Talent hunt underway for DHL’s career programme in Singapore

DHL Supply Chain in Singapore is offering an opportunity for 10 young professionals with two to three years of working experience to sign up for an 18-month training programme.

The tailored training includes an overseas stint as well as mentoring access to local and regional C-suite executive, and is expected to land successful candidates a regional role with the contract logistics company.

The programme is called AGILE – which stands for Accelerated, Growth, International, Leadership and Excellence – and was developed under the SkillsFuture leadership development initiative spearheaded by the Singapore Economic Development Board.

Kwok-Wai Lee, CFO, DHL Supply Chain Asia Pacific, brought out the need for the logistics sector to find talent to transform supply chains and help global companies stay ahead of the competition. He said: "We are looking for the best candidates to join us and be part of this ground-breaking evolution."

Applications are open till September 10, 2016 and the programme will start in January 2017.

The chosen 10 will undergo a modular-based training, tailored according to the individual’s abilities and professional goals in functional areas such as finance, HR, IT, operations, solutions design and service logistics.

Edwin Wong, VP and regional head of service logistics, DHL Supply Chain Asia Pacific, commented: "We want to identify and develop young talent, regardless of the industry they are in now, as long as they have demonstrated excellence in the first two to three years of their career."

In an exclusive with Human Resources, Teofilus Ponniah, HR director, DHL Supply Chain Asia Pacific, shared details about the programme.

Q. How is the HR team adding business value through AGILE?

The AGILE programme was created to invest in potential leaders for the logistics business. While it is critical to meet today’s talent requirements, it is equally important to identify and develop young managers who can grow with the business and become tomorrow’s leaders to drive further success.

This was the business requirement that spurred the creation of the AGILE programme. It will ensure that we are well poised for future growth by training the right people who will in turn make effective contributions to the business.

The AGILE programme, a brainchild of the HR team, is a unique talent requisition programme that has a specific target audience and a clear learning plan. We want to target high performers with a few years of working experience, who want an accelerated leadership journey or more out of their careers.

Q. How did you get the buy-in of internal stakeholders in launching this campaign?

Our internal stakeholders were extremely supportive when we first presented the value proposition. We explained the importance of having good talent to meet the medium-term requirements of our organisation and the impact on our business bottom and top line growth. By clearly defining the return on investment, we were able to secure the buy-in of our internal stakeholders.

In addition, engaging our stakeholders from the start and making them part of the programme development – where we incorporated many of their ideas in improving the programme’s content and execution – was pivotal in getting them to commit their time and experience.

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