At the recent Deloitte Best Company to Work for Survey awards function, Pragma was confirmed as the 8th best small company (50 – 300 employees) to work for in South Africa. Pragma is also still the holder of the “Best building, construction and engineering company to work for” title, first confirmed in the 2009 survey. It was the second consecutive year that Pragma partook in this competition and received such pleasing results.
On the question why Pragma invests in such a competition, CEO, Adriaan Scheeres, indicated that a company should often test if it still lives its core values. One of Pragma’s core values is People. The value statement implies that employees are provided with the opportunity to enjoy their working lives as much as their home lives while playing to their strengths. Although this can be seen as a bold and unachievable statement, Pragma is committed to continually improve on working conditions to ensure that employees can honestly confirm this as their reality.
Participation in the BCTWF competition is one of the avenues that Pragma use to measure employee satisfaction. The results of the Deloitte survey are used alongside other in-house surveys and forums to understand the needs and concerns of employees. Scheeres is adamant that the success of participation in any survey lies within the reaction to the results. You have to listen to what your team say and then act upon it.
Scheeres further comments that employees are the most important asset of any service company. Engaged staff is key to the success of a service company’s service delivery to its clients. As a physical asset management service company, Pragma is continuously involved in performance improvement of assets and understand that a stagnant approach to asset management does not deliver results. The same is true when you want the most out of your team.
In conclusion, Head of Talent and Organisational Development at Pragma, Stéphan Pieterse, quoted marketing consultant, Simon Sinek who said: “An organization that shows commitment to its people can expect its people to show commitment to them.” He went on to confirm that Pragma will continue to strive for people excellence in the years to come with the ultimate goal of also becoming the best engineering company for our clients.
