Work Attachment Fujifilm Business Innovation Singapore
Jan - Jun 2023
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Fujifilm Business Innovation Singapore (Formerly Fuji Xerox)
Fujifilm Business Innovation Singapore (Formerly Fuji Xerox)
The digital office printers and business solutions arm of Fujifilm Group in Singapore.
Besides one-stop printing solutions, it has branched out to IT services solutions such as shared IT services and onsite support.
Introduction of the Work Attachment in FBSG
What was it about?
It was a six-month internship as a Talent Acquisition Intern in FBSG.
Why this internship: I had previous internship experiences as HR generalist (in Herbert Smith Freehills Singapore) and HR Operations (in Heineken Singapore).
When I was doing the USE project, I had opportunity to experience the employee engagement, welfare and some L&D aspects of HR. Therefore, I thought this was a perfect opportunity for me to know more about the recruitment function of HR.
My Aim: To have better understanding of recruitment process as a whole. To get experiences of being a recruiter.
From this experience, the relevant VSKs include:
Experience that made Me Closer to the actual Workplace where I met important People.
What was this experience about?
In Jan 2023, I joined FBSG as a Talent Acquisition Intern whereby I had chances to learn and experience the entire hiring lifecycle from sourcing to onboarding. I was in a team with about 5 members including myself. My role was to support the Recruiters throughout the hiring process. My main tasks were advertising opening roles, coordinating interviews, assisting in hiring process and onboarding new hires. Nonetheless, maintaining the Applicant Tracking System (ATS) and recruitment working documents are part and parcel of the job scope.
On a daily basis, I coordinated about 3-5 interviews. The peak was close to 10 interviews were arranged in a day. Another peak was attending about 5-7 interviews in a day. In terms of the roles I have assisted in the hiring process, in total, it was close to 30 roles (including full-time, contract, interns).
For certain stages like sourcing, screening and hiring, I may have limited exposures. Nonetheless, I took a special task to learn how to be a Recruiter by handling a few opening roles by myself, with the assistance of Recruiters in my team.
What Have I Contributed in This Internship?
Attracting Talent
I was responsible for advertising opening roles in various job portals to attract potential talents. The insights I have concluded are different job portals have their own characteristics that attract different pool of job applicants.
For example, to hire a fresh graduate, I would post jobs on tertiary institution job portals. MyCareersFuture, the national job bank is an essential platform to post every job opening. To hire highly-skilled professional, LinkedIn would be the most preferred platform.
During my internship, I also explored different job portals that are catered to people with disability and ex-offenders to explore potential talents. Which aligns with FBSG's emphasis on Diversity and Inclusion. I also helped to refine JDs to make them more appealing in terms of customisation for each role (based on its role nature), maintaining a positive tone and focus on growth and developments opportunities.
Nowadays, with the wide adoption of social media in Singapore, Telegram can also be a platform to attract potential talent by Telegram Channels as Job Listing Platform.
Read Lim Zhen He's Article here to learn more about Telegram Channels as Job Listing Platforms:
Coordinating and Sitting in Interviews
Interview coordination can be tricky at times. Lots of coordination are required to set up an interview, including availability of interview participants, meeting room availability, change of timing etc. For confidential roles interview, I had to be careful when communicating with the relevant parties to make arrangement.
Another interesting part was I had opportunity to sit in interviews with hiring managers to facilitate the interview and assess the applicant together. Different hiring managers have different emphasis depending on the roles. Some can emphasize more on technical knowledge and skillsets, some can emphasize more on personality.
For hiring managers who are more junior, facilitation of interview needs to be handled careful so that the interview is on track, applicant is assessed fairly, no sensitive topics or information are discussed or revealed.
Assisting the Job Offering Process
Once a candidate has been selected, I had to send out "intent to offer" email to collect documents that are used by Recruiters in proposing compensation package. I had a few experiences of drafting the salary proposal for Recruiters to review.
Salary proposal has to take into consideration of different aspects, including length of service, skillsets and job role fit, internal compensation structure, market rate etc. I observed the consideration taken by Recruiters and HRBP can be different. Recruiters are to consider market rate, negotiate and convey candidates' desired salary package to HRBP. Who will then consider internal compensation structure and current department structure, organisation strategic direction etc. to finalise the salary proposal.
Pre-boarding and Onboarding New Hires
Once the candidate receives the offer, I will launch onboarding module for the candidate, who will be able to connect with HR, same department colleagues and direct managers even before their first day. Also, there are useful information to prepare new hires for their start of work. I find this pre-boarding phase is useful because it keeps the new hires warm by using various touchpoints designed to create a positive onboarding experience.
On new hire's first day, I will give them a brief introduction about the company structure, key HR contact points, company systems, benefits etc. I will then bring them to have a office tour and lastly, bring them to meet their direct reporting manager. Also, I will send them the introduction slide deck on the same day for their reference.
Managing ATS system, Job Portals and Documents
It includes constantly updating the job portals, ATS system, and documents on the opening roles and filled roles. This process can be tedious at times, but it is necessary for the Recruiters to track and generate insights to identify gaps and opportunities which can be considered to adjust recruitment strategies.
For example, one of the Job Portals received a few to zero application for some roles in the past 2 months. We might have to consider stop posting the affected roles in that job portal. Meanwhile, exploring other potential job portals.
