Colm Coffey, HR director, Cable&Wireless, Europe, Asia & US

Cable&Wireless is a leading international communications company, providing enterprise and carrier solutions to some of the world’s largest organisations.

With an intention to be the first customer-defined communications services business, our focus is on delivering customers a service experience that is second to none.

During the last two years we’ve been successfully engineering a major transformation of our business with such success we’ve actually hit many of our financial targets ahead of schedule and are now moving into a growth phase. 

A critical success factor has been our ability to engage with our colleagues on what they think needs to be done to turnaround the business and to set up genuine two way communication.  We’ve invested heavily in this approach and made it one of our top priorities as we know better than anyone that those on the front line can make or break an organisation.

We have a range of programmes and projects for our people that benefit both their individual careers and the success of the business as a whole.  In terms of how we engage our colleagues, we go through several steps which translate into various programmes.  They include the following and of course, this entire engagement strategy maps onto our strategic business objectives.

1 – Make a clean break from the past through re-branding and language changes

2 – Engage colleagues by demonstrating how their individual contribution matters in the context of our business transformation

3 – Provide opportunities for colleagues to unleash their ideas and innovations via a number of colleague centric programmes

4 – Provide guidance on how colleagues can benefit from the success of the business

Breaking with the past

Our proposition is to be upfront and honest with everyone in the organisation, lead from the front and create a colleague-centric workplace. One small example of how this translates into everyday working life is the language we use – to us, people are not ‘employees’, they are ‘colleagues’ and you’ll find this language rather than more traditional  terms such as employees or the workforce. 

Before talking about the different ways in which we engage our people, it’s important to qualify that corporate transformation from the bottom up needs direction and leadership.  People in the business need to be able to look to the leadership team and believe in their ability to take the business forward.  In addition, they need to understand what the strategy is to get us to this success and how they can contribute to it.

Before the programme for commercial transformation was announced externally, the executive chairman, John Pluthero and CEO, Jim Marsh, attended internal road shows to speak face-to-face with colleagues throughout the country, explaining why and how things needed to change, the vision for the future and getting people involved in the successful turnaround of the company.  Communication and engagement is at the heart of this turnaround. This is done regularly to maintain pace and focus in the business.

Individual performance and the bigger picture

We’ve also changed the way we go about rolling out our performance management system.  We use a programme called Jump Start to help translate out transformation plan into specific performance goals for each area of the business.  Colleagues are then invited to a problem solving session in which they work in their teams to determine what performance goals they would set themselves. This process allows each colleague to have an active say in how we’re going to get were we want to be and understand why.  In turn, this helps each colleague to become more aware of how their individual contribution fits into the bigger picture and makes for a more motivated team. Only when this exercise is complete, do we capture these into each individual’s objectives.

We ensure our colleagues are enthused about the business by allowing them to share in its financial success. Our introduction of a Buy One Get One Free offer for our Share Purchase Plan resulted in an increase from 7% to 46% since the initial launch in 2000.

Barry Parkinson, SIOD product specialist, took up the offer and says: “Buying shares in the business you work for is one of those circular things - you buy into the success of the business and in turn that motivates you to create that success.” 

Unleashing colleagues’ ideas and innovations

In addition to the shares scheme, our Ideas Machine programme builds on the idea of allowing colleagues to share in the success of the business but in a very specific way.  The programme promotes anything that will either make or save money for the business.  So, if someone has an idea, they are encouraged to log it on our intranet.  Ideas are then reviewed and, if successful, get funding and resource to be actioned.  The person who had the idea is rewarded with a percentage of the money gained or saved by the implementation of the idea.

One such example is an idea by Phil Williams, learning and development manager

“I had the idea of setting up major incident rooms at Cable & Wireless offices to give our customers a better service experience. Any major incident (i.e. a network fault) harms our customers’ businesses so need to be resolved ASAP.  I believed the team would benefit from a quiet place to gather their thoughts and focus solely on the problem at hand.  With the help of the Major Incident team and the Facilities Management team, we found two suitable rooms in our Bracknell and Manchester offices and kitted them out with independent networks and phone lines that can’t be affected by an incident.  The rooms are currently undergoing testing and are due to be fully functional at the end of April.” 

We 100 percent believe that the people in the trenches know where the real problems lie and how to fix them and that’s why we created our Just Flamin’ Nuts (JFN) programme. 

When colleagues think out loud ‘That’s flamin’ nuts, I can’t do my job properly with this’ or ‘I wish we had X because it would make everything so much easier’, we want to hear about it because they’re usually good ideas that can make the business run better.   The JFN programme can be accessed online or JFNs can be emailed directly to a manager.  Since November 2007, we’ve had over 900 JFN’s logged and so far, we’ve managed to solve over 500 of them quickly, and are actively addressing those that need a more long term resolution...

A JFN which was logged and resolved within a month was raised by Mark Robinson, Service Manager.  He says, “My JFN was ‘Missed ADD (Agreed Delivery Dates) orders get lower priority’ which essentially means that once an order has missed its delivery date target it gets sidelined in favour of those that can still get delivered on time when they should be given even higher priority.  My JFN was submitted on March 26th, I received a response on April 10th. The result was that a process change currently being implemented would prevent the issue happening in future. People are being re-organised into two teams and one person is responsible for driving the order which I think will really help.  I’ve accepted this as a solution and the teams were announced in late April – I’ll be reviewing it in three months to see if customers are getting better service and the backlogs decreasing.”

