Our human capital is collectively our workforce and the efforts, capabilities, skills, and dedication they bring into the organization. Enabling our employees and workers to bring their authentic and best selves to work allows us to meet our business objectives and contribute exponential value to our stakeholders. We foster them by endowing relevant resources and tools, celebrating their diversity, safeguarding their rights, and ensuring their safety at work.
We comply with local and national labor laws, general labor standards, and international labor conventions entered by the Philippine government. Internally, we have stringent policies, initiatives, and programs to ensure the welfare of our workforce.
Additional details on our approach to managing our human capital can be found in Annex 3 of our 2020 Integrated Report, uploaded on our website at www.fphc.com.
New Hires and Turnovers
The capabilities of our 9,538 employees across the group contributed to the success of our business operations in 2023. This represents a 24.3 percent increase in our headcount, which is caused by the continued growth of our business segments. Our construction business reported a 40.2 percent spike in its headcount from the previous year to accommodate its growing roster of infrastructure and engineering projects.
A total of 2,404 employees left the group in 2023, a 11.1 percent decrease from the previous year. Resigned employees cited better career opportunities, educational advancement, and other personal reasons as causes for separation. Given the nature of our business segments, a portion of our turnover is attributed to the conclusion of contracts for our project-based employees.
We welcomed 4,905 employees in our businesses for 2023, representing a 27.0 percent increase from the previous year. Our business segments consistently participate in job fairs and university career fairs to strengthen our talent attraction and employer branding. Through these, we expand our connection with academic institutions across the country enabling us to build stronger applicant pools. These activities are deemed effective, as around 58 percent of our new hires for the year are in their twenties.
Developing and Enriching our Human Capital
Average Training Hours
Average Training Hours per Rank and per Gender
Providing our employees with the proper tools, resources, and capabilities allows them to maximize their contribution to our chosen industries. We place a strong emphasis on enriching and capacitating our human capital, so they may deliver their best at work and further progress in their respective careers.
The average training hours for all employees in 2023 increased by 47.7 percent. The significant increase in average training hours for Philec employees was due to the upskilling activities done in the year, training most employees in all aspects of their transformer production. Subsequently, the group-wide training hours increase is driven by the diversification of our learning and development platforms, emphasizing the co-existence of both online and in-person training modalities. With the reopening of our physical offices, most of our virtual training was now held in person. Our online learning platforms are retained for pre-recorded courses and modules, enabling employees to learn new skills at their most convenient time.
We maintained our development programs, such as the Internal Recruitment Policy and Career Development System, to enrich the specific capabilities of our employees. We continued our coaching and mentoring offerings to equip employees with the necessary skills to excel in their roles as individual contributors and people managers. Our energy solution segment piloted Dual Career Track discussions amongst their team members, allowing them to take on cross-functional responsibilities and explore career options beyond their current roles.
We continued to hone our employees’ capabilities to accelerate meeting our mission of decarbonization and regeneration. Consistent with our embedding programs, new employees are onboarded on the principles of our mission and are oriented on our flagship environmental and social initiatives. Additionally, we curated multiple courses in our online learning platform to capacitate employees on the language and principles of decarbonization and regeneration. Entitled “ESG & Sustainability - Regenerative Learning Path,” the curated courses were aligned with discussions from COP28 to upskill our employees on emerging sustainability-related capabilities.
Safekeeping our Employees’ Well-being
Ensuring the well-being of our employees in the workplace is a top priority for the conglomerate. Through these, we can meet the fundamental needs of our employees to ensure that they deliver their best at the workplace.
Wellness Wednesdays, our flagship well-being program, serves as a platform to promote lifestyle and practical skills. In 2023, we held 19 sessions encompassing themes on physical, mental, emotional, financial, and spiritual well-being. These sessions were positively received by employees, with at least 260 employees from our head office and power generation segments participating in these sessions. Employees from other business segments are highly encouraged to participate in these sessions.
Despite the waning effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, non-critical employees across our businesses are still allowed to work remotely on selected days of the week. Following our nine hybrid principles, our employees are empowered to maximize their productivity despite not being in our physical offices all the time. In 2023, our industrial real estate segment adopted our Flex Your Ways of Working (WOW) workshops. This enabled teams to adapt quickly to the new ways of working. Through these sessions, employees are encouraged to share effective communication and collaboration practices that allow teams to maximize productivity. Teams cited that these sessions were highly effective in managing team performance and productivity despite working asynchronously.
