Singapore’s world talent ranking rises one level

It is the only Asian country to be among the top-ten countries in the latest ranking, moving up from its 10^th-placed ranking in 2019. The top-three countries in the list were: Switzerland, Denmark and Luxembourg, in that order.  

The ranking measures the capacity of an economy to develop and attract talent to be more competitive, said Switzerland-based IMD World Competitiveness Centre in a report. The report assesses the development, attraction and retention of human resources in 63 countries based on three criteria: investment and development, appeal, and readiness.  

The investment and development criterion measures the resources set aside to build up the local workforce. The appeal criterion assesses the extent the country attracts foreign talent and retains local ones, while the readiness criterion evaluates skills and competencies available in a country’s talent pool.  

READ: Singapore to launch dedicated tech pass for foreign talent from Jan 2021

Eight of the top-10 countries are European due to their high levels of education and mobility. In addition, because of their greying populations, they need to remain open and attractive to a young, international, highly skilled workforce to offset future labour shortages. 

Singapore scored high in investment and development with its apprenticeship schemes, employee training, quality of education and female participation in the workforce. It ranked the highest in readiness with its availability of skilled labour and finance human resources.