the immediate, medium, or longer term.

Positive Work Environment

CapitaLand recognises that a positive work environment is essential to attract, motivate and retain talent. A total well-being programme has been put in place to promote personal development, health and work-life harmony. Initiatives include a flexible medical and benefits plan, flexible work arrangements, employee engagement initiatives and subsidised rates for employees staying at Ascott’s serviced residences. Part-time employees are entitled to the same benefits on a pro-rata basis. CapitaLand advocates a pay-for-performance philosophy to drive ownership of collective goals, leading to a high performance culture which creates long-term shareholder value. Its robust performance management system ensures that all employees receive regular performance and career development reviews.

In 2016, 435 eligible female employees went on maternity leave and 322 returned to work. CapitaLand also provides paid paternity leave to all male employees in Singapore and countries where practicable. 163 eligible male employees took paternity leave. In Singapore, the Central Provident Fund (CPF) is a comprehensive social security savings plan introduced by the Singapore government to enforce savings by salaried workers to help CPF members work towards a secure retirement. Under the CPF scheme, CapitaLand and its employees make monthly contributions to the employees’ CPF account in accordance with the prevailing regulations.

Apart from complying with Singapore’s statutory requirements on making monthly contributions to employees’ CPF accounts, the Group also adheres to the respective social security contribution or pension plan obligations of the countries it operates in.

Fair Remuneration

All staff sign employment contracts with clear terms and conditions and their progress are subject to a formal annual performance assessment.

To ensure that CapitaLand remains competitive and continues to attract and retain the right talent, the Group engages external consultants to benchmark the company’s compensation packages against different markets. All regular full-time employees undergo an annual performance review where there is an open discussion on the employee’s performance, areas for improvement, developmental needs and career planning.

The Group rewards and motivates employees with comprehensive and competitive compensation and benefits programmes. CapitaLand’s compensation packages, which include short-term cash bonuses and long-term equity- based reward plans, are benchmarked against different geographical markets and industries to ensure competitiveness. The performance based Restricted Share Plan (RSP) is an attractive long-term incentive offered to employees of managerial grades to provide them with a personal stake in the Group, contingent on achieving performance targets. This better aligns employee and shareholder interests to deliver business results. For non-managerial grade employees, an equivalent Restricted Cash Plan (RCP) gives equivalent cash awards when business targets are met. The incentive pool is funded by the Group’s profitability and economic value added (EVA) performance, to award employees based on their job responsibilities and individual work performance.

Regular benchmarking against different geographical markets and industries, as well as innovation in compensation strategies ensures CapitaLand remains competitive and continues to attract and retain talent.

The remuneration of key management executives is also tied to a set of key performance indicators including their efforts in building the management bench strength and in the development of talent.

CapitaLand monitors the movement of its workforce closely and its staff turnover¹⁶ was 13.8%. In 2016, the turnover was 12.4% in Singapore which was better than the national average of 21.6%¹⁷. The turnover was 14.5% in China, which was better than the national average of 18.6%¹⁸.

Almost 43% of employees globally have been with the Group for five years or longer. The company also interviews resigning employees as part of its continuing efforts to improve its retention policies and initiatives.

Job Security

CapitaLand is committed to providing meaningful jobs for its employees. This is in line with the Tripartite Guidelines on Managing Excess Manpower issued by the Singapore Ministry of Manpower (MOM) together with its tripartite partners, Singapore National Employers Federation (SNEF) and the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC).

These guidelines also suggest various arrangements such as providing company retraining programmes for workers, redeployment of workers to alternative areas of work, implementing, flexible work arrangements, and managing wage costs through a flexible wage system.

In 2016, other than the centralisation of certain functions there was no major reorganisation in CapitaLand. There were no layoffs arising from these changes.

In the event of termination or employee resignation, there is a minimum notice period of one to three months that needs to be fulfilled, depending on the employee’s job grade. Due to operational requirements, senior management employees are required to serve a notice period of three to six months.

Learning and Development

Employees are provided with appropriate training to be better equipped to contribute at optimal levels, and contribute effectively to Group’s performance. At least 95% of employees are required to attend at least one learning event per year and each employee is required to achieve an average of at least 40 hours of learning and development for continuous upskilling and improvement.

CapitaLand commits up to 3% of its annual wage bill towards initiatives for employees’ learning and development. This includes personal development courses and certified training programmes to equip employees with the necessary skills for better performance. Employees are granted paid examination leave for their studies. Full-time employees are allowed up to 10 days of examination leave per calendar year.

In 2016, about 89% of the workforce attended at least one learning event¹⁹, and the average number of training hours completed by each employee for the year was more than 54 hours, well above the recommended industry guide of 40 hours per annum.

In anticipation of the technological change and its impact on the skillsets of its employees, CapitaLand organised a series of fireside chats providing an informal learning platform where industry experts are invited to share insights on topics and trends related to our business, especially developments in the global tech scene. By organising these casual discussions, the company hopes to inculcate a spirit of lifelong learning and help equip employees with the knowhow to navigate a constantly changing world with topics ranging from mobile payments, change management, digital realities to the office of the future. Staff located outside of the venue could join the session via private streaming.

Other training organized by the CapitaLand training arm included analytics, change management and diversity related training. Over 960 employees invested over 3,600 hours attending these sessions in 2016.

Staff Engagement*

CapitaLand actively engages its employees through various avenues, including regular communication sessions held by senior management for effective flow of information and alignment of business goals and objectives across all levels of workforce.

Quarterly staff communication sessions by the President & Group CEO allow the Group’s senior management team to communicate and interact with staff. These sessions are webcast live to CapitaLand offices in Singapore and overseas. During these staff communication sessions, information on the Group’s results and key business focus are shared with employees. These sessions include a question and answer session, where employees can pose and vote on questions via an online platform, via email, or in person.

CapitaLand practises an open-door policy, allowing all employees to obtain a fair review and a prompt response to problems or concerns relating to any aspects of employment with the Group. This includes harassment, grievance handling and whistle blowing policies applicable to all employees. Staff members can also raise their concerns to a higher level of management or the Human Resource Department.

Information such as employment terms, benefits and practices, Ethics and Code of Business Conduct is made available to all employees through CapitaLand’s intranet portal iHub.

Since the 2015 global Employee Engagement Survey²¹ (EES), 169 focus group meetings were organised across 18 countries and various follow up actions were taken.

Innovation

CapitaLand encourages a collaborative, innovative and entrepreneurial culture within the company. It created platforms for staff to make suggestions and organised training programmes to encourage employees to think differently and to be innovative.

In 2016, CapitaLand organised regular evening sharing sessions featuring speakers from within the company, as well as industry experts, to share their experiences on game changing trends and innovation. These were attended by over 560 staff who invested over 3,000 training hours.

CapitaLand organised the CapitaLand & CNN Future Cities: Asia Forum which brought together a panel of change-makers from the government, real estate and technology sectors to discuss what it takes to be the builder of future cities and the catalysts for change as Asia’s bustling metropolises evolve into smart cities. During the event, CapitaLand launched its fully automated artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot on its CapitaStar digital platform.

As sustainability is integral to CapitaLand’s business, it conducted a competition to encourage and identify outstanding EHS Innovations within the Group which contribute to the environment and its business. In 2016, six EHS Innovation Awards were given out.