Renovations at the head office were carried out to meet our evolving ways of working. Our workstations, meeting rooms, and collaborative spaces were reconfigured with productivity, creativity, flexibility, and inclusivity in mind. Subsequently, we have a fitness center, a game corner, and a dedicated mental wellness room to enhance our workplace amenities and adapt to the needs of our employees.
Our power generation’s efforts in promoting employee wellbeing were recognized at the ATRAM Sustainable Investing Awards, wherein First Gen was awarded as a Sustainability Champion for their wellbeing initiatives and activities.
Solidifying a Shared Culture for the FPH Group
Aligning the interests and purpose of our employees with our corporate mission enables us to unlock the potential of our human capital. To articulate and validate the FPH Group Culture, our HR group held “Nurturing Each Other, Regenerative Together” sessions in 2023. These sessions were attended by a total of 125 employees across the conglomerate. Participating employees were asked to share their experiences and thoughts on FPH’s shared culture as a conglomerate, the relatability of our mission, and existing synergy and collaboration practices.
The majority of the participants cited that they feel a sense of belongingness within the FPH Group. This stemmed from the conglomerate’s mission and purpose, environmental advocacies, employee engagement activities, and values experienced at the team level. They also cited that the FPH culture is strongly evident in our new employee onboarding activities, effectively influencing new hires to resonate better with our mission. The results of these focus group discussions will be utilized to establish employee engagement initiatives targeted to strengthen the FPH Culture for 2024 and beyond.
Fostering Diversity and Inclusion in our Corporate Value Chain
Achieving our mission of decarbonization and regeneration requires the concerted effort of each stakeholder. Promoting diversity, equality, and inclusion (DEI) in our workplace is a key element in achieving these aspirations. With this, we continue to protect the rights of our employees by installing policies, safeguards, and initiatives through our DEI and human rights programs. The updates on our human rights performance can be found in the Social and Relationship Capital section, on page 162.
WEPs Gender Gap Analysis Tool score in a Glance
The FPH head office and First Gen completed an assessment for the UN Women Empowerment Principles (WEPs) Gender Gap Analysis Tool in 2023 to identify our alignment with internationally recognized practices on gender equality and diversity (GED). As a baseline, we received an overall score of 53.6%, which is well above the 2021 global average. The assessment determines the maturity of a company’s holistic GED performance against four (4) components: Commitment, Implementation, Measurement, and Transparency. The results also allow organizations to determine areas of improvement in certain aspects of the corporate value chain. FPH and First Gen’s scores for the leadership, workplace, and community aspects were commendable; however, more has to be done in the marketplace aspect. To address this, procurement, marketing, and corporate communication activities will be reviewed to ensure implementation and alignment with global best practices.
Through our partnerships with notable local and international organizations that advocate for DEI, we learned best practices from experts and embed this knowledge into the way we conduct business and manage our talents. We maintained our partnership with UN WEPs, the Philippine Business Coalition for Women Empowerment (PBCWE), and the Enhancing Equality in Energy for Southeast Asia (E4SEA) program of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).
Through E4SEA’s support, we applied a gender lens in our recruitment channels, as well as in existing and new policies. Additionally, they supported us in crafting in-house modules for our Overcoming Unconscious Bias training. Pilot sessions in FPH-FGen, which were delivered to key human resource personnel, senior leaders, and people leaders, were conducted throughout 2023. At the end of the year, 84% of people managers participated in these sessions. Shortened versions of the modules will be cascaded to employees, which are intended to be released in our internal learning and development platforms.
Workplace Health and Safety
Prioritizing the health and safety in the workplace ensures the smooth operations of our businesses. FPH and its subsidiaries have policies, procedures, and initiatives in place to ensure the success of the group’s Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems (OHSMS). These are installed and implemented by abiding by local and national laws, regulations, and international standards. All employees, contractors, and workers whose work is under the company’s supervision and control are covered by our OHSMS. Subsequently, stakeholders are regularly consulted to ensure the optimal delivery of health and safety services. We do these by holding weekly toolbox meetings, periodic safety walks in our sites and operations, and hosting a safety bulletin on our sites and online platforms.
Given the varying nature of our industries, our subsidiaries are empowered to develop specialized health and safety programs and management systems to ensure that the bespoke needs of their employees and workers are addressed. As an attestation, several of our business segments are certified with ISO 45001:2018.
