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Flight Centre hailed by employees

11th March 2008 Print
Flight Centre has been included in ‘The Sunday Times Best 100 Companies To Work For’ list for the sixth year in a row, making it the only travel company in the country to remain in the list since 2002. This year the travel retailer was voted the 51st best company to work for in Britain.

The UK’s fastest growing independent travel retailer was presented with the prestigious workplace award on 28 February, with the full list appearing in a supplement in The Sunday Times yesterday (9 March).

As part of the process, Flight Centre also received the “outstanding” Two Star accreditation from Best Companies Ltd, the firm responsible for researching and compiling the Sunday Times ‘Best Companies To Work For’ list.

The ‘Michelin Star’ style review of UK employers recognises consistent organisational excellence in the workplace. For this year’s accreditation, over 140,000 employees from 653 organizations were surveyed. Of the 653 companies that registered for ‘Star Status’, only 117 were awarded two stars.

Lin Hilditch, head of Flight Centre’s recruitment, learning and development division, Peopleworks, said: “Our commitment to making Flight Centre one of the best companies to work for in the country continues to pay dividends. We value the feedback that we get from our employees and use the results to ensure we are continually improving the working environment for everyone.”

“We are a people-focused business and our culture allows personal and career development as well as giving our employees a strong degree of empowerment through ownership of the business. Our employees clearly appreciate this along with our innovative and unique approach that rewards hard work through an uncapped incentive scheme.”

One of the top benefits on offer, as voted by Flight Centre employees, was Moneywise, a service set up to help employees manage their finances. Staff are offered a financial counselling service which provides help and advice on mortgages and pensions. All advice is independent and the goal is to instill financial confidence in all Flight Centre team members.

This is achieved through ongoing financial education, training courses and personal one-on-one interviews. Other benefits endorsed by Flight Centre staff included Healthwise, which offers regular free health checks to all employees, and the market-leading fast-track to management training scheme.

85% of employees said that they find their teams fun to work with and over three-quarters said that they feel a strong sense of family in their teams - two of the highest scores seen in this year’s survey. Employees gave an overall positive score of above 80% for team spirit.

‘The Sunday Times Best 100 Companies to Work For’ identifies Britain’s best employers by surveying 250 randomly selected employees from the company and then following up with an independent assessment. This year companies across the country, from all industries and sectors entered.

The survey evaluates employees’ trust in management, pride in their work and the company, staff satisfaction and camaraderie. Employees are also asked to fill out a cultural assessment of the company looking at company structure, ownership and benefits.