SMALL and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) which need expert advice in these trying times - but cannot afford it - can now turn to the inaugural Business Advisers Programme (BAP).
The scheme has a second benefit: offering short-term positions to unemployed professional executives in various fields.
Launched by the Singapore Management University (SMU) on Friday, the BAP will match jobless professionals, managers, executives and technicians with SMEs. They will serve as full-time business advisers on short-term stints.
Spring Singapore will fund up to 60 projects, paying 70 per cent of the $5,000 per month project fee in each case. The SME will pay the other 30 per cent.
There will be one adviser per project. Each SME can have up to two projects. Whether the SME takes up one or two projects, the entire project duration must not exceed 12 months.
SMU's Associate Professor Annie Koh, dean of executive and professional education, said: 'SMEs which do not have the financial means to engage business advisers can now do so with government funding support, while jobs are created for retrenched or unemployed professionals, managers, executives and technicians with a wealth of expertise to contribute.'
Applicants must have at least five years' relevant working experience and should be available for short-term assignments. SMEs must agree not to displace existing staff by taking on the business advisers.
Matching will be done according to areas of expertise and firms' needs. Shortlisted applicants will attend a two-day BAP workshop in May to understand more about the SME's business culture, before the attachment begins.
- The Straits Times
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