Learning From The Transformer
Colonel Rupert Gwee from Singapore jokes that he heads the world’s second smartest team: “The smartest team all ran away when they realised how much work the Singaporean Armed Forces HR Transformation Programme would be!” COL Gwee visited New Zealand in early June to share his experience of transformational change with Defence Transformation Programme members, the HRM Change Programme Sub-Steering Committee and various ELT members.
Over the last seven years, he has moved the SAF HR function from one focused on administration to one which the SAF now describes as “focused on harnessing insightful HR strategies and enhancing human capital.” And while technology has been a key enabler, COL Gwee says it has been the harmonisation of business processes that has been critical to the transformation.
“In any organisation you can find forms that have no purpose, and reports that were done once then kept being done because nobody thought to stop them,” says COL Gwee. “At one point we stopped a whole series of activities for six months and no-one even noticed.”
The SAF HR Transformation involved identifying over 400 end-to-end HR business processes and working across Services to match and simplify what was done.
“This was an enormous job – we had over 100 Business Focus Group (BFG) members, and over 1000 BFG sessions were conducted to review, harmonise and modernise SAF HR processes. In the end we got it down to 169 processes. Only three of those were specific to single Services. That meant we could build systems to deliver HR services in a much more cost effective way.”
While the structures and systems put in place are unique to what SAF needed, the lessons about how the transformation was achieved are relevant to the NZDF.
“Leaders need to commit to the change and create a vision for how they want you to look. At the same time, involve your subject matter experts – make them your change champions and drive the change from the bottom. And make sure your preferred processes and structures are very clear before you build supporting information systems, or it will be very expensive.”
COL Gwee says transformational thinking has now become ingrained in SAF.
“We spent a lot of time training our people to think like entrepreneurs. We provided them with common tools and processes then got them to implement them in ways that were relevant to their own Service. Now they take the same attitude to all the activities they do. It’s a train we couldn’t stop even if we wanted to.”
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