Commentary

Although terms and conditions are always important for staff, particularly those trying to fit the day job and the evening job of raising a family into the same working week, they have become overshadowed by economic facts of life. So how have the industry’s elite employers coped with the recession?

To address this question this year’s survey asked firms whether they had shed staff. The answer was that almost half (22 firms) have not made redundancies. This is a remarkable statistic, given the deep black of the economic background. For example, Building reported last week that seven of the industry’s largest consultants had shed more than 40% of their workforce. Not everyone has been so resilient; the 28 firms that did cut shed a little more than 12% of their staff, although this figure is bent out of shape by three small firms that were forced to make deep cuts, from 27% to 50%, even though the total number of posts axed was relatively small.

Another topic at the forefront of consultants’ minds is whether they can hang on to their present salary. Here, again, the best employers are well ahead of the industry average: 29 of them have made no changes to their pay and benefits, seven have instituted pay freezes (although some cushioned the blow with bonuses) and others have improved pension and other terms. Remarkably, only seven of our good employers cut pay, and in some cases this was done voluntarily to avoid job losses. Being good employers, cuts were made on a sliding scale, and in one case the management opened its books to the staff and invited them to decide their own pay cuts. These were then voted on (passed with one vote against and an abstention). Of course, there is no painless way to lose money, but this employer did its best to apply anaesthetic first.

The employee ratings

Congratulations are owed to architect P+HS. Although we don’t calculate exact rankings for the firms, this company made it into every top five for which it was eligible, the first firm to do so. And contrary to what you may have read elsewhere in the press, and indeed this supplement, it seems our architects are happy in their work: the profession comes top of the feel good factor and also the smarter working index. This may be explained in part by the fact that they have also come top of the market condition index (a new rating, which measures how well employees believe their company is dealing with the recession). The architects tend to be small firms, and although one or two have been knocked sideways by the downturn, most have been agile enough to find new work. Another factor is that, as was the case last year, smaller firms tend to have higher ratings than large one.

That said, it has been an outstanding year for contractors, generally the largest firms in our survey. Gentoo deserves a mention for achieving the highest score in any category ever (10.8 for social responsibility), and as a group the builders came top in the social responsibility, inspiration and leadership categories. The consultants were the firms where staff felt most able to contribute, which essentially assesses how democratic an organisation is.

Looking at the industry as a whole, these figures confirm the findings in previous years: which is that its weakest area is first leadership and second smarter working. The strengths are once again social responsibility and the feel good factor. The really good news, though, is that every indicator with the exception of ability to contribute, has risen this year.

Benefits

The striking change in this year’s tables is the increase in the number of hours staff spend training. No doubt, all the applied mathematics engineers need explains why they spend the most time training – 58 hours – but not why they only spent 35 hours doing the same last year. The other professions all showed smaller increases: consultants rising six hours to 38, architect four hours to 44 and contractors one hour to 29.

Architecture is the most easygoing profession when it comes to regulating comings and goings. Six out of 10 firms allow flexitime or part-time working, which may be a reflection of the high proportion of female staff (23%, compared with 14% in consultancy, 11% in engineering and 8% in contracting). The strictest profession is consultancy: only 22% of firms allow staff to customise the working day, by comparison, 40% of contractors and 45% of engineers offer this benefit.

Finally, even the best firms in construction are not particularly friendly to the newly born. Half of consultants offer extra maternity and paternity benefits, but only a third of engineers, a quarter of architects and a fifth of contractors do the same. Max Fordham, which just happens to be the firm with the 18 female equity partners (the average for other firms is one), offers the best maternity deal: 26 weeks at full pay. On the other hand, firms are generous with childcare vouchers, and a word should be said of GHK Architects, which provides 10 fully paid “keep in touch days”, throws in an organic “baby grow” gift and publishes a picture of the tiny Winston Churchill-lookalikes in its staff magazine …

Average employee ratings by profession

Working smarter
Contractors 6.1
Engineers 6.1
Consultants 6.6
Architects 6.9

Feel good factor
Contractors 6.4
Engineers 6.2
Consultants 6.5
Architects 7.6

Inspiration
Contractors 6.9
Engineers 6.1
Consultants 6.4
Architects 6.9

Leadership
Contractors 6.2
Engineers 5.4
Consultants 5.6
Architects 6.1

Ability to contribute
Contractors 7
Engineers 6.9
Consultants 7.4
Architects 5.6

Market conditions
Contractors 5.6
Engineers 5.1
Consultants 5.4
Architects 5.6

The top fives

by profession
-----------------------------------
Architects
Architecture plb
Bailey
LSI Architects
P+HS
Pozzoni
-----------------------------------
Consultants
AA Projects
CBG
Drivers Jonas
John Rowan & Partners
Keegans
-----------------------------------
Engineers
Conisbee
Elliott Wood
Max Fordham
Hannah-Reed
Henderson Green
-----------------------------------
Contractors
Hill Partnerships
Gelder Group
Gentoo Construction
Swift Horsman
Willmott Dixon

