WHAT are we doing to demonstrate that?
Below are highlights since our 2015 CSR report.
Grounding our Safety Performance in our Values
Safety is the foundation for everything Ameren does. Our focus continues to be consistent improvement in safety performance over the long-term. Every employee is expected to challenge any unsafe act and complete each workday safely. It’s about people, not numbers. At its core, Ameren’s safety strategy involves more than changing procedures—it involves changing culture.
Moving the status quo beyond rules adherence and regulatory compliance to a mindset of values-based safety performance is key to our commitment to operational excellence. A Safety Recharge workshop was introduced in 2015 to help co-workers focus on Ameren’s core value of accountability.
Our relentless focus on safety has resulted in meaningful improvements. We believe that one injury is one too many.
Jason Klein, director, Division V, Ameren Illinois, center, receives feedback on the new Safety Recharge workshop from Cory Duncan, gas construction foreman, left, and Jerry Haas, right, gas construction general foreman. Klein was a co-leader of the team that developed the Safety Recharge curriculum.
Improving Long-Term Safety Performance
Lost Workday Away cases (LWA) reflect injuries where a treating physician has determined that an employee would not be able to return to work the following day. Our 2015 LWA cases matched our all-time low across Ameren: 22.
Crafting and Evolving our Workplace Culture
Our company is best able to achieve our mission, vision and values with the right culture and employee mindset in place. Ameren understands that it takes the right culture to empower co-workers to execute company strategy. With an eye on the ever-changing business environment and utility industry, we have identified several cultural elements to maintain, and three specific elements that we must shape and evolve going forward. Work is ongoing to build a culture with the following attributes:
- Foster innovation
- Build trust
- Drive results
Employee engagement at Ameren is strong. We are pleased, but not satisfied, with 2015 employee engagement scores as measured through the Values Pulse Questionnaire survey. These were our 2015 engagement results, as measured by IBM Kenexa 2015 employee engagement survey:
% Favorable Replies
Fostering Innovation to Meet Customer Needs
Tomorrow’s workforce will not be prepared to meet our industry’s evolving employment needs unless we directly engage students and community organizations. Ameren’s talent strategy is to keep us poised to meet the following challenges:
- A significant segment of our workforce is nearing retirement age and we have near-term knowledge gaps to fill.
- Technology is rapidly evolving, and our company must keep pace on several fronts.
- Students must get excited about the energy industry and the type of careers now available at utility companies.
Each year, Ameren brings on board 70 to 100 interns and co-ops in key areas such as engineering, finance and supply chain. In 2015, Ameren became the first major energy company to open an office at the University of Illinois-Urbana Research Park. The Ameren Innovation Center team collaborates with university students and faculty, as well as companies across multiple industries. In this exploratory environment, undergraduate and graduate students work on projects ranging from data analytics and mobile applications to projects that focus on the needs of the utility of the future. The goal is to better meet our customers’ needs, now and for years to come.