Banyan Tree and the art of work-life balance
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Banyan Tree and the art of work-life balance
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Category: Asia Pacific - Careers -
Recruitment / Job / Training
This is a press release selected by our editorial committee and published online for free on 2008-08-29
Long lauded as a service-oriented hospitality company, Banyan Tree faces a long-term challenge: to grow its existing pool of 7,000 employees into a major ocean of 24,000 employees by 2011.
Let’s not even call them employees. Banyan Tree has a long established practice of referring to its employees as more than just “staff”. The people who make Banyan Tree what it is through their dedicated efforts are indeed part of the corporate family; they are ambassadors of the brand, the company’s associates.
Associates in the company’s Singapore corporate headquarters recently celebrated a welcomed win: the Work Life Achiever Award, conferred by the Tripartite Committee on Work-Life Strategy from the Singapore Ministry of Manpower. The Work-Life Excellence Awards takes place once every two years as part of an effort to promote the concept of a work and life balance in Singapore.
Banyan Tree strongly believes the balancing of work and family life is vital to the wellbeing of its associates, which in turn results in the success of the company that is intrinsic to the award-winning Banyan Tree service culture. As part of its founding values, Banyan Tree defines its overall success as a combination of the triple bottom line – financial, social and environmental performance. Human capital in particular is the key to delivering the Banyan Tree experience to its guests.
Associates in Singapore enjoy enhanced child-care options, flexible work hours, and options to work from home. Formalised bi-annual surveys conducted across the board help better understand the needs of all associates.
On a global scale, benefits available to associates in all Banyan Tree and Angsana properties worldwide, as well as in the Group’s different business units such as Architrave Design and Planning division, and spa and retail gallery operations, include a high level of career flexibility, such as redesignation of work roles and transfers, as well as complimentary hotel stay, extended leave benefits, and family focused activities.
Banyan Tree recognises that commitment to Work-Life Strategy forms many layers within the organisation. At the management level, it is imperative that the organisation’s leaders actively support and promote free access to Work-Life Balance benefits to all employees.
Grooming From Within
Founded to train future leaders to service the Banyan Tree’s rapid expansion, the Banyan Tree Management Academy (BTMA) was formally established in 2008 in Phuket, Thailand. It is a centralised training facility which provides a consistent framework for all training conducted throughout the Group. It also acts as a vehicle to communicate company vision, mission and strategies to future managers and instill in them the core values of Banyan Tree.
BTMA has two milestone programs – Management Development Program (MDP) and Talent Management Program (TMP). The former is designed to hone senior managers’ management skills to help them perform in key and challenging positions. The TMP, on the other hand, aims to assist new managers to develop managerial capabilities to effectively manage their new associates and responsibilities.
By balancing work-life strategies with building human resource capacity, Banyan Tree has mapped its priorities in the bid to support its growth strategy over the next few crucial years.
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