Workplace

We believe in providing our employees with opportunities to develop their talent and to contribute to the business they work in. We support them by investing in improved safety, upholding their statutory rights and creating an ethical, supportive environment where colleagues are treated fairly and with respect.

Adding value

Throughout Smiths, people are taking action to achieve the best possible long-term performance for our shareholders. We invest in the skills and capabilities of our people and expect them to reflect that investment in their performance in terms of business results.

Career progression

As a global technology group, we offer a variety of ways to help our people progress their career within Smiths, in line with their capabilities and performance. We identify potential leaders and provide them with development tools and opportunities to support their career ambitions and our business needs. We also recognise the need to balance internal development and promotion with external recruitment, where this is necessary to fulfil our commitment to add value.

Diversity

We welcome diversity in our workforce, not only to adhere to our legal obligations but also because we believe that everyone needs to challenge constructively and to contribute ideas from their own perspective, to support our business performance objectives.

Succession management

Smiths operates a systematic succession-management process for leadership roles. Our businesses identify leadership talent and development needs using a set of key competencies, common tools and a consistent language. Development plans are monitored by senior management to optimise effective succession.

Developing talent

We have a number of development programmes to evaluate and enhance core leadership competencies. These programmes are tailored to address a wide range of learning styles, incorporating workshops, experiential learning, mentoring, team working and project experience.

For employees to add value, we have to ensure they are properly engaged with and committed to the business. We provide training and development that represent an investment in both their future and that of the business. We also offer a safe and responsible working environment that encourages mutual respect, provides opportunities for personal growth and rewards individual and team contributions that realise value for the business.

Communication

Communication is crucial to helping employees engage with the business. At business unit level, we communicate through team briefings, presentations, intranets and newsletters. Many businesses have well-established forums for exchanging information and best practice, as well as discussing current business issues including efficiency initiatives, training and development, and environment, health and safety issues. In European Union (EU) countries we have workplace information and consultation arrangements at our sites. These link to the Smiths European Forum, through which employee representatives from across the EU meet annually to discuss transnational matters with Group executives.

Acquisition integration

Smiths Group periodically acquires new businesses and, when doing so, we implement plans to integrate them into Smiths, ensuring that our business ethics, employee development and EHS policies and programmes are well established.

Employee engagement

In FY2011 Smiths conducted a Global 'My Voice' Employee Engagement survey for the first time. We partnered with Kenexa, a leading survey provider, to ensure that responses were anonymous and to enable us to conduct the survey in local languages. We achieved a participation rate of more than 85%. Results were measured against the global norms for manufacturing industry and divisional, local and functional results have been communicated. Action plans to address the most significant issues have been drawn up using focus groups and local champions. A further global survey will be conducted in Spring 2012 to measure our progress.