The NEC Group instils work/life balance

Citation

Moor, C. (2008), "The NEC Group instils work/life balance", Strategic HR Review, Vol. 7 No. 6. https://doi.org/10.1108/shr.2008.37207fab.005

The NEC Group instils work/life balance

Article Type: Rewards From: Strategic HR Review, Volume 7, Issue 6

Short case studies that demonstrate best practice in rewards

As one of Birmingham’s biggest employers, The NEC Group has been pivotal in the renaissance of the city into a twenty-first century visitor destination. Comprising of The National Exhibition Centre (NEC), The NEC Arena, The International Convention Centre (ICC) and The National Indoor Arena (NIA), every year The NEC Group brings 4.5 million people together at its four world-class Birmingham-based venues to see some of the UK’s best-loved shows.

Together they generate an estimated £1.3 billion of business and visitor expenditure and support the equivalent of 22,000 full-time jobs in a 12-month period. This includes around 1,000 permanent full time equivalent posts across the group as well as up to 3,000 causal workers supporting the business every year.

The venues provide unrivalled flexibility for staging exhibitions, conferences, concerts, sporting championships and entertainment events. The NEC Group aims to create the ultimate customer experience and provide everything the customer needs for a memorable visit, so that they return again and again.

Achieving excellence through people

At The NEC Group, our vision is to be recognized as the place where people come to discover the future. We want our customers and visitors to prefer our venues over our competitors, and because we provide everything they need they enjoy the time they spend with us. We achieve this through our employees – and we are proud of every one of them – and a focus on providing the best possible work/life balance has lead to better retention of staff, improved staff moral, loyalty and job satisfaction – all of which results in improved service levels. We have also improved the health and fitness of our team, which has in turn reduced sickness levels.

In 2005, we recognized as a company that the secret ingredient in achieving our company vision was our people. This emerged as a result of reviewing the way we worked, and through seeking feedback from our staff through an engagement survey. The hours of work in our industry can be long and unsociable and we have unbelievably busy periods during the creation of a show or exhibition and while it is actually running. When it is over, our people are still busy as halls and conference rooms need to be cleared for the next event.

As a result, often our staff work late nights meeting our visitors’ needs, and when the visitors go home, many of our staff are still here for many hours. We cannot change this aspect of our work – and we would not want to as our people enjoy the buzz that surrounds their roles and the energy in our arenas after a major concert or event can be electrifying. But what we can do is put policies and processes in place to make things a bit easier, and to ensure staff know that we are grateful for what they do for us and that we want to give something back when we can.

Creative HR solutions

Our role in HR is to provide the business with the creative solutions to enable them to do this, so we came up with a raft of measures that we have been introducing over the past three years and we have plans for more in the future. So far we have introduced part time working, with flexible working requests considered from anyone who wishes to apply, not just those with children. We offer compressed working and job share, we pay towards parental leave and we employ a chaplain who helps us support and recognize working arrangements based on cultural and religious reasons. Generous company maternity and paternity pay arrangements also feature as well as an occupational health advisor who leads on health initiatives across the company, including offering free health checks and healthy eating advice. Free private healthcare is offered to all employees as well as a comprehensive employee assistance program to provide advice and support on any matter that is causing employees concern.

We also recognize the importance of having fun at work so we support initiatives such as “Happy Hour,” where employees are invited to get together an hour before normal office hours finish for company updates, launching of new shows or departments and to meet senior managers and other colleagues for fun and chat. “Dress down Friday” has been a huge hit for staff, who can don jeans for the day and support our company charity.

We join in many fundraising initiatives across Birmingham, such as the annual Dragon Boat Race through the canals, Red Nose Day and Children in Need. Every year we host a summer gala day for all staff and service partners and their families, so that everyone can come together for fun, food and laughter during a packed afternoon of it’s a knockout, quad biking, children’s entertainers and so on.

Focusing on people boosts the business

There is no doubt the company has benefited from the introduction of these initiatives. Through our engagement survey, “Speakup,” we know that across the company 79 percent of our employees are satisfied with us as an employer, compared to the UK norm of 76 percent, and that 85 percent are proud to be working for the company. Sickness levels and employee turnover have reduced. From October 2006 to September 2007, we have gone from a sickness level across the group of 4.2 percent to 2.77 percent. Turnover has also significantly decreased over this 12 month period, from 20.98 percent in September 2006, to 16.48 percent in March 2007 and at the end of September 2007 to 13.07 percent. We are very proud of all of this.

We pride ourselves on the training and development that we give our staff, not just on the job or practical training, but also allowing them to gain qualifications. A lower turnover figure shows that our investment in our employees is contributing to them staying with the company. We are now embracing our talented employees and looking at ways to ensure succession planning and career paths add to the value we place on them, allowing them to grow with our business and not feel they have to move onto other businesses in order to further their career.

We believe that if we did not invest in employees’ work/life balance, they would not invest their time with us. Of our women employees, 95 percent return to work after a period of maternity leave. We feel that this in itself shows that we are achieving the right work/life balance for working parents as well as making sure that we do everything to keep mums informed about the business while they are on maternity leave.

Winning industry recognition

In January 2007, our ICC food and beverage team was named the UK Hospitality Industry’s “Best Place to Work.” This was down to enthusiasm and fun in the workplace, as well as the benefits and initiatives that show we are going the extra mile for our staff. The vibrant and exciting atmosphere created by the team helped to wow the judges, along with what they termed as “progressive HR policies.”

Then in December last year we were delighted to win The Birmingham and Solihull Best Business Award for the development of Work Life Balance (large business category). Positive feedback from staff for the efforts being made by the company to develop a good work/life balance culture earned the award, seeing off tough competition from finalists such as the West Midlands Police and National Express Coaches. A cross-section of permanent employees from all five venues was interviewed by the judging panel and the participants praised a range of positive benefits at The NEC Group. Empowering staff is at the very heart of The NEC Group, with training and development offered to all, whether it be practical training or the prospect of gaining qualifications. It was an honor to be recognized for this and providing added confirmation that our innovative policies are working for our employees.

About the author

Carol Moor is director of human resources at The NEC Group. She joined The NEC Group in 2004, after previously working in financial services with Egg and Prudential. Prior to that she was in retail and worked for Morrisons Supermarkets and Asda, where she started her career in HR having joined as a graduate. She can be contacted at: carol.moor@necgroup.co.uk

Carol MoorDirector of human resources at The NEC Group