52. Chapter 4: The employees
Consequently, throughout this ongoing process,
all our managers 'own' the engagement process.
They are required to translate survey results
into tangible actions with their own areas of
responsibility. Their performance is measured
against their success in doing so.
We also encourage leadership development
initiatives and leadership communication
programmes within our operating companies. A
great example of this is Teamtalk: a team briefing
process based around a strategic core brief that
is delivered by front line managers. Last year we
piloted Teamtalk in Lebanon and Italy. The results
of our pilots were encouraging: they showed that
employees clearly take pride in working for an
international organisation and want to be kept
informed about the full picture. However, the
degree to which people in different markets and at
different levels, either understand or are interested
in the global context varies greatly. For this reason,
we will use the results from the pilots to customise
and localise Teamtalk prior to rolling it out in
our priority markets. We will allocate time and
resources to develop our managers' communication
and facilitation skills in one market, while using the
process to further support existing face-to-face
communication with executives in another.
In 2006, we will also launch CEO dialogue sessions,
designed to align employees across our business
and provide them with the opportunity to challenge
our approach and share their ideas with us.
Ultimately, Heineken aims to make engagement
a way of life throughout our organisation,
continuously capturing our employees' hearts
and minds with a clear, unifying vision.
Employee rights
Heineken endorses the principles underlying the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights: respect
for the dignity of all people, irrespective of race,
religion, sexual orientation or political conviction.
Heineken will not cooperate, actively or passively,
directly or indirectly, in any violation of human
rights and will support its employees if their rights
are violated by third parties. We are willing to
declare, in the most appropriate manner, our
position on the human rights situation in countries
in which we operate and we seek to ensure that
our employees are aware of their rights.
Human rights concerns are complex. In reality,
the term 'Human Rights' refers not to a single issue,
but to a number of issues that are of the utmost
importance to our company and to mankind
in general. We make a distinction between the
internal component of human rights - those rights
relating to our own people in their capacity as
employees of our company - and the external
component, referring to the general human rights
Heineken N.V. - 2004/2005 Sustainability Report