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Employees
Grit
Cognisant that banking is an essential service, our people adapted quickly to the different circuit breaker and lockdown situations, as well as work from home arrangements. This ensured that our customers remained well-served during the pandemic. On our part, we made sure to take care of our employees’ physical and mental well-being, and to equip them with skills of the future. Not only did the bank pledge to keep all jobs, we also created new ones to bolster employment in a difficult year.
Hiring talent in good and bad times
DBS hired former system analyst Dawn Lum, who spent 14 years in the telecommunications industry as a trainee as part of the SGUnited Traineeships Programme.
Developing a contact-tracing solution to protect our people
Eight departments in DBS Singapore came together in double-quick time to develop a contact-tracing tool to uncover the movements of employees affected by Covid-19. This enabled us to promptly identify employees who were first-, second- or third-degree contacts of potential Covid-19 cases, and to quarantine those at risk, protecting the health of all employees. The solution was also made available to DBS’ key overseas offices.
Upskilling to be future-ready
Ray Goh experienced first-hand how Amazon Web Services’ DeepRacer platform made learning artificial intelligence and machine learning easy and took it upon himself and his team to run the DBS x AWS DeepRacer League to help equip over 3,000 employees with these skills. In 2020, DBS trained over 3,000 employees in artificial intelligence/ machine learning through gamification. Going forward, more employees will be trained in these areas, as well as in design thinking, data and analytics and agile practices.
Looking after the physical well-being of our people
Provided our employees with care packs which included hand sanitiser, masks, thermometer and Vitamin C. Complimentary medical webinars and consultation with virtual doctors were also made available. In addition, DBS’ digitalisation capabilities meant that 80-90% of our employees could work from the safety of their homes.
Keeping morale high while working apart
Galvanised our 12,000 strong workforce in Singapore amid Covid-19 with the launch of DBS’ TOGETHER movement. The initiative helped to boost employee morale through a series of programmes aimed at addressing their physical, emotional and mental well-being.
Creating and protecting jobs
Hired over 2,000 people in Singapore, of which more than 1,000 included new roles, comprising a mix of traineeships for fresh graduates as well as more specialised roles for seasoned professionals. Of these, over 150 were young talent recruited into DBS tech programmes for the bank to build a strong local core and pipeline of tech talent. DBS’ annual internship programmes continued unabated in 2020.
Keeping each other safe
When the Covid-19 situation began unfolding, data scientist Wu Wei and his team tapped on diverse data sets and advanced analytics techniques to enable contact tracing for up to three degrees of separation in less than two days.
Building a future-ready workforce
Held a series of large scale virtual learning events to promote continuous learning among our workforce to equip them with skillsets of the future. For instance, we ran our inaugural ‘LearnShareTeach TOGETHER’ Virtual Festival and DBS FutureForward Week in April and July respectively, to encourage our employees to pick up new skills and to connect with colleagues through the sharing of knowledge and experiences. More than 120 learning sessions were organised in 2020, providing employees in Singapore and across the region access to a diverse range of courses to enhance their skillsets even as they worked from home during the pandemic.
