Our 12,000 employees represent the face of DNV GL with customers and other stakeholders all over the world, every day. The relationships we develop with our customers are based on trust in our technical ability and the integrity and personal conduct of our people. Our values — WE CARE, WE DARE, WE SHARE — are beliefs that shape our performance. These ideals are the behaviours expected of all of us and are important for achieving our purpose and vision.
Our aim is to attract, retain and develop people who are committed to our purpose, vision and values. We see diversity within our workforce as a way of delivering excellence and we recruit the best people regardless of their background. This is backed up by an attractive employee-value proposition and varied development and career opportunities. By continuously developing our people’s competencies, we enhance the skills and expertise we offer to our customers.
After facing a challenging financial reality for a number of years, with associated headcount reductions, we experienced a more stable and sustainable situation in 2019. Although headcount fell slightly in 2019, this was due to the divestment of the KEMA Laboratories in the Energy business area.
Open All
Close All
-
Investing in our digital transformation
We continued to invest in our digital transformation in 2019, underpinning our belief that being a digitally-agile organization will support our future strength and success.
Training is a key component of our digital transformation and across 2018 and 2019, more than 1,100 managers have taken our DNV GL/INSEAD Leading Digital Transformation programmes. The programmes are designed to enhance our capability with both digital technologies and methods to accelerate our transformation into a truly digital organization.
Building on this success, we have designed a condensed programme for all employees. All 12,000 employees have been invited to participate in weekly online challenges related to Digital Transformation. To engage participants, questions have been posted on Yammer, the DNV GL social media channel. The first module broke our internal record for Yammer activity, with over 4,900 messages posted and 51,000 read messages. In total, over 5,300 employees – almost 45% of our workforce – took part in module one, demonstrating a high level of engagement among employees. This has continued into module two with 2,900 employees taking part since its launch in September.
-
HR system
We launched a new global human resources (HR) platform in late 2017, which provides improved efficiency and people analytics. In 2019, we broadened the system’s functionality, including performance management, regular check-in dialogues, onboarding and succession.
-
Employee engagement
Following successful pilots in 2018, we have implemented pulse surveys across DNV GL in 2019 to assess engagement among our employees. Pulse surveys involve more frequent, less comprehensive assessments with quicker, more targeted follow-up actions. It is a more agile approach than previous annual engagement surveys and provides an effective way to enhance communication between employees and management. The case study provides more information on our pulse surveys.
To engage employees in our strategy and provide feedback to leadership, we have created a ‘Strategy Champions’ initiative. Almost 100 strategy champions from all business areas and more than 20 countries are selected and execute strategy-related ‘missions’ in their local offices. The goal is to stimulate discussions about how strategic goals are understood and acted on in a local context.
DNV GL launched a new vision and revised values in January 2020. We will run various initiatives throughout 2020 to embed the new vision and values across the organization. A new DNV GL Strategy will also be introduced in 2020 and we will review our current people policies and principles to ensure they are aligned with and support our new vision, values and strategy.
Our people-related governance documents will be revised and simplified in 2020 to enable a more empowered organization. We will also review the DNV GL compensation and benefits approach and we will revise our short-term incentive / profit share system for implementation in 2021.
As a professional services provider, we rely on the knowledge and skills of our people to deliver our products and services. We strive to foster a company culture with people who are committed to our purpose, vision and values.
Open All
Close All
-
Strategy and management system
Our Group strategy and management system, including our people policy, governs how we attract and develop employees and build our company culture. This system also underpins our value-based leadership approach.
Our people processes are designed to create a common culture within a flexible work environment and provide career and development opportunities for all.
-
Governance
The Group President and CEO approves our people, leadership, and roles & responsibilities policies. The Group HR function establishes these policies and sets the direction for HR management. It works closely with HR teams in the business areas and Global Shared Services to ensure an aligned approach company wide. People management is a line responsibility and line managers are supported by HR managers and a range of HR tools.
We have broad geographic employee representation on DNV GL’s Board of Directors. Our management works constructively with employee organizations through the Global Employee Forum, regional and local works councils and unions.
-
Diversity and equal opportunity
We seek diversity at all levels of our company in terms of age, gender, nationality, experience and mindset. Diversity is a source of strength for DNV GL. It provides the widest access to global talent and is the best basis for delivering excellence to our customers. Managed well, diverse teams can also identify and capture more opportunities and manage more risks than homogenous teams.
To support our diversity efforts, we run mentoring programmes, including the reverse mentoring of senior leaders by ‘next generation’ colleagues. We also hold an annual global summit for up-and-coming talent.
-
Human rights
DNV GL is a signatory to the United Nations Global Compact. We are committed to adhering to its principles in the areas of human rights, labour standards, environmental protection and anti-corruption in our business strategy, day-to-day operations, organizational culture and sphere of influence.
