The SME Skills Accelerator Programme is an industry-first collaboration with SkillsFuture Singapore to help SMEs upskill and grow their business.

Prudential stands with the SME community, especially in the currently challenging business climate which has been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. We believe that we can do well by doing good.

Also, as a company, Prudential has benefited from our partnership with SkillsFuture since 2018, and from our own innovation and digitization efforts. Through our interactions with 80 SMEs across 50 industries, we learned that many companies, while keen to reinvent and reskill themselves, were at a lost on where to begin and could benefit from Prudential’s innovation and digitalisation frameworks, as well as from tackling these challenges together as a community.

This year-long programme targets SMEs which are pro-actively looking to upskill and grow.  Participating SMEs must be incorporated in Singapore.  

Under the Enterprise Singapore definition, SMEs have a Group annual sales turnover of not more than $100 million or Group employment size of not more than 200 employees, and have at least 30% local shareholding by Singaporeans or Permanent Residents. 

Participating SMEs can be from any industry.  Listed companies or companies with foreign shareholding that wish to participate will be regarded as SMEs if they meet the above definition.

Non-SMEs may participate in this programme.

Together with Prudential’s community of enterprises and drawing reference from Prudential’s established innovation and digitalisation frameworks, we will help you take the complexity out of upskilling, and work with you to make this a practical initiative where you can see direct business benefits.

For example, you get a dedicated Skills Manager who will guide your company through your upskilling journey. This L&D trained person will be able to direct you to suitable training courses, and help you navigate complex grant schemes as well as get you access to opportunities such as getting subsidized consultants and mid-career adult interns who can help you to implement projects.

You will also enjoy access to our curated Core Contents which we have designed with SkillsFuture, 80 SMEs and the participating institutes of higher learning, and our network of like-minded SMEs.

You can register for the programme through the sign-up link at the bottom of this page.

We have pragmatically chosen only courses funded by SkillsFuture Singapore for this Programme. Employees of your SME who are Singaporeans and Permanent Residents (PRs) are eligible for course fee subsidies of up to 90%. Your Skills Manager will be able to advise on the exact costs.

For Non-SMEs, your employees will be eligible for course fee subsidies of up to 90% if they are Singaporeans or PRs aged 40 and above. Singaporean or PR employees under 40 years old will receive lower subsidies.

Until 31 Dec 2020, Singaporeans and Permanent Residents (PRs) working in your SME will be eligible for the enhanced Absentee Payroll Funding of up to $10 per training hour (per staff) is available for courses that are supported by SkillsFuture Singapore – Workplace Learning, Innovation through Design Doing, Digital Workplace and Digital and Agile Transformation.

After 31 Dec 2020, Absentee Payroll Funding will cover up to 80% of Singaporeans’ and Permanent Residents’ (PR) basic hourly rate, capped at a maximum of $7.50 per training hour (per staff) and a maximum of $4.50 per training hour (per staff), respectively for SMEs and non-SMEs.

September 2020 to August 2021. Sign up early for a longer runway to enjoy all the programme benefits!

The compulsory core content courses will take up a total of about 7.5 days.

You may find a brief summary of the core contents below:

SkillsFuture Advice: Understand your career interests and discovering funded programmes that suit your needs.

NACE Workplace Learning Course: Coaching and mentoring in the workplace.

Design Innovation 101: Create anything that is new and better with a practical view to innovation.

Innovation through Design Doing: Share business challenges and seek new methodologies to solve them.

Design Innovation 101: Create anything that is new and better with a practical view to innovation.

Innovation through Design Doing: Share business challenges and seek new methodologies to solve them.

SkillsFuture Digital Workplace: Equip yourself with relevant digital skills and be aware of how data and information can be used.

Digital and Agile Transformation: Be equipped with agile and digital strategies and techniques to develop digital initiatives.

The SME Skills Accelerator has carefully curated a set of Core Content for participants. SMEs who sign up for this programme will sign up for the entire package, and would reap the benefits from package of curated courses.

The Core Contents include: SkillsFuture Advice, NACE Workplace Learning, Design Innovation 101, SkillsFuture for Digital Workplace, and Digital and Agile Transformation. The last 2 courses are highly encouraged, but optional.  

We have kept the time commitment relatively low, and apart from the minimum of 2 pax in 4 of the courses, you will have discretion on how many employees you would like to send for training.

We strongly encourage you to complete the programme.  To support you in this, we have also linked up with various universities and polytechnics which will be able to support mid-career interns to help you apply your learnings in your SME and accelerate business growth. 

If there are unforeseeable circumstances that make it difficult or impossible for you to continue the programme, your Skills Manager will be able to advise and guide you on the appropriate next steps.

Your Skills Manager will give you guidance at every juncture, please work closely with them on administrative matters. Payments made will go towards the courses and consultancy services for your staff and company; none of the payments go to Prudential.

Enterprises can support as many employees as they wish through the programme.

Note: Some of the programmes are more relevant for team leaders or functional leads. Also, some programmes are complimentary while others are chargeable. Your Skills Manager will guide you on this in your one-to-one meeting after programme enrolment.

We will have a few intakes per year for the SME Skills Accelerator Programme at an interval of every two to three months. 

Attending the complete programme is highly recommended, however, attending selective parts is possible too. You may work with your skills manager for this.

The SME Skills Accelerator is an industry-first collaboration between SkillsFuture Singapore and Prudential, co-created with 80 SMEs over 50 different industries.  It is, at its core, a practical upskilling programme designed to kickstart business and digital innovation, to accelerate business growth.  Prudential will further support SMEs by providing access to complimentary digital tools for workplace learning and sector specific mid-career interns from our partner institutions.