Philips 2009 Annual Report Download - page 52

3 Our planet, our partners, our people 3.5 - 3.5
52 Philips Annual Report 2009
Accelerating change
Philips employees are engaged and have
proven resilient during a year of
restructuring and economic uncertainty.
We accelerated planned initiatives to increase organizational effectiveness and
simplify our structure. Within Healthcare, for example, we focused on de-
layering our management structure to increase speed of execution and lower
operating costs.
In addition to less layers and costs, simplifying Philips means culture change.
Reducing management layers brings people ‘on the shop floor’ closer to the
Board of Management and gives managers a broader span of control. As a result
they delegate more and focus more on getting the right people on their teams.
Unfortunately transformation necessitates job cuts. As a people-centric
organization, we support those affected responsibly and with respect.
While engagement remains high, we aim higher
We seek honest feedback from our employees and are pleased that 91% of
them participated in the 2009 Employee Engagement Survey. At 68 the overall
engagement index is two points short of our high-performance target of 70.
Although we aim higher, it is encouraging to see that our engagement levels
remain high and have improved in several of our businesses.
The survey offers valuable insights into how we can improve. Teams talk about
results in open, honest ‘Deep Dive’ sessions. In this way root causes of any
issues arising from the survey are addressed and corrective actions put in place.
Diversity and inclusion continues to evolve
Diversity allows us to better understand our customers and meet their needs.
While the percentage of female executives across our company has remained
stable at 10%, we continue to focus on achieving our goal of increasing that
number to 15% by 2012.
Because we recognize it is vital to have local staff to organize around customers
and markets, we will grow the number of executives with BRIC (Brazil, Russia,
India, China) nationality.
Philips Pride, our network for gays, lesbians and gay-friendly colleagues, has
grown to over 150 members, mainly based in the Netherlands and US.