The declining threat of COVID-19 in our workplaces further enabled our teams to recalibrate its focus on other health and safety risks encountered by our employees.
We strengthened our health and safety capabilities by establishing a Corporate Industrial Hygiene unit that would identify, control, and mitigate environmental factors that may impact the health and safety of our workforce. We employed the expertise of industrial hygienists and procured equipment, such as airborne contaminant monitoring devices, that would track health hazards in our head office and operational sites. Findings from these devices are then utilized to identify, address, and mitigate health and safety risks and hazards in our workplaces.
Addressing heat stress in the workplace
With the continuous rise of temperature brought by global boiling, we identified heat stress as a major health risk for employees and workers designated in our sites. Our teams utilized heat indices released by national government agencies and heat monitoring devices to determine temperatures in our workspaces. The findings are then utilized by our health and safety groups to identify and improve control measures to reduce heat-induced impacts. We have installed multiple water dispensers, temporary shades, and industrial fans for outdoor work activities. Site workers are also constantly informed and educated on heat stress and heat stroke symptoms.
Post COVID 19 Well-being Concerns
Other hazards identified in our 2023 Workplace Health Risk Assessment are mental health concerns arising from the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic and workplace ergonomics related to our hybrid ways of working. Employees’ mental health concerns were addressed through our wellness and emotional well-being programs, which consist of awareness sessions and access to mental health counseling services. We have devised an ergonomics program that assists remote employees to work comfortably and safely.
Through our consistent health and safety programs, our subsidiaries continued to achieve well within industry averages on safety.
Our 2023 Health and Safety Performance
Our Compensation Strategy
EXECUTIVES AND EMPLOYEES
In ensuring pay equity within the organization, we regularly review our compensation packages and external labor market through a benchmarking process. Our salary structure and benefits package are designed to follow minimum regulatory requirements. To remain competitive in the talent market, we look for ways to improve our total compensation package while balancing affordability. Our core compensation strategy lies on three principles:
- Ensuring that compensation programs and policies support the delivery of the corporate strategy and create long-term sustainable shareholder value;
- Pay for performance;
- Keeping our competitive market position concerning total rewards (these include base pay, variable compensation, and benefits)
Through these, we seek to attract people to join the organization, retain key talent and reward high-performing individuals, and motivate employees to develop their skills and competencies based on the changing demands of their jobs and of the business. This policy and practice applies to the Company’s senior management and the overall workforce.
Our compensation and benefits programs contribute to our business success by balancing market competitiveness and affordability based on a total compensation approach. These are performance-driven, flexible, legally compliant, and are absent of any gender-discriminatory pay practices. The key elements of our compensation structures are annual base salary, fixed bonuses, variable compensation based on annual targets, and employee benefits.
The company views sustainability as a mindset expected from everyone, from our executives down to the employees, hence performance related to ESG is not incentive-based at the moment.
DIRECTORS
Under the Corporation’s By-Laws, directors shall receive a reasonable per diem for his/her attendance at each meeting and may receive a portion of the annual profits as determined by the Chairman and the President. Directors receive a per diem for every board and committee meeting. In addition, Section 29 of the Revised Corporation Code provides that the total yearly compensation of the directors shall not exceed ten percent (10 percent) of the net income before income tax of the corporation during the preceding year.
The Corporation does not have any other arrangements pursuant to which any director is compensated directly or indirectly for any service provided as a director.
- The war for talent is still prevalent, prompting our human resources team to be creative and flexible in managing our employees. We maintained our robust roster of 9,538 employees within the group, allowing us to continue creating value for our customers and other stakeholders.
- We continued to develop our human capital through training and development initiatives. We maximized the learning experience of our employees by capitalizing on multiple learning and development platforms and modalities. In 2023, our employees logged 20.6 average training hours.
- We continued our Human Rights programs and utilized tools to measure our GED and DEI performance.
- We maintained our robust and effective OHSMS, safekeeping the health and safety of our employees. We implemented measures to ensure our employees are healthy and safe in this climate-changed world.
- We maintained our human capital performance by ensuring that we are up to date with the latest developments in talent management, occupational health and safety, human rights, and DEI. In response to the growth of our businesses, we increased our human capital, employing an additional 24.3% in comparison to our previous year’s headcount.
- As we continue to strengthen our human capital, we are empowered to deliver products and service offerings to our consumers. This, in turn, drives profit for the organization, attributing to the increased revenues at the end of 2023.