Recruitment
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Pensions
Tescos provides an award-winning defined-benefit pension scheme, which now has 127,000 members. Unlike other companies who have moved to money purchase schemes, the Tescos scheme is based on career average earnings. One of the great advantages of the career average approach, compared to a final salary scheme, is that if staff want to reduce their hours as they approach retirement, they can do so without making a big difference to the final pension they receive. As the employer of choice for the over-55s, this is considered one of the major benefits Tesco offers. We contribute 10.5% of pensionable pay, and 56% of Tescos staff are covered by the company pension scheme.
Health and safety
- A safe place of work goes beyond legal requirements: it is about providing a safe working environment for Tescos staff and there customers.
- It is about risk management and this can improve financial performance – good health and safety is good business.
- The commitment to health and safety comes from the Board through Tescos Health and Safety Policy, and they review the performance of the business on a regular basis.
- Achieving Tescos goals depends upon all Tescos people working together. Managing health and safety successfully demands investment in Tescos staff through training, support and setting standards.
Training and development
As an innovative and energetic company in a highly competitive retail environment, learning and progression from within the company is core to Tescos operation.
Training forms an important part of staff development and Tescos give opportunities for all staff to develop their talents to the full.
A key business priority is to serve customers better and so our ongoing training programmes seek to ensure Tescos people understand the Group’s customer service objectives and strive to achieve them. Tescos support their staff to achieve there potential through access to training programmes and all staff has personal development programmes (PDPs) to ensure they have the right skills to do their job. All employees of Tesco will be able to access learning tailored to their own personal development needs, from induction and operating and leadership skills to core skills, such as project management, personal efficiency, effective meeting management, presentation skills and facilitation. All retail employees complete basic training (our Bronze Award training scheme) as well as job-specific training, as part of our overall training framework. Last year, we set ourselves a target of training 95% of Tesco retail staff and achieved 93%.
Tesco has launched a new way of helping people develop their careers called "Talent Spotting". Individuals have a career discussion with his or her manager to plan their career progression. They are then placed in a talent pool and the information is used to determine who fills future vacancies and to identify cross-functional movement and development opportunities
Employee organisations and unions
Staff Fundraising
Tesco encourages staff fundraising for charity by adding a 20% top up from the Tesco Charity Trust to all the money they raise. This applies to the Tesco Charity of the Year as well as other local charities.
Fourteen male workers at Cleckheaton stores have stripped off for a calendar to raise money for the Tesco Charity of the Year Cystic Fibrosis Trust.
The hills were alive for one employee from Tesco Oldham store, who climbed Ben Nevis, Scafell and Snowden, singing and strumming on his guitar as he went to raise money for Cystic Fibrosis.
A brave Ellesmere Port Tesco employee raised money for the Trust by taking the plunge with 23 sand tiger and nurse sharks at the local Aquarium in order to raise money for Cystic Fibrosis.
Tesco Rugby store workers toured the town on the world's largest bicycle - a 24 seater.
Five dare devil employees from Trowbridge stores, including one 62 year old, completed a 10,000 feet skydive who raised £700 for Cystic Fibrosis Trust
Tesco Give as you Earn
This is an easy and tax-free way for all Tesco staff to give to charities they care about directly from their pay. Tesco launched the scheme in 1987, and approximately 15,000 employees have donated almost £900,000 in the past two years to local and national charities.
Staff Benefits
Diversity benefits a business in many ways, including greater customer and staff loyalty. To review Tescos progress, they identify best practice and set next steps, we held an away day in January for all those responsible for diversity issues across the business.
Tescos are committed to ensuring that at all times and in every aspect of employment, including recruitment, training and development, everybody receives the same treatment. Both internal and external applicants are considered on individual ability, regardless of factors such as gender, age, color, creed, race, ethnic origin, disability, marital status, religion or belief, trade union membership or sexual preference and orientation.
One of the many ways in which Tescos are able to be a more inclusive employer is by offering our people opportunities to work flexible hours. Where practicable, Tescos staff is able to job-share, work flextime or compressed hours, shift swap, work from home, or work part-time. Tescos were chosen by the Department of Trade and Industry’s Work-life Balance Challenge Fund to conduct further research into flexible working opportunities and to develop new ideas. Employees of Tescos can also take holiday for a wide range of reasons, including Grandparent Leave, Careers Leave, Study Leave, Religious Festival Leave and Yellow Ribbon Leave – a paid day’s leave to staff with relatives returning from military service in Iraq. Not only do flexible hours mean Tescos can attract a wider range of employees, but it also means that staffs are more committed to their jobs, which reduces absenteeism and improves morale and retention.