Our Code of Conduct establishes our commitment to nondiscrimination, equal opportunity, the right to join labour unions and fair employment. All employees are introduced to the company’s policies during the onboarding process and human and labour rights are part of this.
DNV GL’s Statement on Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking has been issued further to section 54 (1) of the UK’s Modern Slavery Act 2015 and constitutes the DNV GL UK’s slavery and human trafficking statement for the financial year ending 31 December 2019.
-
Freedom of association and collective agreements
Employees’ right to freedom of association and collective bargaining is documented in DNV GL’s management system and our commitment to the UN Global Compact. Around 45% of our employees are covered by collective agreements.
-
Employee training and development
Our approach to employee development and competence is detailed in internal governing documents. We follow the 70:20:10 learning model; with 70% gained from on-the-job experience, 20% through interaction with others, and 10% from e-learning and classroom training. Training provided through individual business areas ensures the right competencies are in place to deliver our different services.
In addition to a range of mandatory training, cross-DNV GL programmes develop leadership and technical stewardship. Mentoring is a key part of how we work and we enable learning from colleagues around the globe through various mentoring programmes.
Our global career model facilitates employees’ competence development. Competence development planning includes an individual development plan, which is a key part of our performance management process.
All employees are assessed annually on results and behaviour through a structured performance management process. The assessment, development and selection of new managers is based on DNV GL’s expectations for leaders: respect and care, foresight, customer centricity, and results orientation.
Remuneration
As a knowledge-based company whose main resource is our employees, we depend on cooperation, teamwork and knowledge sharing. DNV GL remuneration systems are set up to support this. Our annual salary review and remuneration process is the same for all employees, including management, and is outlined in the DNV GL management system. Our collective agreements with employee groups do not include voting on remuneration policies.
External remuneration consultants are used to benchmark remuneration in our markets. For the largest countries in which we operate, this happens through country-specific salary and benefit databases covering thousands of people. There is no relationship between our management and the remuneration consultants.
For the Executive Committee, the review procedure differs slightly. The Board’s Compensation Committee conducts a review and makes recommendations before the procedure is concluded. The final decision on remuneration for the Group President and CEO is taken by the Board of Directors, using input from the Compensation Committee.
Profit sharing
Profit-share schemes provide the most appropriate variable pay structures to support our values. We have two major global profit-share schemes:
- Grades 1–9: all eligible employees receive a percentage of their base salary in bonus, based on DNV GL Group results.
- Grades 10–15: the annual individual profit share is determined based on grade and a target percentage, individual assessment rating, annual base salary and DNV GL Group and business area EBITA at reference rates versus targets.
In addition to these global schemes, sales schemes are available in some business areas. No employee can be a member of more than one scheme.
-
Career endings
Transition assistance programmes are implemented locally to meet local legislation and requirements. In the case of significant headcount reductions, local assistance programmes are set up. At all times, we seek to retain the employees in the organization, including the following ways:
- All available positions are advertised internally
- External recruitment restrictions are used to facilitate internal transfers
- All employees should have a development plan which focuses on DNV GL’s future capability needs and the employee’s own career ambitions.
The DNV GL management system stipulates that mitigating actions are to be sought before staffing reductions are considered or executed.
A new approach to employee engagement
In the past, DNV GL conducted annual Engagement Surveys to test employee engagement and highlight areas of positive performance and areas for improvement. In July 2019, we shifted our global approach to a Pulse survey methodology. Compared to annual engagement surveys, the Pulse survey approach is more frequent and more agile. Annual surveys only provide a snapshot of employee engagement and do not identify issues in a timely way, meaning it can be slow to establish corrective action and changes can only be measured a year later.
In contrast, the Pulse methodology allows much more frequent engagement leading to swifter responses. Our Pulse surveys are aligned with regular manager-employee check-ins, which were introduced earlier in 2019, and are intended to be part of the day-today operation of our business areas, rather than an annual project.
The Pulse survey includes 21 common questions asked to all DNV GL employees. Individual business areas can ask additional questions based on their specific needs. Each business area has set different survey frequencies, ranging from weekly to every second month. With more frequent surveys, fewer questions are asked per survey. Currently, the DNV GL response rate is 83%, which is close to the benchmark of other companies.
The benefits of DNV GL Pulse surveys include:
- More regular, open and honest communication between managers and their teams
- Enabling employees to provide regular feedback to managers on what’s working and what needs improving
- Allowing employees to anonymously share comments with their managers, which managers can acknowledge or respond to without the identity of the employee being disclosed
- Providing managers with real-time feedback through dashboards, allowing them to identify issues as they arise and to address them swiftly, together with their teams
- Allowing managers and their teams to track changes in engagement over time, to see if what they are doing is making a difference in their team
- Tracking the DNV GL Transformation Index and the DNV GL Resilience Index.
Feedback received so far from managers and employees suggest the benefits outlined are being delivered at the local level. Results are also actively being used by senior management to track the development of business areas and the company as a whole.
