Anglian Water ensures that the behaviours and values that are important to the organisation are woven in to its benefits strategy.
The performance of the water organisation’s 4,000 employees is measured against its behaviours framework. One of the key components of this is customer service, which is underlined by the attitude, skills and knowledge that the organisation wants its employees to display.
Sally Purbrick, head of reward, says: “All employees’ performance is measured against the behaviours framework. It’s not just about the tasks and the output of our employees that is important.”
Anglian Water has an online recognition scheme which allows all employees to nominate a colleague to receive a ‘thank you’ or small monetary award which has been attributed to a behaviour. For example, an employee can recognise a colleague who has provided impressive customer service. “[The scheme] has landed so well with us as an organisation, maybe because of strategy and culture, and we’ve looked for something that underpins that,” explains Purbrick. “It’s saying, these are the things we as an organisation have said are important to us, and how do we recognise our staff against that?’”
Anglian Water has received external recognition for its workplace culture and benefits: in December 2017, it was ranked in second place in Glassdoor’s Best Places to Work in 2018 list.
Another key area valued by Anglian Water is that of wellbeing. Purbrick explains that the organisation has been on a journey to move from a safety culture to a wellbeing culture. To reflect this, the employer is planning to enhance its recognition portal so that employees will be able to nominate colleagues that have done great work either for their own wellbeing or for someone else.
Anglian Water recognises the impact that an employee’s wellbeing can have on how they contribute to the organisation, and has focused a number of benefits on supporting this, particularly around financial wellbeing. In this area, it offers employees access to a savings scheme and an employee loan facility.
“We certainly try not to just do things because it’s a trendy thing to do but to really look in terms of what can help underpin our corporate strategy through the use of employee benefits,” says Purbrick.