by category
-----------------------------------
Social responsibility
CBG
Gentoo Construction
LSI Architects
P+HS
Willmott Dixon
-----------------------------------
Working smarter
Henderson Green
John Rowan & Partners
Keegans
LSI Architects
P+HS
-----------------------------------
Feel good factor
Hannah-Reed
Henderson Green
Keegans
LSI Architects
P+HS
-----------------------------------
Inspiration
AA Projects
Drivers Jonas
Gelder Group
Max Fordham
P+HS
-----------------------------------
Leadership
Gelder Group
Hill Partnerships
John Rowan & Partners
LSI Architects
P+HS
-----------------------------------
Ability to contribute
Hannah-Reed
Henderson Green
John Rowan & Partners
Keegans
P+HS
-----------------------------------
Current market conditions
Hannah-Reed
Hill Partnerships
John Rowan & Partners
LSI Architects
P+HS

by size
-----------------------------------
Small firms (0-50)
Apex
Architecture plb
Henderson Green
LSI Architects
Maber Architects
-----------------------------------
Medium-sized firms (51-250)
AA Projects
Keegans
John Rowan & Partners
Hannah-Reed
P+HS
-----------------------------------
Large firms (251+)
Gelder Group
Gentoo Construction
Leadbitter Group
Mace
Willmott Dixon

Key to staff ratings

Social responsibility
This measures how seriously the company takes its responsibilities towards the safety of its staff and the betterment of the construction industry and wider community.

Smarter working
How the company encourages a realistic balance between the work and personal lives of its employees.

Feel good factor
The level of fun and enjoyment staff members get from working in their own companies.

Leadership
How well employees believe their company is being led and how well looked after they are by their managers.

Inspiration
Are employees inspired by the type of projects the company is involved in, and are they getting a “buzz” from working on them?

Ability to contribute
How well employees feel they are able to participate in decisions that affect them, and do they feel the company listens to them.

Current market conditions
How well employees believe their company is dealing with the challenges brought about by the current economic climate.

Methodology

Readers of Building who are eligible to enter Building’s other “top tables” such as consultants, contractors, housebuilders and other industry firms were invited to take part in the selection process. Each interested company was asked to complete a simple prequalification questionnaire and provide a staff list comprising email addresses for all employees in non-support roles.

Samples of employees from each firm were then sent an online opinion survey that elicited strength of feeling regarding a series of statements related to six areas being measured: social responsibility, smarter working, the feel good factor, leadership, inspiration, and ability to contribute.

Surveys were issued to professional and technical office-based staff with a minority being issued to trades and site-based staff. Employees in purely support roles such as secretarial, marketing, HR and IT support were not surveyed. For firms with more than 400 non-support employees a random sample of staff was selected, to provide a significant pool of opinion. Site-based staff without individual email addresses were not surveyed.

Support staff are defined as those who are employed in activities such as: secretarial, PA support to fee-earners, marketing & PR, finance & accounting, IT support, human resources, receptionist duties, facilities management or property maintenance of the firm’s own offices.

Using a simple weighting system to rank individual responses to each given statement, a score was calculated for each set of company employees. Companies scoring below the required “pass mark” overall or in any one of the seven categories were eliminated as were firms that did not return sufficient responses.

The remaining employers were then asked for details of the benefits they offer staff over and above salary and bonuses. They were also asked to describe the sectors in which they work, the projects in which they are involved and general staff demographics. This information was used to corroborate results from the employee surveys, to set a benchmark for selected staff demographics and to form the basis of the descriptions for each of the companies within this guide. For example, a large practice with no female employees would have to provide acceptable rationale for this figure to remain in a lead placing.

The top 50 participants are listed alphabetically with ranking for the top five provided for firms within various categories.

Notes

AECOM Only building engineering staff were surveyed.

architecture plb Only architectural staff were surveyed.

Balfour Beatty Management Part of the Balfour Beatty group of companies.

Cluttons Only project and building consultancy staff were surveyed.

Drivas Jonas Only project management and building surveying staff were surveyed.

Henry Riley Part of Riley Consulting.

Turner & Townsend Only UK company surveyed.

Willmott Dixon Only Willmott Dixon Construction staff were surveyed.

Training Includes attendance at internal and external courses that are intended to develop skills, behaviour or experiences appropriate to the individual’s job but excludes time spent in mentoring programmes, on-the-job shadowing or time spent at networking events. Events counting towards CPD are included.