The human resource (HR) function in an organisation is designed to maximise employee performance in alignment with an employer’s strategic objectives. When implemented effectively, it helps the business to gain competitive advantage over others.
Indeed, the effective management of people in a company requires a strategic approach to ensure that the organisation can achieve its overall vision.
The HR department, amongst other functions, manages the overall employee experience; authentic employee value propositions, talent attraction, learning and development and talent management.
In addition, it is responsible for driving organisational change and managing industrial relations, or the balancing of organisational practices with requirements arising from collective bargaining and governmental laws.
Conscious of modern trends in HR and keen to raise the bar in HR practice in Nigeria, Ms. Temi Dalley, Chief Human Resources Officer at Sterling Bank Plc, says people are at the Heart of the bank’s overall strategy for success.
According to her, “At Sterling Bank, we seek to build our leaders from within and engage our community to achieve our vision of being the financial institution of choice. One of our long-term metrics for achieving our goals is to build a Great Place to Work”.
“We are deliberate about putting our people first. In turn, they put our customers and our community first. Whether in rallying round to provide succour for a grieving widow or coming together to build one of the most innovative brands in Nigeria, we have empowered our people to believe that we can do anything as one.”
She says the bank has built the concept of a home into the workplace by providing a space that is physically and mentally safe for employees. “Although the bank’s team is diverse, employees are happy to work and collaborate. The culture enables everyone and there are institutionalised systems that ensure our employees are protected and everyone is heard, seen, and safe,” she adds.
In a bid to change the narrative in an industry where people are prone to stress, Sterling created a wellness programme for its people as a preventive measure, including the employee assistance programme initiative. The bank designed a plan known as Flexi-Work plan which allows employees to choose their work hours or work remotely.
This means a person can commute when there is little traffic, be home to spend time with those they love or explore other interests, especially in a stressful city like Lagos where traffic is unbearable.
“Therefore, every little bit of rest helps,” she says.
She adds that the bank also has a plan that supports its female employees in a bid to reduce maternal mortality.
Dalley says, “A further step is how we utilise our mood index surveys from time to time to check the emotional well-being of our employees.”
Also, the bank has created a system that makes every employee feel safe to report wrongdoing in the workplace.
Dalley explains that, “our whistle blowing system ensures that our people can raise concerns regarding undesirable workplace situations through channels that enable even the lowest-ranked employee to make reports directly to senior management, including our Managing Director, Executive Directors and me, the Chief Human Resources Officer.”
According to her, Sterling Bank believes that the only barrier to success is one’s mind, which explains why the bank has enthroned a culture of equal opportunity and encourages its people to dream and dare to be more.
With this, some employees have taken advantage to upgrade their educational qualifications and in turn, enabled them to experience career progression.
Among other things, she explains that Sterling Bank rewards its people for the excellent job they do for the organisation.
“Our remuneration programme is one of the most attractive in the industry and it contributed to us recently winning the Jobberman Award as one of the best companies to work for in Nigeria,” Dalley remarks.
Jobberman is a leading career platform in Nigeria.
The bank also has a flexible remuneration policy known as Flex Pay, which gives employees the option of choosing a flexible remuneration plan.
She says, “Our employees can choose to receive an advance on their salaries to cover urgent expenses. They don’t have to bother about saving for rent and children’s school fees at the start of the year; the lump payment is made right at the start of the school year. So, despite a previously ‘detty’ December, our people can start the year with enough funds to fulfil all their financial obligations. This gives new meaning to financial security, as the Flex Pay model caters for different financial plans and responsibilities.”
She adds that, “our commitment to putting our employees first also resulted in an average 12 percent salary increase across all grade levels in 2019, a show of our determination to provide the best for our people. Also, when the lockdown became imminent in Lagos and Abuja, we paid our employees five days earlier than the usual payday to cushion the effect of the lockdown on their families.”
Another initiative the bank has put in place for its workforce is the Sterling Share Ownership Initiative which allows employees to become co-owners of the bank. Sterling Bank accomplishes this by allotting shares to every employee, irrespective of grade or length of stay, as part of their monthly emoluments.
