How SAESL Is Training Its Workforce to Work Alongside AI
Singapore Aero Engine Services (SAESL) is using NTUC LearningHub courses in AI and design thinking to upskill staff and cut repetitive admin work.
Singapore Aero Engine Services Private Limited (SAESL), a joint venture between Rolls-Royce and SIA Engineering Company, has partnered with NTUC LearningHub to run AI literacy and design thinking courses for its workforce. The goal is practical: staff are already using what they learned to cut admin work with Power Automate, and the company plans to expand with three AI-powered internal tools. The partnership is framed around the idea that technology only delivers value when the people using it have the skills to apply it well.
What happened
| Detail | Fact |
|---|---|
| Company | Singapore Aero Engine Services Private Limited (SAESL) |
| Ownership | Joint venture: Rolls-Royce Plc and SIA Engineering Company |
| Training partner | NTUC LearningHub (founded 2004) |
| Courses delivered | Fundamentals of AI Applications in Industrial Automation; Design Thinking Fundamentals |
| Organisations NTUC LearningHub has served | More than 34,000 |
| AI tools launched / planned | askHR (live); askPlanning and askProcurement (planned) |
SAESL provides engine overhaul and component repair for the aerospace maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) sector. According to Rose Chew, the company’s vice president of human resources, the partnership with NTUC LearningHub goes back more than a decade. The newer AI and design thinking courses are the latest step in a longer workforce development programme.
Chew describes NTUC LearningHub’s value as its willingness to build courses around SAESL’s specific transformation roadmap rather than delivering off-the-shelf content. The two courses focus on applying AI in industrial settings and using design thinking (a structured method for solving problems from the user’s point of view) to find practical improvements.
What did the training actually change?
One documented outcome: SAESL staff redesigned the workflow for course confirmation and attendance tracking. They applied design thinking principles and used Microsoft Power Automate (a tool for building automated workflows without heavy coding) to reduce repetitive manual steps, improve accuracy, and create a faster system. According to Chew, this translated directly into time savings and productivity gains.
More broadly, Chew says staff are now more confident in spotting process problems and testing solutions with digital tools. The shift is described as cultural: teams are moving toward continuous improvement rather than waiting for top-down directives.
What comes next for SAESL?
Three AI-powered internal tools are either live or in progress. askHR is already running, designed to help staff find HR information faster. askPlanning and askProcurement are planned to follow the same pattern in their respective departments. The company is also building a skills transformation initiative that uses AI to map the competencies needed for each role, with the aim of creating more personalised learning paths.
Future training will cover Industry 4.0 skills: AI literacy, digital automation, design thinking, and problem-solving. SAESL also says it wants to develop leadership, creativity, communication, and collaboration alongside the technical skills.
Why it matters
This story is a clean example of what responsible AI adoption looks like at the operational level. SAESL is not replacing roles with AI; it is training people to use automation tools and then giving them real projects where those skills apply. The Power Automate workflow redesign is a small but concrete result that shows the approach working.
For businesses in any sector, the pattern is worth noting. Buying an AI tool does not move the needle if the team does not know how to frame problems, question existing workflows, or interpret what the tool produces. The investment in structured training, including design thinking, is what turns a software subscription into an actual efficiency gain.
The aerospace MRO sector is a demanding context: precision, compliance, and safety matter enormously. If this model works there, it is transferable to most other industries with complex operations and regulated processes. You can see a similar logic in how larger AI deployments at OpenAI, Anthropic, and Microsoft are being structured around human oversight, not autonomous replacement.
Our take
The advertorial framing here is obvious, so take the quotes with appropriate scepticism. That said, the underlying model is sound. The specific outcome (a redesigned admin workflow using Power Automate) is the kind of measurable, low-risk win that makes AI adoption stick inside an organisation. It is also repeatable: once staff know how to build one automated workflow, they tend to find the next problem themselves.
The three askX tools are interesting. Internal AI assistants for HR, planning, and procurement are a common first move because they reduce time spent searching for information without touching any customer-facing systems. The risk is that they become shelfware if the underlying data they search is messy or incomplete. SAESL has not said how it is handling data quality, which is usually the harder problem.
If your business is thinking about a similar training investment, our AI integration work tends to start in exactly the same place: identify one repetitive admin process, automate it with something like Make or Power Automate, and use the result to build internal confidence before scaling. The tools are available; the bottleneck is always people knowing what to do with them.
What to do about it
- Pick one repetitive admin process your team complains about and document every step it involves.
- Run it through a simple design thinking exercise: who does it, what frustrates them, what would a better version look like?
- Test an automation tool (Power Automate, Make, or similar) on that single process before rolling anything out more broadly.
- Measure the time saved after four weeks and use that number to justify the next training or tooling investment.
- Consider a structured AI literacy course for your team before buying more AI software subscriptions.
Start with one workflow, prove the saving, then expand. That is the pattern SAESL used, and it is more durable than a company-wide AI rollout with no grounding in real problems.
Building an automation like this? Most client workflows we ship run on Make (referral link, it supports our reporting). If you would rather have it built and monitored for you, that is our workflow automation service.
Frequently asked questions
What courses did SAESL run with NTUC LearningHub?
SAESL delivered two courses through NTUC LearningHub: Fundamentals of AI Applications in Industrial Automation and Design Thinking Fundamentals. Both are designed to build practical skills employees can apply directly to their daily work.
What is NTUC LearningHub?
NTUC LearningHub is a Singapore-based continuing education and training provider founded in 2004. It has supported more than 34,000 organisations with tailored training programmes covering AI, digital skills, and workplace innovation.
What AI tools is SAESL rolling out for employees?
SAESL has launched askHR, an AI-powered tool to help staff find HR information. It also plans to introduce askPlanning and askProcurement, which will follow the same model in their respective departments.
How did design thinking training help SAESL in practice?
SAESL staff used design thinking principles alongside Microsoft Power Automate to redesign the workflow for course confirmation and attendance tracking. The result was fewer repetitive manual steps, better accuracy, and time savings that the company says translated into measurable productivity gains.
