Our People

As of 31 March 2022, NIEC’s total staff strength across HQ and the 4 campuses stood at 196 full-time staff and 250 adjunct faculty (Lecturers and Practicum Supervisors).

 

 

Manpower Scaling And Planning

NIEC embarked on a Manpower Planning Study to re-examine the assumptions and parameters, as well as identify in greater detail other manpower drivers and new work trends that influence the demand, supply and productivity of our teaching and corporate workforce. The study will enable NIEC to forecast with greater accuracy, manpower needs in response to sectoral changes and demands. The study is expected to be completed by end 2022.

 

Major organisational changes were also introduced in 2021:

 

Formation of Student and Academic Services Division
With better understanding of the synergies between academic affairs, applications processing, and student management, particularly for CET courses, a new Student and Academic Services (SAS) Division was formed to harness the synergies, streamline processes and consolidate resources. The roles of SAS will be to safeguard and uphold academic affairs, quality and governance, lead in student development and support delivery of quality training to provide all students with a positive learning experience.

 

Formation of Communications & Business Development Division
With the formation of SAS and the transfer of the Marketing Operations team to the new SAS division, a new Communications and Business Development (CBD) division was set up to establish NIEC as the brand authority in early childhood training for early childhood educators. This would be achieved through communications, branding and marketing efforts to consistently and accurately establish NIEC’s presence in the industry, and through leading and driving initiatives to increase NIEC’s influence in the early childhood sector and develop new revenue streams to support NIEC’s financial resiliency.

 

Building NIEC’s Identity And Culture

To promote and institute a positive workplace culture which can in turn help boost teamwork, morale, productivity and efficiency, a series of staff engagement initiatives were rolled out during the year. These included:

 

a. Bee Heard – Employee Engagement Survey (EES)

1. To gain a more in-depth insight of staff’s engagement levels, NIEC conducted a formal EES in October 2020 to measure the present level of staff engagement, identify key gaps in engagement drivers if any, and propose interventions to close these gaps and strengthen engagement of staff in turn.
2. The survey results were analysed and the topline results were communicated to all staff in early 2021. This was followed up with several action plan workshops. A more detailed sharing of the results and key action plans was done at the virtual Staff Recognition Day on 28 May 2021. Subsequently, various initiatives, activities and policies were introduced to address some of the engagement gaps.

b. Bee Recognised

1. To build a culture of appreciation and recognition in NIEC, a ‘Bee Recognised’ drive was initiated to encourage all employees to constantly and openly recognise one another through little acts of acknowledgement and affirmation.
2. The initiative went underway with campuses/divisions sharing how they banded together to survive the many changes and challenges they faced amidst the pandemic, and in doing so, how NIEC’s core values of Respect, Integrity, Care, Collaboration and Excellence shone through.
   
   

c. Roll out of Online Engagement platform

In November 2021, Yammer was adopted as an internal employee engagement platform where staff can post pictures/ articles, share comments and reactions to their colleague’s posts. By using an existing platform, NIEC was able to optimise and leverage resources without having to spend additional money in procuring new systems and training staff on how to use it.

d. NIEC Cares Challenge

The Challenge was launched in November 2021 as an opportunity for staff to show appreciation and thank colleagues who have helped or supported them in any way. Riding on familiar social media design, participating staff posted pictures or videos with short captions on Yammer, and prizes were given to staff with the highest number of posts, highest number of “likes”, the most inspiring posts and the most creative posts.

 

Developing Staff

a. Bee Welcome and Bee Acclimatised
These 2 NIEC new staff onboarding programmes were revamped to provide better structure and depth for new colleagues to better understand the NIEC values and the opportunity to meet the Senior Management team as we welcomed them into the NIEC family.

 

b. Blossom Series
A new series of developmental programmes were rolled out for all staff to hone their leadership and personal mastery competencies. The Blossom Series consists of 5 distinct programmes. They are namely:

In 2021, Module 1 workshops for the Starflower, Zinnia and Fireweed programmes were completed. For the Aster programme, a 360-degree feedback questionnaire followed by a 1-to-1 feedback session with members of the Senior Management team was conducted during the year as part of the programme. Module 2 for all programmes in the Blossom series will be conducted in Year 2022.

 

As part of the Blossom series, all participants were provided with Occupational Personality Questionnaires (OPQ) to facilitate better self-awareness, understanding of individual strengths, areas for development with regard to relationships with others and more. The OPQ reports would eventually be used as a reference for every employee to draw up individual development plans with their Reporting Officers and for following through as part of the annual performance management cycle.

 

c. Bee-Learned
An NIEC Learning Sponsorship Scheme was introduced to support NIEC’s staff continuous pursuit of learning, excellence and personal growth so as to build a capable, innovative, and effective organisation that meets the challenges of an evolving knowledge-based economy. Under the scheme, NIEC would sponsor up to 70% of the fees for eligible courses and progammes. On top of the co-payment, staff would also receive a monetary completion award upon successful completion of the course.

 

Growing The Pipeline

1. A 2-year in-house development programme for Echinacea participants was designed and rolled out to further develop their leadership competencies.
   
   
2. Follow-up engagement sessions were held with Echinacea participants to forge strong relationships among them, build networks within NIEC and provide exposure to and learning from Senior Management.
   
   
3. To increase the internal availability of experienced and capable staff who are prepared to assume critical leadership positions as they become available, a succession planning framework was developed to identify and develop new leaders who can potentially step up to take over the portfolios of current leaders when they leave or retire.

Staff Welfare 

During the year, NIEC’s Staff Welfare Committee (SWC) organised various fun activities to promote bonding and camaraderie across campuses and divisions. As telecommuting was the default mode of work, the activities, which were based on the theme "Recharge, Reconnect, Re-energise", served as a platform for staff to check in with one another and take a break from their hectic work schedules. Some of these activities include online workout sessions, brown bag sessions, festive celebrations, and more.