HOWZAT

The companies which are leading the way in employee engagement try to support staff in every area of their life so they don’t feel the need to leave. Practices range from offering sabbaticals to allow staff to fulfil personal ambitions outside of work, secondments to other departments or offices abroad and enabling workers to learn new skills or help charities in work time.

“There is more to personal growth than career growth,” says Bradon. “You might stay in a company because you are going to grow in your career, becoming a manager in the next five years for example, but you might stay because you learn something new every day. That can be people going on meditation courses which are not necessarily career-related but are a positive benefit of your work.”

Central heating installation firm Heat, our mid-list winner this year, boasts one of the lowest turnover rates of companies on the list at 4%. The Belfast-based company encourages employees to gain additional qualifications and not just professional ones. It also pinpoints employees’ training needs and aspirations in twice-year development reviews and likes to help its staff grow in any way they can from learning how to use home computers to overcoming dyslexia.

At Lane4 Management Group any reasonable request for self improvement will be considered — from doing an MBA or coaching accreditation course to going on a retreat — as long as it benefits both the company and the individual.

As well as offering 10 annual development days, two annual corporate social responsibility days and shared learning sessions, the global performance development consultancy has also introduced sabbaticals of up to three months for staff with at least four years’ service. Workers can bank holidays in advance so they get paid while they are away.

The company, ranked the 12th best small company to work for in this year’s competition, with a positive score of 86% got the third best result among SMEs for personal growth. Staff turnover is a low 9%.

Best Companies data shows that overall there is little difference in terms of staff turnover between different size firms who made it to the list. The statistics do show though, that for the top 20 big companies, it was their positive approach to the issue of personal growth that set them apart. Staff at these firms say the experience they gain from their job is valuable for their future and that there are plenty of opportunities to learn and grow within the firm scoring 15% and 14% higher scores respectively on these questions than those big companies that entered but did not make it to the list.

“The data is saying that those big companies that are willing to deal with this issue are really going to reap the rewards. If they have a big turnover it is even more important,” says Bradon.

Management, engineering and development consultancy Mott MacDonald builds loyalty by showing employees that they value them as individuals. In addition to in-house, online and external training, there is an exchange programme with its Australian sister company and staff can also be seconded to the firm’s offices around the world. And being a large company affords the flexibility to agree to specific requests. One senior manager, for example, goes to India every August to work with a local community. “Individuals are important to us,” says Tania Heap, UK human resources director. “Our retention rates speak for themselves. If you respect people enough to do things at certain times in their career to develop them and they can see they are developing why would they need to go?”

Mott MacDonald, which ranked eighth among the 20 best big companies, has one of the lowest turnovers at 11%, and it gets a top 10 result for doing a good job in personal growth, earning it a 70% positive score.

Employees are encouraged to work with local organisations and communities, and many help youngsters prepare for job interviews.

“Education is important to us,” says Heap. “People like to do it because, yes, it is a break from their work, but it also makes them feel they are giving something back.”

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