Statistics don't tell the whole story
WITH reference to last Thursday's article, 'Discriminatory job ads decline: Report', discrimination is not easy to discern or prove.
When a previous employer tasked me with crafting a job advertisement to recruit an engineer, I was careful to ensure that it was non-discriminatory.
However, my employer instructed me to shortlist applicants only from certain racial groups for which there was no justifiable basis. I had no choice but to comply.
Not putting up a discriminatory job advertisement does not mean that there is no discrimination when it comes to recruitment and selection of candidates.
While the decline in discriminatory job advertisements cited by the Tripartite Alliance for Fair Employment Practices (Tafep) is impressive, important aspects of job discrimination have not been addressed.
Discriminatory job ads may have plunged to 1 per cent compared to 19.7 per cent in 2006, but what about actual recruitment and selection of applicants?
What about workplace discrimination and prejudice against job seekers?
In fact, it is harder to discern discrimination against job seekers. How does one prove that one's application was rejected because one was too old or not of the preferred sex?
While it may be encouraging to note that some 1,200 companies have signed Tafep's non-discriminatory pledge, are the recruitment and selection processes of these companies audited by independent outsiders to ensure that these firms walk the talk?
Unless that is so, the pledge may not be significant.
I consider the doubt from the author as a representative of general public. However, as I believe nowadays more and more have already abandoned the concept of “racial discrimination” or they never believe, which implies that the current assessment of a person is no more his race but capability and credentials. Nevertheless, I do agree that the racial discrimination does exist and it is difficult to discern and prove. Even under the restriction of laws and regulations, it is incertitude whether a job-seeker is rejected by discrimination or not. Bosses may expect a specific race of employee who will have better communication with his colleagues or customers. Is this situation also defined as “racial discrimination”? Anyway, genius and elites are wanted every where. As long as one is assiduous and spare no effort pursuing his career, he can achieve his goal and get respect from others. USA took decades to eradicate (almost) discrimination, that now we see the Africa-American president Obama. Hence we can see that the government plays an important role in the propaganda of “everyone is born equal”, and this does work in correcting public mindset about race. To start, government ministries and statutory board chiefs - Ministers and their permanent secretaries - must set the example and the appropriate ministry, MOM, must review and strengthen rules against discrimination at the workplace. It is indeed a long way for Singapore and other countries, but once it makes a step, it will make the success.
Well, as stated in your reflection, America has spared no efforts to eradicate discrimination and propagate that everyone is born equal.I think America is the most successful country in coping with this problem. Although the multiple races in Singapore are generally living in harmony, most of the menial jobs are done by Indians as i observed,it still has a long way to go to achieve more equality.
ReplyDelete-------By Ivy
I appreciate Vivian’s response to the news. Your response contains a wide usage of vocabulary and various sentence structures. Moreover, the ideas are organized and stated smoothly with the aid of numerous connectors. I do agree with you that it is difficult to prove or detect certain discrimination exists in recruitments because numerous factors co-exist and play important roles in determining the final result of the employment. Furthermore, I am also under the view that the government can take effective approaches in solving this problem. For instance, regulations with reference to this issue could be revised to ban discriminatory job recruit advertisements and exerts punishment on the violators. By this way, the government could alarm all the companies to follow the propaganda that every job seeker is equal. Last but not the least, the feedback from employers is crucial to make government’s efforts more effective.
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