Best employers have greater levels of gender equality in leadership, with twice the number of female leaders in middle management and above, compared to numbers of female people leaders at other organisations, according to the 2016 Aon Best Employers Australia and New Zealand survey.
Best employers also outperform other organisations, with a 6 per cent median revenue growth and twice as many highly engaged employees.
The insights also revealed that workplace flexibility is the new normal, with 73 per cent of employees reporting they have the flexibility to modify their work schedule to address personal situations – and organisations that are not open to flexible work are falling behind the rest.
In addition, 87 per cent of the Aon Best Employers have a specific communication strategy in place to communicate flexible work arrangements to all employees, and leading companies offer both formal and informal work flexibility, including working remotely, flexible working hours and part-time work.
The 140 organisations and more than 83,293 employees surveyed also recognised the importance of ensuring their employment brand is aligned to their external market brand, and consistently enriches the employee experience.
In this way, best employers attract and retain top quality to their organisations, with 77 per cent of employees at best employer organisations delivering on their employment promises, compared to 55 per cent at other organisations.
“This year’s report revealed that 100 per cent of Aon Best Employers rate their strong culture and engagement as a core competitive advantage,” said Reetta Makinen, head of engagement for Aon Hewitt, Pacific.
“Through exceptional people practices, Aon Best Employers engage employees to stay at the organisation, speak highly of their employer and strive to deliver discretionary effort for the organisation.”
The findings highlighted that best employers manage performance through setting clear expectations that are aligned to business strategy.
For example, 80 per cent of managers at best employer organisations set clear performance expectations with their employees, compared to 67 per cent of other organisations.
“In addition, 93 per cent of Aon Best Employers still believe in their performance management practices and effectively measure and reward individual impact on people and business outcomes,” said Makinen.
“This is indicative of the fact that performance management isn’t obsolete per se, but rather the execution in other organisations often does not stack up to that of Aon Best Employer organisations. Aon Best Employers do performance management exceptionally well.”
“The company has exceptional communication practices and strong leadership to connect employees to the organisation’s purpose”
The 2016 Aon Best Employers Australia and New Zealand Study also found that best employers:
- have more than twice as many ‘highly engaged’ employees than any other organisations, driving increased discretionary effort across the organisation
- maintain consistently high levels of employee engagement, regardless of employee age group
- understand that leaders must be engaged to create high levels of engagement and performance inside their teams
- are successful at engaging employees throughout their tenure, regardless of time spent at the organisation
Cisco won the title of Aon’s Best of the Best Employer 2016 for its high levels of employee engagement and culture of trust, effective leadership and communication, flexibility and autonomy given to employees and focus on giving back to society.
“The company has exceptional communication practices and strong leadership to connect employees to the organisation’s purpose and keep them constantly up-to-date with company’s performance and market trends,” said Makinen.
Other Australian and New Zealand organisations accredited as Aon Best Employers included:
- Blackmores
- Chorus New Zealand Ltd
- Coca-Cola Amatil New Zealand
- DHL Express (New Zealand) Limited
- Eden Brae Homes
- Estée Lauder Companies Pty Ltd, Australia
- Estée Lauder Companies, New Zealand
- Federal Express Pacific, LLC
- Online Education Services
- Renault Australia
- SEEK
- Wood & Grieve Engineers
- Z Energy
“Our leadership team takes personal responsibility for the development of our key talent”
Kim Garner, managing director of FedEx Express Australasia, said its people-service-profit philosophy was fundamental to the company’s success.
“We believe that by taking good care of our people, they will deliver exceptional service to all of our customers, which will in turn generate the profit that enables us to reinvest in our team and business,” said Garner.
“By creating a positive working environment through a combination of leadership development, recognition and training programs, FedEx ensures our team members feel engaged and valued.”
Some 87 per cent of the company’s New Zealand management team have been promoted from within the company, Garner added.
Online Education Services CEO, Denice Pitt, said the company’s success is largely due to its highly engaged workforce that is student-centric, people-focused and agile.
“Engagement is built into our DNA, it has been top of mind since day one. Everything that we build is about our employees and students,” she said.
“Our leadership team takes personal responsibility for the development of our key talent to ensure that we are continuously engaging them and delivering consistent messaging to them about their future at our organisation.”
OES GM HR, Shanyn Payne also noted the importance of using innovative strategies to engage a workforce that is both remote and in office.
“OES has a unique combination of office and remote workforce and therefore has had to adapt new and innovative ways of communication and collaboration,” Payne said.
“A remote workforce doesn’t need to be a disconnected workforce. If clever strategies are engaged employees will feel supported, engaged and part of a community.”
Image source: iStock
