BT 2007 Annual Report Download - page 24

easy to use, we will help those customers succeed in their
business and personal lives.
We are committed to contributing positively to society and a sustainable future.
This is part of the heart of BT.
Our brand values are implicit in our new advertising strap line –
Bringing it all together – which captures both what we can do
for customers (helping them make the most of the possibilities
of converged communications) and our commitment to acting as
a single BT team.
Motivating our people and living the BT values
At 31 March 2007, BT employed 106,204 people worldwide –
101,701 in Europe, the Middle East and Africa; 3,688 in the
Americas; and 815 in the Asia Pacific region. Our commitment
to meeting our customers’ needs means that every one of these
employees has opportunities to develop innovative solutions,
generate new business, drive efficiencies and experience
personal growth.
Our aim is to create a team of high-performing, engaged and
motivated people who can make a difference for customers,
shareholders, the company and themselves. Only by living our
values will we deliver our strategy, keep our promises to our
customers, seize new opportunities in new markets and maximise
the return from our traditional business.
Motivating leaders
The quality of leadership in BT is key to the successful delivery
of our strategy for transformation and growth. We are focused
on ensuring that leaders at all levels understand what is
expected of them, have access to appropriate development
opportunities and are able to benchmark their performance
against that of their peers.
We have, for example, rigorously defined the capabilities we
expect our leaders to exhibit and have introduced a 360 degree
feedback tool to help them measure their performance. In the
2007 financial year, we conducted extensive research into the
capabilities of our leaders to support focused investment in their
development.
Engaging and motivating our people
Our annual employee attitude survey was conducted most
recently in February 2007 and attracted a 74% response rate
(over 78,000 responses). The survey generates around 5,000
feedback reports for managers and their teams across the
business, helping to promote effective team working.
Employees are kept informed about our business through a
wide range of communications channels, including our online
news service, bi-monthly newspaper, regular e-mail bulletins and
senior management webchats and webcast briefings.
We have a record of stable industrial relations and enjoy
generally constructive relationships with recognised unions in the
UK and works councils elsewhere in Europe. In the UK, we
recognise two main trade unions – the Communication Workers
Union and Connect. We hold regular meetings between
management, employee trade union representatives and other
groups of employees in order to ensure that their views are
taken into account in any decisions affecting employees’
interests. We also operate a pan-European works council (the
BTECC). Our Chief Executive and other senior executives have
regular meetings with the BTECC and other employee
representatives.
Rewarding and recognising achievement
We continued to provide our employees with opportunities to
acquire a stake in the company. Under the BT Employee Share
Investment Plan (ESIP), BT can provide free shares to employees
and employees can buy shares in BT from their pre-tax salaries.
In the 2007 financial year, £25 million was allocated to
provide free shares to employees under the ESIP. Employees
outside the UK received the same award of shares where
practicable; otherwise, they will receive cash equivalent to the
value of the shares. This allocation of profits was linked to the
achievement of corporate performance measures determined by
the Board. From the 2008 financial year, the award of free
shares under the ESIP will be replaced by free BT Total
Broadband Option 3 for all BT employees in the UK.
Employees can also buy shares at a discount under our
savings-related share option plan.
More than 93% of eligible employees participate in one or
more of these plans.
Learning now and in the future
We believe that people, particularly at the start of their careers,
will increasingly want to work for companies that commit to the
long-term development of their employees.
Our successful company-wide re-accreditation to Investors in
People in February 2005, first achieved in 1998, demonstrates
our continuing commitment to the effective alignment of our
communications, training and development with our business
strategy.
We have created a learning governance model to ensure our
learning and development objectives and practice align with the
key strategic objectives of the business. Senior learning and
development representatives form the Learning Council, a body
which provides strategic and operational guidance for the whole
of BT to ensure that all learning and development activity is co-
ordinated across all lines of business.
R2L (Route2learn), our web-based, group-wide learning
portal, is evidence of our continuing investment in lifelong
learning and education for all BT people. Providing all BT
employees with an extensive range of learning programmes and
facilities, it is one of the largest corporate learning management
systems in Europe.
In the 2007 financial year, R2L delivered over 310,000 online
and 21,400 instructor-led completed courses.
Embedding flexibility and diversity
The changing nature of the markets in which we operate, our
focus on cost leadership and our investment in new services all
shape our permanent workforce.
In the UK during the 2007 financial year, 6,391 people joined
BT (2006: more than 6,600), natural attrition was running at 4%
(2006: 3%) and 2,151 people left BT under our voluntary leaver
packages (2006: 2,169).
The ability to support flexibility and agile working practices is
a key benefit of many of the products and services we offer
customers and is fundamental to our own employment practices.
Agile working is well established in our UK operations – where
around 10,400 employees work from home – and is increasingly
important in our global operations. In Budapest, for example,
BT Group plc Annual Report & Form 20-F 23
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