What’s good about this particular JFN is that it really illustrates our colleagues’ commitment to great customer service – they keep us honest. 

Colleagues’ opinions matter

If the JFN programme is the opportunity to make a difference on a nuts and bolts level, then the Employee Consultation Forum (ECF) is the opportunity to impact at a strategic level.  All policy changes are taken through this group which is made up of 18 people who have the power to suggest changes to and even veto policies.  The 18 people are democratically elected and represent the various different business groups and geographies.

Speaking about the ECF, delegate and co-ordinator Richard Hale says:  "The ECF has fought for and won early engagement on all aspects of our business transformation, robustly challenging the rationale and proposed execution of developing plans before the final decisions are reached.  We then ensure these are put into practice with rigorous respect for all concerned.  This means that colleagues are at the core of transformation, bringing to the business a passion and integrity you can't buy off-the-peg.  In the ECF, we've always recognised a simple principle: 'What's best for colleagues is a healthy business, and what makes a healthy business are engaged and motivated colleagues.'  What we are now taking is the opportunity to prove this.”

Your Say is an internal colleague engagement programme which is focused on creating engagement through providing opportunities for colleagues to voice their opinion and make a difference.  Last year we ran monthly surveys concentrated around particular parts of the business to identify business issues which had a response rate of 67%.  We’ve changed the method slightly for this year and hope to reach 80 / 90% engagement.   

Programmes such as ECF, JFN and Your Say are quite business orientated but we also concentrate on the softer things that make colleagues happy and therefore more engaged with the business.  These sit within the Cammunity groups programme – no, that’s not a misspelling, it stems from our Changes Are Made umbrella programme – and a prime example is Phil Gripton, Director of Cultural Transformation, and his Manchester experience. 

Atlas Community Group

When Phil went to our Manchester office he kick started the Atlas Community Group.  The group aims to create a better place to work through five workstreams including InOffice, OutOffice, Charity, Clubs & Societies and Communications.  Charity involves both local and international work. We support an orphanage in Uganda that one colleague is currently visiting and we raised £1k from a fashion show we held in the office in association with New Look, which is undergoing its own transformation.

Talking about the programme, Phil Gripton says: “It’s so interesting to see what makes people tick and one memory that really stands out is when a colleague said he disliked the plaque in reception.  I hadn’t even noticed it before but apparently it was unveiled by the then chairman and none of the colleagues where allowed to be there when it was.  So, we re-opened the building as ‘Atlas House’ and we asked that colleague to unveil the new plaque with the exec team and his colleagues watching - it was like giving the building back to its rightful owners. I’m inspired by the turnaround, short term absences have declined and productivity improved but more importantly, the atmosphere has dramatically changed for the better.” 

As we said at the start, all of this activity surrounding engagement and promoting our corporate transformation from the bottom up is brilliant but it does need direction and guidance and we have a number of programmes that tie together individual performance with the strategic goals of the business and thus clearly show how we support colleagues in contributing to the business success.  We believe that people really do want to do a good job!

Learning and development

We have a big focus on developing colleagues in their current role and their next one. We do this because essentially, it’s a two-way thing.  We want our colleagues help to transform the business but in turn, we understand that we need to give back.  We do this via three programmes that promote development among colleagues; the New Way of Learning (NWoL), New Way of Management (NWoM) and MyCareer. 

The NWoL is a microsite hosted on both the corporate and cultural intranet offering information about opportunities for learning.  E-based learning courses from soft skills to technical run through an online portal.  The site is accessible 24 / 7 and colleagues can also book themselves on face-to-face courses.   The NWoL portal averages over 3,000 pages visited per day whilst an average of over 2,000 colleagues accessed iLeARN every month during the last six months resulting in over 23,000 e-learning courses and resources accessed and over 7,700 hours of e-learning taking place and that’s not counting those who access the site directly. 

New Way of Management preceded NWoL and catered specifically for managers to learn how to manage colleagues more effectively. 12 online modules are completed by all people managers and this ensures standards of management are met which improves colleague engagement and performance.  To build on the success of the online modules, we are launching 12 ‘Management Masterclasses’ that will support the behaviours associated with being a successful Cable&Wireless manager, if the online modules were the ‘WHAT’ the master classes are the ‘HOW’.

My Career is another programme that actually came from a JFN.  The JFN being, ‘you never come to us when there’s a new opportunity, why not?’ Unfortunately, at the time there was no central place where we could check colleagues’ existing skills.  Now colleagues can log onto our culture portal and update their CVs so their skills and aspirations are searchable via a database for the talent management team. Now, one of the goals of the business is to promote from within before looking externally.  Within the last three months over 900 colleagues have used the tool – that’s about 20% of colleagues.

Tips

It really is all about our colleagues because ultimately they will deliver our customers the service experience which defines us as a company – that’s why we have all the programmes we do. But it does need to take place in a structured environment with processes like Jump Start and a responsive and respected leadership team.  If there were three things I’d say to a HR Director about to embark on a similar transformation, they would be: 

- Be open and transparent about the business issues that drive the need for change – if the business is broken, say it’s broken

- Create a variety of mechanisms to engage and listen to your colleagues from top to bottom and keep doing it – maintaining momentum and motivation is key

- Speed and results are essential in a transformation so make sure you and the leadership of your company are ready to respond to colleagues who take you up on the challenge!