The bank also has an integrated rewards strategy that focuses on the right remuneration, benefits, as well as career progression opportunities that align with employees’ personal and professional aspirations. Asides adequate remuneration, it also believes in human capital development.
The bank has a bursary scheme, an educational grant which enables its employees to pursue a local or international Master’s or Ph.D. degree at the bank’s expense, either through a full-time or part-time programme. About 250 employees have benefitted from the scheme since it was launched in 2019.
To strengthen its leadership bench and groom leaders internally for the future, the Sterling Leadership Series was created to bridge idea gaps between senior and middle management.
The bi-annual forum allows its leaders to explore synergy in networking and learn invaluable insights from seasoned professionals across Africa.
Also, for its younger hires, the Sterling Mentorship Programme provides support and guidance for them to settle into the organisation.
Dalley says, “We are constantly adapting to the demands of the new generation of the labour market to become more attractive to a lot of young professionals in various fields. Our recently launched Reverse Mentoring initiative re-enforces our belief in the zest and knowledge that the younger generation brings to the bank and creates an avenue for our seniors to learn from their younger colleagues.
“At Sterling Bank, building a great place to work is more than just paying our people right and developing potential; it is about creating a culture that nurtures innovation and creativity. This explains why we have also paid special attention to creating a gender-balanced organisation through a best in class talent acquisition strategy that focuses on merit, competence, and equality, having 53:47 male-female ratios with equal pay across all grades,” she says.
The CHRO adds that “The bank believes that change is a journey and it is this journey that has created its agile culture, which is shown in its efficiency and its adaptability – a feat for which the bank was recognised as the Most Agile Company in Africa in 2018.
“Other aspects of our bank’s human resources culture that seem to amaze competitors and the watching public are the reward for excellent performance and introduction of Exceptional Achievers’ Award at individual and team levels as part of the strategy to encourage innovation which has become part of our DNA; the culture of referring to one another by first names which enables employees, irrespective of levels, to communicate freely; the quarterly town hall meetings with the Managing Director, Abubakar Suleiman, in different locations across the country and most recently virtual, where employees of the bank can communicate effectively without fear of backlash or repercussion — of course, everyone, irrespective of grade, calls our CEO ‘Abu’.”
The bank has also put in place a Digital HR Chatbot and a Human Resources Information System, known as HCHub, which helps it strike the right balance between the use of technology and a more human-centred approach, especially on its digital transformation journey. This is similar to the Sterling Stars initiative birthed to support wealth creation for employees by supporting their business ideas.
Giving insights into other plans for employees, Dalley posits that “Sterling Bank hopes to continue to build a sustainable workforce which is better equipped to deliver results sustainably.”
To this end, it can be concluded that the bank is constantly recreating its people strategy to ensure effective leadership in the present while building the leadership of the future through sustainable succession planning.
Sterling Bank’s commitment to learning is rooted in Alvin Toffler’s tripartite ideology of learn, unlearn, relearn.
Evidently, it is one of the key strategies for achieving a great and sustainable workplace. The bank’s learning and development intervention has since 2019 been able to train over 2,000 members of its workforce, while its specialised academy called i-Learn trained more than 200 employees in two months of its launch and over 1,000 as at date.
The bank hopes to continue to equip its people with the right skills while scaling up capability building in the future.
From the foregoing, it is not surprising why Sterling has received several awards as the overall 3rd best place to work in Nigeria/Africa from the Great Place to Work (GPTW), Best Practice for the Support of the Millennial Generation for Large Corporate Organisations by GPTW, Best Practice in Leadership Practices for Large Corporate Organisations by GPTW; Jobberman Best 100 Companies to Work for in Nigeria 2019, winner, Financial Services Category, 2019 HR Optimisation Awards by Chartered Institute of Personnel Management (CIPM) and overall winner of 2019 HR Best Practice Awards by CIPM, among others.
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