Corporate Responsibility
KPI: Colleagues satisfied with opportunities to learn
Colleague Strategy
As we face the unprecedented financial turmoil in global markets, our focus on colleague development has never been more important. Our ability to execute our strategy within these tough markets relies on engaging with, and motivating, our colleagues to deliver consistently outstanding performance.
Our strategy
Our colleague strategy is very clear. We aim to have the strongest leadership teams in the sector and have clear expectations of both what and how our leaders deliver. HBOS-U, our corporate university for all leaders, has been an outstanding success: 76% of colleagues believe their line manager is good at managing people (against an industry norm of 58%).
We provide all colleagues with ongoing opportunities to learn and develop their careers. We constantly evaluate our efforts to create a positive working environment that reflects the diversity of our colleagues.
Colleague rewards
We keep our reward systems under continuous review to ensure they deliver in respect of recruitment, retention and motivation. In 2007, colleagues were awarded £80m in free shares and £270m in cash bonuses. HBOS colleagues across the UK have received £218m in free shares since our Free Shares scheme began in 2005.
Through our Colleague Opinion Survey we track our leadership and capability indices as well as employer advocacy. Our success is clear, 76% of colleagues would speak highly of HBOS as an employer (against an industry norm of 50%).
Union Partnership Agreement
Last year, we signed a groundbreaking Partnership Agreement with our partner unions ACCORD and Unite. Our target is to increase membership to 70% of colleagues over the next five years. We believe this ambition makes us unique in the UK financial sector.
We have made excellent progress, but we are not complacent. Our challenge is pressing given the changed marketplace but we are confident our work has created a platform that we can build on this year to help set HBOS apart from its competitors.