People serving people
We manage bases for the UK’s Royal Air Force,
prisons in Australia and the Metro in Dubai.
Throughout the world we help educators,
scientists, commuters and the families of service
personnel. But from the depths of the ocean
to satellites in space, wherever we operate
and whatever we do, our work has one thing in
common. It’s all about people serving people.
We don’t use the word ‘serving’ lightly. Serco
is a company rooted in strong values such as
honesty, openness and integrity. To make these
values real and thus ensure we deliver what is
needed, requires not only hearts in the right place,
but also efficient, systematic support. That means
good people management, rooted in good
leadership, honest dialogue, empowerment
and respect. This year, we have maintained
progress in improving what we regard as the
three management fundamentals: leadership,
engagement and the development of our people.
In leadership, we took steps to enable external
benchmarking and help us develop an accurate
picture of our performance vis-ŕ-vis marketplace
peers. Such benchmarking is particularly crucial
internationally, helping ensure that we recruit
and reward people appropriately wherever they
are and whatever they do. When we have the right
people in place, we trust and empower them.
Employee engagement has always been core to
Serco. In 2010, we continued our relationship with
David MacLeod and Nita Clarke following the
successful launch in 2009 of their seminal report
Engaging for Success, which examined practical
ways to encourage employee engagement in
UK businesses. We also introduced a number
of innovations to improve the employment
experience including the US Serco Scholars
Programme that provides educational grants to the
children of employees; UK Bike4work scheme to
encourage our employees to use environmentally
friendly forms of transport when travelling to and
from work; payroll- giving in North America and
India; fi tness and wellbeing programmes; and
the re-launch of our recruitment website, both to
raise the calibre of recruits and to improve visitors’
experience. We have also carried out pilot
research on establishing links between employee
engagement and business performance.
For the full report, click
here.