CapitaLand executives take pay cuts of 3-20% amid economic gloom

[Ah Hai]

SINGAPORE: Property developer CapitaLand said on Tuesday it will not be laying off staff for now.

Instead, executive-level staff will take pay cuts of between three and 20 per cent as part of the company's cost management measures.

In a statement, CapitaLand said the cuts are due to the deteriorating global financial environment and economic uncertainties.

President and CEO Liew Mun Leong will bear the maximum salary reduction of 20 per cent.

According to CapitaLand's annual report, Mr Liew earned S$1.15 million in base salary in 2007, and was paid S$5.35 million in bonuses.

All salary reductions will take effect in January 2009.

CapitaLand said the salary reduction exercise is one of several cost management measures it has taken.

In the last crisis from 2001 to 2003, CapitaLand had also implemented a salary freeze for management and staff.

Management subsequently took a significant pay cut when the recessionary environment persisted.

Despite the latest pay cuts, CapitaLand said it will continue its training and development efforts and review its business operations for future growth opportunities.

- CNA/yb:oIo:

 

[2lanu]

According to CapitaLand's annual report, Mr Liew earned S$1.15 million in base salary in 2007, and was paid S$5.35 million in bonuses.

20% of the base salary is really peanut to him. The bonus is what the problem lies...

 

[silverfox@]

20% of the base salary is really peanut to him. The bonus is what the problem lies...

The bonus was due to property boom in late 06 till 07.
don't think 08 he can get anywhere near that amount :p

 

[Ah Hai]

SPH cuts costs to keep jobs

THE economic crisis will hurt earnings, but multimedia group Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) has taken cost-cutting measures to help staff keep their jobs as far as possible.

These include freezing wages of senior management and slowing hiring this year to counter a recession that may last 'several quarters,' said SPH chairman Tony Tan on Thursday.

'This is a multi-sector, global phenomenon - quite unlike anything we have seen since the 1930s,' said Dr Tan, Singapore's former deputy prime minister who is also the deputy chairman of the Government of Singapore Investment Corp (GIC), at the company's annual general meeting at News Centre, Toa Payoh North on Thursday morning.

'With its global linkages and open economy, Singapore will be buffeted by the global economic storms.'

In anticipation of a slowdown, Dr Tan said SPH has earlier this year 'slowed down our hiring, instituted a pay freeze for all senior management staff'.

The company, which has some 3,000 employees, has also 'tightened our operations and strengthened our financial resources', he said.

These measures should help SPH 'ride out the downturn although it will be painful'.

Singapore is currently in a recession. The government has cut Singapore's growth for the fourth time this year and warned that it may even contract next year.

SPH shares was 1 cent up to $3.51 as at 1pm.

New media - a threat, an opportunity, and how to get there profitably - cropped up again at the AGM.

Shareholders raised question after question on this issue, from its continued losses in this area to how it would recruit talent to propel its multimedia initiatives forward, at the hour-long meeting.

SPH CEO Alan Chan said while SPH remains a highly profitable publishing business that enjoys the 'best (profit) margins in the world', it recognises that publishing is a 'mature industry'.

Thus, it has no choice but to 'prepare for the inevitable ... if the tastes of readers shift' away from mainstream media like newspapers and magazines and invest in new media, he said.

While it continues to suffer losses, such investments are necessary so as to 'sow the seeds of a bigger tree', he added.

In recent years, SPH has launched new online products like its citizen journalism site Stomp, online TV channel The Straits Times Razor TV. It has also made acquisitions in this area, including popular tech forum fuckwarezone and Shareinvestor.com.

Mr Tony Mallek, executive vice-president of finance, said the company has no direct exposure to 'toxic investments' and a small, indirect exposure to Lehman Brothers, adding that the impact of the Lehman-linked investments is 'insignificant' to SPH's business.

 

[theblackhole]

Re: SPH cuts costs to keep jobs

so high salaries, pay cut is peanuts.

for those of us earning groundnuts, pay cut means die liao!!!

knn got such thing happening here or not?

so much $$$$ losses and yet all smiling with continued high salaries as if nothing happened...sway lah!!!

 

[Ah Hai]

CapitaLand's Liew Mun Leong: A CEO others should emulate

FOLLOWING last month's mass retrenchment at DBS Bank, and anticipated job cuts in coming months, there is cause for worry for many.

Wednesday's article featuring CapitaLand group CEO Liew Mun Leong ('When times are bad, prepare for good times') is most assuring. He gave an insight into the running of a company with a 10,000-strong workforce. A believer in the theory of common happiness and common misery, he advocates job saving over retrenchment. Coming from a humble background, he is in sync with the working class. Citing the recent retrenchments, which he described as 'morally wrong', he displayed his humane spirit by saying how he felt 'very sorry' for those asked to go.

The president and chief executive leads by example. He takes a hefty 20 per cent pay cut next month, with his management team following suit, albeit with a lower percentage.

I applaud his stand at this time of financial crisis and look forward with reasonable confidence that companies will emulate his exemplary model.

Bennie Cheok

 

[Ah Hai]

Re: CapitaLand's Liew Mun Leong: A CEO others should emulate

Latest comments

Wonder why very highly paid "international talent" having thought about all these? Even UBS past management are handling back the money that they got from the past. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, the CEOs of China's financial institutions' will have the right to share the profit of their firm even after they leave their company.
Salaries of such positions should be structured in such a way that their final pay cheque should be dependant on the company's future performance as well. It's like parents grooming their kids.
Posted by: kjks at Fri Dec 05 09:08:48 SGT 2008
I really like Liew Mun Leong management philosophy. I have learned a few things after reading the article last week.
Posted by: betterment at Fri Dec 05 08:54:15 SGT 2008