Learning to be a Recruiter
I requested for a special project to learn how to be a Recruiter, under the guidance of my team (which I felt very grateful to have them). Sourcing can be time-consuming, especially I am a beginner, I had to allocate time properly for my usual workload and this project.
The most significant learning points here are:
techniques to manage and communicate with candidate and hiring manager
sourcing platform and technique
screening technique (e.g.,, resume screening and phone screening)
LinkedIn Recruiter mode
The experience of handling opening roles by myself was very different from supporting Recruiters. I had to consider:
how to find the suitable talents? which job portal(s) I should go for?
what keywords to be used for filtering candidate?
% of fit for resume and job description (if I cannot find a 100%, can I find 80% /60%/40% fit? )
There was situation where I found this candidate was well-fitted for the role, but hiring manager may have other opinion. In this case, I need to align my understanding of this role with the hiring manager's to agree on adjusted hiring requirement.
When doing phone screening, Recruiter needs to have some understanding on the candidate's salary expectation. I realised this conversation needs to be done tactfully to avoid any miscommunication on salary topic. It is a sensitive topic, I can only gather facts and I cannot make any promise to the candidate on compensation details.
Organised a HR Department Engagement Session
I was tasked with another 4 HR team colleagues to organise a HR Department Engagement Session. It was a 3-hour session. We designed a few small games to enhance our team bond and let our colleagues to have a small break from their busy work.
Reflection of this Experience (SWOT Analysis)
The most significant strengths I have embraced deeply in this experience is the courage to fail. During my 6 months internship, I was taking another 3 modules at the same time. I started off the project of learning to be a Recruiter in the 3rd month (i.e., March 2023) of my internship. At the same time, I had multiple school assignment kicked in. After I finished school assignments, the exams were around the corner. Therefore, I took a pause on this project and focused on my school assignments and exams. I finished exams in May 2023 and I only left about 4-5 weeks to go for this internship. I decided to continue this project right after my exams.
The progress of this project did not go smoothly. I procrastinated a lot on this project at the beginning. The slow progress caused a lot frustration and anxious in me. Until a point where I asked myself if I really want to continue learning how to be a Recruiter? Why I had this option was because I was the one requested for this extra project, which was initially out of my internship scope. Technically I can choose not to continue at any point in time. My anxiety and stress actually came from my fear of failure. The negative thoughts such as "I might not find a suitable candidate", "the potential talent might not be interested in this role" kept coming into my mind. Which caused me to procrastinate a lot.
I decided to continue eventually because I did not want to give up this precious opportunity to gain valuable knowledge and practical hands-on recruiting experience. I affirmed my determination to grab this opportunity. There was a change in mindset from negative thoughts that focused on the result, I shifted my mindset to "let's do one step in a time and just focusing on the small step that I am doing". With this new mindset, the project's progress started catching up.
The fear of failure is not necessarily a bad thing, it made me be more prepared to do the every single step better. For example, before I did my first phone screening, I seek guidance from Recruiters from my team and watched YouTube videos about phone screening to make myself more familiar and comfortable for the actual phone screening process.
Eventually, I got two potential candidates (both passed final interview) in the pool for a technical role opening. From this experience, I learnt to appreciate the journey instead of just keep pursuing after the desired result. My new motto is "do one step at a time and I will get to where I am supposed to be".
Thoughts about this Experience (Reflection)
Through this internship in FBSG, I have a better understanding about the hiring cycle, IT industry and different technical and corporate roles. Besides, I have learned many new skills related to sourcing, screening, job posting, ATS system etc.
Having experience of being a Recruiter, I actually like the feeling of matching candidate to a role that suits them. I feel this process is very special and significant to every candidate. It is also a very special and meaningful process to me. If I can match candidates to roles that fits them, I feel satisfied and contented. After this experience, I feel specialising in recruitment might be one of my future career possibilities.
In Year 4, after I took the Strategic Human Resources Management Module (HRM488), I can better appreciate and relate how hiring is important for an organisation to build a pool of potential and capable talents who can contribute to the organisation goals. It reminds me of the experience where FBSG hiring strategies follow the direction that FBSG is trying to move to. It is interesting to me on how HR can connect to the business strategy and make the relevant HR strategies to move the organisation towards the desired direction.
In the Strategic HRM perspective, some questions to consider when it comes to hiring strategies:
is our hiring strategy fit to our existing business strategy?
is our hiring strategy taking into consideration of future business direction?
is our hiring strategy effective in building our desired pool of human capital?
is our hiring strategy efficient to keep hiring cost within budget?
does our hiring strategy complement other HR functions? Such as L&D, performance appraisal.
During my times there, I participated a CSR activity that collected pre-loved items from employees to help the underserved communities. During festivals like Christmas, there is a CSR activity that encourages employees to prepare Christmas gifts for children who needs them. FBSG has been organising CSR activities regularly to contribute back to the society. Its strong dedication to social good and making positive impact opened my eyes to the deep impact a company can have beyond profits. More than just giving material goods, these CSR activities were about building empathy, understanding the needs of marginalized communities, and actively contributing to positive change.
What is Next?
This experience has exposed me to the recruitment related career path, which I might consider in the future. At the mean time, I feel stronger urge to explore HR functions that I have not had much work experience in, like compensation and benefit and HR analyst.
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