Insurance organisation Aviva uses its all-employee share schemes to retain and engage its 28,000 global employees.
In the UK, the organisation’s annual UK engagement survey, Voice of Aviva, compiled in September and October 2016, found that the overall engagement score for employees who participated in one of its share schemes was 76%, compared to an overall engagement score of 66% for employees who did not do so.
The 10 percentage point difference in employee engagement linked to employee share scheme participation was used as part of the approval process to launch Aviva’s global employee share scheme in November 2017 with deductions beginning in January 2018. To date, 47% of global employees have joined the scheme.
Elena Petrou, share schemes manager at Aviva, says: “[Employee share schemes] certainly do aid retention because after people have been saving for X amount of years, it does form part of [their] consideration of making that decision to jump ship and go elsewhere because often with these schemes, [employees] will lose the benefit of them if [they] do walk away. I have these conversations quite frequently with people, and I know it aids retention just because of how frequently I have that conversation. It definitely forms part of people’s decision-making process.”
In the UK, Aviva operates two approved all-employee share schemes. This includes a sharesave scheme, where employees can buy shares at a pre-set 20% discount on the current Aviva share price and save up to a monthly maximum of £500, as well as a share incentive plan (Sip) offering matching shares. This scheme sees Aviva match partnership shares that employees buy on a two-for-one basis, up to the value of £40 a month, although employees can save a monthly maximum of £150. The global share scheme also follows this matching format.
Currently, 56% of the organisation’s 15,700 UK employees participate in its sharesave scheme and 74% in its matching scheme.
Aviva also offers four discretionary share schemes for approximately 500 senior employees.