There are many sound reasons why companies should put people first. From productivity and morale to higher rates of retention and lower recruitment costs – all of which are valuable in the ServiceNow world.
However, when #peoplematter is ingrained into every aspect of your business, the effects can be amazing. It goes further than bringing together a group of extraordinary people. It takes you into territory where people stop thinking in terms of colleagues and departments and start feeling like they are part of an extended family with genuine and long-lasting friendships.
There are many ways in which you can put people first. Below, I’ve tried to capture some of what I see daily.
What matters to you?
We support our people in pursuing initiatives that they are passionate about – things that really matter to that individual. This could involve participating in our school outreach programme which means visiting local schools to talk about a career in IT or collaborating on awareness raising initiatives such as Women in IT.
If I look back at the 3 years since TeamUltra became Computacenter’s ServiceNow Centre of Excellence, our people have been instrumental in numerous initiatives and causes. This includes the creation of an Ethnic Diversity Employee Impact Group, which enables employees to influence and create sustainable change within the business, giving them the opportunity to play a key role in creating the environment they want to be part of.
There is no pressure on anyone to support a particular cause, but other areas where members of our ServiceNow practice have got involved also include supporting an open discussion on mental health, highlighting personal journeys during Autism Awareness Week and fundraising for good causes too.
By giving people a platform to get involved in causes which are close to their heart, we enable people to not only perform to the best of their ability in their work role, but to take a sense of responsibility for wider issues that matter.
Having your back
Something that gets called out a lot when discussing what makes Computacenter’s ServiceNow practice a great place to work is that our people are supportive and approachable. ‘Someone’s always got your back’ is how it was described to me. We keep an eye on our people and genuinely care about the person doing the work and not just the outcome.
Many members of our team have grown up with us over the last decade. A good example of this is that the first cohort from our graduate intake in 2016, have long since progressed into Lead Consultant roles, and in turn help to run our ServiceNow training programmes.
This illustrates another good point. Colleagues are always available to support colleagues. Why? It’s more than knowing that collaboration is key to our overall success – our people care about the people they work with. If you need five minutes of a colleague’s time to talk through a problem, our people will make that time. They are always on hand to listen and share their experience.
No substitute for experience
We are often able to promote from within as part of offering positive career pathways to all. What this means is that our managers have usually worked on lots of projects using the Now Platform and have practical knowledge of the job that their teams are doing today.
As a result, they have a real insight and understanding of the work that is required and know the right levers to pull to help you get on with the job in hand.
Bucking the trend
When you have a stable leadership team, managers have the time to get to know their team and can plan for the long term. Our managers believe in treating their teams as individuals and trust them to do what is needed.
People are allowed to be themselves and deliver great things at work. What really matters to us is that you achieve your objectives and that you’re focussed on providing excellent outcomes for our customers.
We will never be a ServiceNow partner that just focuses on utilisation targets and billable resources. For us, it is important that our people can find the right work-life balance. We spend a lot of time in our fantastic resourcing team ensuring this happens. It means people can flourish within our hybrid-working environment.
The power of social interaction
Socialising with your work colleagues was sadly missed during COVID times but is an important aspect of work for many. It’s more than heading to the nearest pub, although we do some of that too! It’s about being able to get together in a relaxed environment. You often see tricky work situations resolve themselves during a face-to-face interaction, or over a coffee.
Despite our roots as a remote working company, we’ve always supported networking and allowing people to get to know other parts of the business via the Summit and regular ‘work together’ days. This is when colleagues across different teams arrange at work a particular office during the day which can also be followed by a team meal afterwards.
In India, for example, our ServiceNow colleagues took part in a Computacenter sports day where the team played games such as throwball and volleyball. As my colleague Bhabatosh Bisi said “It was a great day for everyone, filled with lots of laughter, teamwork, and of course, a little friendly competition.”
Along with members of the Computacenter Romania team, one of our Technical Architects Aidan Cooper, spent a day volunteering at a family-type foster care centre run by Dare to Care. Activities included decorating, planting trees, painting murals, and helping to fix equipment. It was a brilliant way to bring people together from different parts of the company to make a real difference to children’s lives.
First for people
I strongly believe that if we continue to put our people first, then we will be well on our way to achieving our goal of being the first-choice destination for great people with ServiceNow skills.
Interested in joining the ServiceNow Centre of Excellence team? Find out more about career opportunities here.