Our people

The issue: Companies succeed by attracting and retaining the best employees. To do this, they must offer attractive pay and benefits packages, opportunities for training and development and must provide a safe workplace, free from harassment. Companies that encourage equal opportunities will also benefit from the innovation and creativity of a diverse workforce.

Our approach: Heathrow employs around 4,600 people, nearly half of whom work in security. We aim to attract and retain the best people by creating a high-performing organisation where:

• People are rewarded for the work they do
• People are encouraged to increase their skills through learning and development
• Team working is fostered
• Equality of opportunity is a reality and employees can work in an environment free from bullying and harassment.

Diversity
A diverse workforce with people from different backgrounds brings creativity and innovation. It also helps us reflect the diversity of the population and understand the needs of our customers.

We launched a new diversity policy in 2006 which commits us to treating employees and potential recruits equally whatever their race, colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin, sex, marital status, sexual orientation, religious belief, disability, age or community background. We also have a comprehensive bullying and harassment policy which we publicise to all employees.

We have updated our employment policies and procedures to comply with the UK’s new age discrimination laws.

Pay and benefits
We aim to offer pay and financial benefits that help us recruit, retain and motivate employees to meet the needs of the business. This year we negotiated a three year pay deal with our employees.

All staff are eligible for an annual bonus based on company performance. Managers’ bonuses are based on a combination of the company’s performance and achievement of personal objectives.

All our employees can benefit from good company performance by joining share schemes. Our share schemes include:

• Deferred Annual Bonus scheme for our most senior executives
• Executive Share Option Plan (ESOP) for senior management
• Bonus Saver Plan for all employees.

These schemes were introduced in 2006/07 to replace those in place before the takeover.

We value employee loyalty highly and at Heathrow we run schemes to reward employees after ten years’ and 25 years’ service.

Training and development
We aim to offer the training and development opportunities that our employees need to increase their skills and to adapt to new roles. BAA’s virtual university, called Uni, provides information on development opportunities including traditional classroom sessions, e-learning, coaching and mentoring.

We consider training and development as key to achieving our business objectives. Employees agree learning objectives with their manager each year which are linked to performance bonuses.

Health, safety and wellbeing
We want our employees to be able to balance work and home life. We offer flexible working options including:

• Part-time working
• Job sharing
• Home working
• Reduced hours
• Special leave for domestic emergencies and for volunteering
• Maternity, paternity, adoption and carer leave.

Employee engagement
We aim to keep employees informed about the business and to understand their views. We engage with our employees via regular written communications, team meetings and management conferences and via our employee survey, 'Make Your Mark'. Our communication channels include:

• Heathrow People - our monthly internal newspaper
• The Week – a weekly round up of news across Heathrow
• ConnectLive - real time information screens
• Emails sent to all staff
• Letters to home addresses
• Other audience specific channels, eg Security News, Leadership Matters etc.

Managing change
We have been restructuring our operations to put decision making as close as possible to the front line. This will bring clear benefits to customers but meant that around 450 managerial and office workers’s roles were affected. Many of these were successfully redeployed and 350 of them chose to take voluntary redundancy.

We aim to manage people through change carefully and fairly by communicating clearly with all those involved and using a consistent approach. We have published a ‘change toolkit’ on our Intranet which contains guidelines on how to achieve this.

Through our redeployment process, New Connections, we help people find alternative roles in BAA where possible, or outside the company if no suitable internal roles are available.

Trade unions
Maintaining good relations with the trade unions that represent our employees helps us meet their needs and be productive. Our airport employees are represented by four trades unions:

• Transport and General Workers Union (TGWU)
• Amicus
• Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS)
• Prospect.

We meet formally with these trade unions to negotiate pay and employment policies through the Joint National Forum (JNF).

Our performance:
Diversity

Gender diversity
This year the gender diversity of our workforce remained fairly consistent compared to 2005/06. We recognise that women are still underrepresented at all levels at Heathrow and we are actively recruiting female security officers.

Age diversity
Our employee age data shows a good spread of ages up until 60 years old when most of our employees retire.

Ethnic diversity
Ethnic diversity data also remained consistent with the year before, and ethnic minorities remain underrepresented.

 based on May 07 data.

In 2006/07 as part of a Leadership Development Programme which is being rolled out across our leadership teams in Operational areas, all managers are participating in Equal Opportunities training.

Employee survey results
This year 42% of employees invited to participate, responded to 'Make Your Mark', our employee survey. This fall in completion rates is due to the challenging year we have had during the acquisition.

The survey showed a drop in the number of employees who said they were proud to work for BAA from 69% to 54%. We believe that this is partly due to the increased stress placed on employees by the heightened security levels at our airports and the negative media coverage that followed.

Following last year’s survey the Executive Committee identified three focus areas for improvements:

Leadership/Teamwork
Action to support this included:

• Customer Service Directorate Change Programme
• Leadership Development Programme
• Grow Our Own – developing management skills for front-line staff
• High Performing Teams.

Performance Development
Actions to support this included:

• Performance Development Plans for everyone involved in the CSD Change Programme
• Talent reviews
• Focus on Performance reviews.

Improve the working environment
Actions to support this included:

• Refurbishment of Visitor Centre into new Academy
• Rest room refurbishments
• Facilities team within the terminals.

Training and development
This year there were 230 internal promotions and around 85% of vacancies were filled by internal applicants (excluding security officer posts).

As part of the ‘Leadership Development’ programme, we have filled 677 spaces on our training programmes/courses which include ‘Attendance management‘, ‘Managing and Leading People and Teams’, ‘Performance Improvement’ and ‘Age Discrimination’.

Employee engagement and communications
Communication with employees is vital, particularly during times of uncertainty like the acquisition. During 2006/07 we:

• Piloted face-to-face briefings for front-line staff in Terminal 4 with a view to rolling out across the airport
• Created a new training programme ‘Great Relationships with Our People’ about employee relations and communications
• Held three conferences for senior managers
• Introduced One HR – a consolidated, easy to use, HR call centre for all BAA Heathrow employees.

Managing change
In 2006/07 we welcomed 958 new recruits. Our employee turnover rate at end of 2006/07 was 14.2% compared to the UK average of 16% for our industry. We aim to manage people through change carefully and fairly by communicating clearly with all those involved and using a consistent approach.

Our plans:
Our focus for 2007 will be:

• Strengthening our management teams to meet the new challenges
• Managing individual performance
• Improving communications
• Making our airports clean working and friendly for our people and for our passengers
• Continuing to deliver diversity
• Continuing to build constructive relationships with the trade unions
• Supporting people through change programmes.