Tescos have been supporting the UK Government’s Age Positive campaign and have long recognized the benefits of a mixed age workforce. Tescos are one of the first companies that positively encourages the recruitment of the 50+ age group, and have a Working Beyond Retirement Policy. This enables employees to work as long as they feel fit. Tescos are very proud that 17% of other employees are over the age of 50.
Tesco has become the first business to set targets for the recruitment of disabled people. Tesco are working in partnership with Remploy, the UK Government agency, and the Shaw Trust, who act as ‘job brokers’ for disabled jobseekers. Also Tescos are looking to recruit 200 disabled people over the next year, to add to the almost 500 disabled employees they have in supported placements. They also reviewed their Selection Toolkit this year to include suggestions to make reasonable adjustments for disabled staff.
Three Functional Areas
Finance
Business Support: Each function in Tesco has a finance support team headed by a Finance Director. Each team's role is diverse, covering all aspects of financial analysis, such as investment appraisals, cost benefit analysis, developing targets and monitoring performance.
Financial Reporting: This department provides management information to measure and monitor the business, either in the form of our corporate steering wheel (or balanced score card), five-year plans, operating budgets, forecasts or our weekly/monthly financial results.
Financial Service Centre: We pay our suppliers over £1 billion a month and process over 500,000 invoices. Every month our stores receive over 300,000 deliveries and there are over 200,000 employees on the payroll. All this activity needs to be processed in an accurate and efficient way - and it's this team's responsibility to make sure that's always the case.
Treasury Management: This team is responsible for funding, cash management, group structuring, managing financial risks and purchasing financial services. The aim is to minimise the cost of funding the business through providing the highest level of financial expertise. Opportunities exist for travel, too, working with Tesco operations in other countries and our Treasury Centre in Hong Kong.
Audit: Our internal audit team reviews our operations to ensure that our management and financial controls are adequate and that the business is properly protected against risk.
Taxation: A business like Tesco has to pay tax in all sorts of ways in different countries. The taxation team ensures that we comply with all these national tax and import/export duty rules, whilst advising the business to ensure that we operate tax-efficiently.
Marketing and Sales
Tescos marketing gets noticed. The TV advertising campaigns, starring Prunella Scales and Jane Horrocks, are enjoyed across the UK, while more than 10 million customers have a Clubcard and receive our targeted quarterly mailings with vouchers and bonus coupons. Over 700,000 people are members of Tesco clubs such as Baby Club, Toddlers Club and Kids Club, receiving regular information and offers.
However, persuading customers to shop at Tesco is only part of the story. There are many other marketing issues to address.
We cover all this and more in Marketing. Tesco is at the centre of the organisation and Tescos work is creative, fun, energetic and innovative. It's also about being first for customers by championing them and supplying information about their purchasing trends to the rest of the business. Tescos ensure that everything Tesco does is based on customer knowledge, and that all communication is clear, consistent and in line with brand values. In short, we provide many of the facts and processes that influence key decisions.
Our Customer Insight Unit analyses our business, customers and competitors to allow us to determine strategies to meet needs, encourage loyalty and increase customer spend. Local and Stores Marketing ensures that each store has its optimum layout, range, prices, services and location. Brand Marketing builds our brand image and communicates initiatives to customers. Price and Promotions is the guardian of the Tesco price position. Through monitoring and analysing comparisons with competitors, they make recommendations and plan seasonal activities. Customer Services Marketing ensures that customers always have a good shopping experience through constantly evaluating Tescos service, reviewing competitors and recommending improvements.
Information Technology
It's probably no surprise that Tesco has been extremely quick to embrace IT. For example, Tescos passion for new technology has been key to Tescos becoming the world's biggest e-grocer in a remarkably short period of time.
But technology touches every other part of our business too. Tescos has over 200 internal systems, links to hundreds of suppliers, communication across 700 sites, and more than 5000 office-based IT users to support.
Tescos doesn't just view technology as hardware and software. It's about creating services and solutions that help make things better for there customers and there colleagues. Simply put, Tescos is a business function with technical skills. Our 700-strong team understands the commercial impact of their work and uses technology accordingly. This has enabled our online grocery business, Tesco.com to flourish, just as it will for B2B e-commerce and class-leading supply chain systems. The UK-based IT team mostly covers the domestic market, but with an eye to our global business as we work ever more closely with our international colleagues - some of Tescos people are seconded abroad.
