Most desired companies to work for

Working parents and Generation Y employees have chosen Singapore Airlines, IBM, Procter & Gamble and Citibank as their most desired companies to work for.

A recent survey of 455 working professionals in Singapore has revealed that most employees want to work for Singapore Airlines (SIA) if given a choice. While SIA garnered the highest number of votes overall as well as working parents' preferred company, Citibank was listed favourably in the top three by all employee groups, including Gen Ys.

Conducted by PeopleSearch and Boardroom Research, the results were announced at a gala awards ceremony last Friday held in concurrent with the Leading in the 21st Century forum.

IBM and Procter & Gamble were the next most popular employers overall while working parents picked HP as their third best option to work for after SIA and Citibank. Despite the recent global economic crisis, most Gen Y respondents still rank financial institutions highly, with DBS Bank, Goldman Sachs and HSBC Bank included in their list of most desired companies.

Yet the average Singapore employee is still unhappy with their current job and career prospects. According to the same Singapore Workforce Study, only 56% were happy with the progress they have made in their career so far.

While 73% were happy with their current employer's reputation and two-thirds do respect their immediate superior, they did not think the company is rewarding them well either financially or with advancement opportunities. Only 21% were happy with their promotion chances.

Close to four-fifths indicated that salary was the most important job aspect to them, followed by career advancement opportunities (40%) and job security (35%).

Respondents also believe that the high staff turnover rate their companies are experiencing is because they lack good talent retention strategies and competitive pay packages.

The online study, conducted at the end November last year, polled respondents above age 21 who have been working full-time in Singapore for the last three years and earn a monthly income of at least S$3,000.

The list of winners in PeopleSearch's "Most Desired Company to work for" survey:

Overall winner (voted by all respondents)

Singapore Airlines

IBM

Procter & Gamble

Citibank

HP

Microsoft

Voted by working parents

Singapore Airlines

Citibank

HP

IBM

Keppel Corporation

Microsoft

Ministry of Education

Voted by Gen Y

Procter & Gamble

CapitaLand

Citibank

DBS Bank

Goldman Sachs

HSBC Bank

NCS