Enabling people to thrive

Employee performance is recognised through regular performance and objective setting meetings. Employees are rewarded for performance and long service through an employee voucher scheme at key milestones and commendable achievements. 

Employee performance is also celebrated with an annual awards ceremony known as the ATG Spotlight Awards.

Every year we run a company-wide survey to understand employee sentiment and engagement, which is followed by focus groups and actions for the coming year. The most recent survey saw 92% of the respondents feeling personally engaged with the Company and their roles – the highest score since we started conducting the survey a number of years ago. This was driven by employees’ trust in our leadership, purpose and Company direction.

Throughout the challenges of remote working in the past two years, we have supported parents with flexible working patterns and offered paid and non-paid time off to support their childcare responsibilities. 

All employees have remained connected while working from home, via business updates through regular Global All Hands meetings, which all employees are invited to attend. Team meetings were also held focusing on specific work activities and for managers to ensure the wellbeing of their teams whilst based at home.

The launch of our global wellbeing programme facilitated two or three activities per month allowing employees to connect with each other away from work responsibilities.

As we transition back into the office this year, management has taken into consideration feedback received from the employee engagement survey whereby the majority of employees requested flexible working and permanent opportunities to work from home. With this in mind, we have adopted different models for different geographies according to local government guidelines and the needs of the business operating in that country.

We are fully committed to the elimination of unlawful and unfair  discrimination, and we  value the differences  that a diverse workforce brings to our organisation. We know that our continued success relies on people  having a wide range of experience and skills to bring different perspectives, promote  innovation and provide constructive challenge  and as such are in the process of implementing our diversity and inclusion strategy in  accordance with our Board and workforce  diversity policies.

In the last 12 months, 45% of our new hires have been female,  however as with most  tech companies, there is a shortage of female applicants in technology  specific roles. Our hiring strategy looks to increase the sourcing of more female candidates  by engaging with women in tech forums and working with agencies to balance out applications where possible.

As well as improving gender balance, we look to increase our mix of ethnic backgrounds. In the US, we have forged a partnership with the Professional Diversity Network where every role is posted to 17  ethnically diverse job boards with the aim to increase our sourcing of diverse candidates.

Our hiring practice is committed to fair and equal treatment regardless of an  individual’s race, age, gender, ethnic background, religion or beliefs, gender assignment, sexual orientation, marital or civil partnership status, or disabilities. Our recruitment and selection processes focus on selecting the best candidate for each role and we hire based on merit and the right skills for the role.

As well as hiring, we continue to track the gender and ethnic minority balance of our workforce and are committed through our initiatives to ensure that we improve this.

Our other initiatives include:

• A talent review to identify female high potentials with clear development  and progression plans. The Board  also continues to focus on succession planning and developing diversity and  potential within the senior leadership team.
• We have reviewed  all employee pay  and taken steps to  level up pay gaps  for male and female employees  doing the same  role with similar  experience levels.
• Diversity, equality  and inclusion  training for all  employees.  Through online  interactive training  we educate  employees and  create awareness  on the following  topics:
  • Microaggression in the workplace
  • Unconscious bias
  • Workplace cultural competency and humility
  • Diversity, inclusion and sensitivity
• Celebration and recognition of internationally diverse days including Pride Month, International Women’s Day, and  World Day for Cultural Diversity. Our North America employees will be given Juneteenth as a paid holiday to support our black communities commemorating  the emancipation  of enslaved people  in the US from 1865.
• We will seek to actively gain employee feedback on what more we  could be doing to  support diversity,  equality and inclusion by adding a new theme in the next employee engagement survey.
• In the UK and  Germany, we have  shown support to  government initiatives such as  the Kickstarter  programme and  apprenticeships by  offering young people, or those without the opportunity to  study further education, a placement at ATG.  This provides qualifications, training and on the job corporate experience in entry level roles.
• In North America we are aiming to create more internships which  support young  people gaining  quality work experience through the University of  Nebraska supported  schemes. 

We ensure that all employees have access to the training they need to support their development. All employees are required to undertake mandatory training annually to ensure they understand their legal and regulatory duties in relation to insider trading, cyber security and data security.

We also offer a bespoke training programme that is run by internal experts, sharing knowledge and learning technical skills from other departments to develop a well-rounded range of skillsets.

Other training includes professional qualification sponsorship for all employees. During objective setting periods, employees review training needs with their managers. Training will be offered on a case by case basis and subject to supporting developmental skills and meeting objectives.

New hires are all presented with a 30/60/90-day onboarding programme to set them up for success and ensure they receive a comprehensive plan to learn about the Company goals, infrastructure, processes and ways of working cross functionally and within their department. In the UK, new hires have probation reviews which take place at three months and at six months.

Performance reviews are carried out twice a year, allowing managers to have meaningful conversations about their employees’ development, discussing talent profiling and career development. To support these conversations, we offer access to development plans and 360 feedback tools.

We believe it is necessary to offer a competitive benefits package to ensure we can recruit and retain the right calibre of person. As well as some key financial benefits and paid holiday/vacation leave, we provide benefits that support people at all stages of life.

We believe in supporting growing families and offer paid leave benefits for new parents across each country, with the UK offering enhanced pay.

We provide pension arrangements for the benefit of our employees in the UK and US, including a defined contribution scheme in the UK and a 401(k) plan in the US. All new UK and US employees, once eligible, can join the Group’s defined contribution scheme or 401(k), respectively. Auto enrolment applies to both plans.

Additionally, we offer a Cycle to Work scheme which supports our commitment to reducing carbon emissions and improving employee health and wellbeing.