Our Research

While most workers maintain stable employment over their career, an increasing proportion of tertiary graduates (i.e. those with polytechnic diploma and above) have been experiencing worsening employment outcomes even before the pandemic. These individuals face difficulties gaining employment or re-employment, and may be entrenched in short-term or casual work earning low incomes. This study seeks to provide further understanding on employment vulnerability in Singapore by examining the extent to which individuals experience EV, the nature of EV, the role that individuals and employers play in mitigating EV, and suggest possible intervention measures that can help to mitigate EV. Time-ordered sequential information is collected over an individual’s work life span since graduation, on a multitude of variables that may affect employment or career decisions. The surveys is implemented on a large nationally representative sample with a focus on individuals with diploma and higher education and companies in industries that who are unemployed or left the labour force due to inability to find work.

This is a collaborative research piece between IAL and UCL Institute of Education’s LLAKES and CGHE research centres. The first objective of this collaboration is to assess the current state of the Singaporean graduate labour market through the lens of graduate jobs and provide important intelligence on demand trends in times of continued expansion of higher education and changing demand patterns brought on by technological change and increased competition on globalised markets. The second objective is to draw on the OECD PISA and PIAAC data to explore the variation across countries, and in particular Singapore, in changes to levels and distributions of core skills (Literacy, Numeracy and Problem-Solving) between age 15 and early adulthood, through the stage of upper-secondary education and training.

Investigate the impact of lifetime skills accumulation, giving particular focus to the contributions of CET, on employment outcomes in Singapore

This project seeks to facilitate change management in enterprises towards adopting a ‘build model’ through changes in key workplace practices including recruitment, talent management and job framing, thereby strengthening the employer pillar of SkillsFuture. It involves industry and the TAE community to jointly co-create change management methodology and tools, to support future intervention studies.

This mixed methods study seeks to better understand the impact of workplace discrimination, harassment and related injury (DHI) on career trajectories and employment vulnerability, and to help inform policy decisions on navigating any challenges faced in workplace DHI in order to ensure fair, inclusive and safe work practices (including recruitment, dismissal, promotion and access to training) and the work environment.

This study seeks to examine the impact of an intervention programme in encouraging learning for enhanced employability and career progression, and to understand the motivation of individuals toward learning, any actions they take or intend to take towards reskilling and upskilling.

This project examines the changing forms of work arrangements and how companies and individuals manage work practices, training, and careers.

The aim of the SSG commissioned study is to evaluate the Workforce Skills Qualifications (WSQ) and the SkillsFuture Credit (SFC). The evaluations seek to understand stakeholders’ perceptions of the initiatives and investigate their effectiveness and outcomes.

This study seeks to provide further understanding of the employment vulnerability (EV) of workers in Singapore, with comparative analysis across young, mature and ageing workers and contrasting vulnerable vs less vulnerable cohorts.