I was in civil service HR before and it really depends on what are your career aspirations long term wise. The way civil service HR works is very rigid in terms of governance and adherence to policy.

It does not matter if you are doing training, talent, C&B or generalist, the policies & directions will come down from PMO and your role is basically to execute & file necessary reports. Even my boss 3 levels up (a Senior Director Head of HR) had very limited flexibility to change what was given to her.

Pros:
1) Work life balance beside peak period
2) Higher starting salary
3) Not much problem solving needed, just execute and ensure compliance
4) Stable, for a non-scholar degree as long as you don’t screw up big time, should be able to retire as Dy Director at MX10 (current salary cap $10400)

Cons:
1) Hard to move to pte sector once you are inside for too long as pte sector HR requires more flexibility, innovation & problem solving experience
2) Salary progression will start to lag behind pte sector peers after 6+years
3) Ceiling is very low, average non-scholars stop at MX10, high performers stop at MX9. A lot of high performing pte HR can already reach MX9 equivalent by early to mid 30s
4) No possibility of regional / global experience, i.e. experience will be limited only to Singapore
5) Prepare to spend more time writing reports than doing HR

In short, a lot of it really depends on what you want out of your career. You want work life balance and relatively simple jobs with decent pay go for civil service. If you want to go for professional development and serious exposure, go private.

If you want to go back pte sector, make sure you do so within 3 years. Once you stay too long, a lateral transfer becomes very difficult without job demotion.