Boosting Productivity and Innovation through Job Redesign

Job redesign refers to the reformation of work tasks and responsibilities to optimize processes and employee allocation, thereby enhancing quality and productivity. While digital technologies support the workforce, and diversity, equity, and inclusion are crucial elements for innovation and profitability, it is necessary to rethink and restructure how work is defined and performed to attract and retain experienced talent while improving productivity. Singapore has been a pioneer in job redesign, especially in the service sector, to optimize company resources and increase employee competence.

A workshop on Job Redesign for the Service Sector was organized by the Singapore Productivity Centre in Singapore from 1-4 October 2024 to facilitate the observation of strategies and good practices to assist APO members in unleashing the potential of their abundant workforces and talent. Nineteen participants from 16 APO members and three observers from Azerbaijan completed the workshop. The workshop was led by five resource persons, one each from Australia and the ROC, and three from Singapore.

Participants learned about current trends and methodologies of strategic workforce planning and service design, enabling them to formulate strategies for service innovation and workforce reskilling before initiating endeavors for job redesign in organizations. Site visits to two restaurants, Gochi-So Shokudo and Tun Xiang, and Singapore's Lifelong Learning Exploration Centre provided good practices related to how businesses could enhance productivity and customer satisfaction through effective job redesign and how individuals could identify necessary competencies and available support for reskilling and upskilling.