Sainsbury’s: Putting family first

Date: 9 Jul 2010

Supermarket giant Sainsbury’s knows only too well the important part its working parents play in the organisation; the majority of employees are women and two thirds work part time. In turn putting family first has naturally become the bedrock for its working culture which recognises the importance of flexibility and support for parents.

Around 65% of Sainsbury’s 150,000 colleagues work part-time with many doing so to fit around family caring responsibilities.

Abigail Bracken, Sainsbury’s Head of HR Policy & Colleague Recognition, says: “We don’t specifically monitor how many of our colleagues are mums but it’s significant. So for example, our night shift runs from 10 pm to 6 am; a lot of our parents choose that pattern. Another popular shift is 8am to 3pm or an evening shift which allows colleagues to do the school run in the afternoon.” Abigail acknowledges that working around school times gives many parents the opportunity to return to work especially when they don’t have to pay out for childcare.

“We try to achieve a sense of family for our colleagues that come to work. The stores vary in size widely so there might be ten colleagues in one shop and hundreds in another,” says Abigail: “Baby-sitting and childcare circles have developed in some stores. We think it’s amazing that colleagues have come up with this even if there is no formal policy around it. We wouldn’t want to interfere with this though – it’s a great idea that they have developed themselves. Coming to work at Sainsbury’s also means making great friends.”

The supermarket offers a flexible working policy that is open to all its colleagues and believes that, by being an accessible workplace where work life balance is encouraged, it makes the most of different talents and abilities. For those parents who want to attend key school dates such as sports day or parents’ evening, the store offers shift change options or time off. “At this time of year we get a lot of requests for flexibility for this kind of thing and we’re happy to offer that where we can,” says Abigail.

The supermarket has also been at the forefront of Government initiatives to promote flexible working. Outgoing director of human resources Imelda Walsh drafted the Flexible Working Review, published in May 2008, on behalf of the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform. This recommended extending the right to request flexible working to parents of older children and identified further measures to help working parents achieve a better work life balance.

Dealing with emergencies:

With many parents, particularly mums, having young children, there inevitably are times when a childcare crisis crops up either through illness or childcare difficulties.

Sainsbury’s has taken a pragmatic approach to these situations whilst maintaining consistency of fairness across the stores. “We always say to our colleagues, just pick up the phone,’’ says Abigail. ‘’We always try to work with them where possible so that if they face a domestic emergency that means they can’t work on that day they can re-schedule their shift, take it as a holiday or unpaid leave. We try to support our colleagues at all times.

"Our key message is come and talk to us. After all no two situations are ever the same.”

In the last six months snow and volcanic ash have added to the emergency leave requests and tested the supermarket’s strength to cope in the face of adversity, but they have managed. By employing the same standards as they do year-round when staff are called off sick or need to attend to family matters at a moment’s notice they have kept the stores delivering great service to its 19m customers.

To bolster their good work in this area, Sainsbury’s has refreshed a number of their training programmes with its 12,000 line managers – an area of work that Abigail is very proud of. “We’re really excited that over the last six months we’ve been working with our line managers on their approach to manage situations and coach their teams. Many of the management are parents themselves so we’ve said to them, ‘It’s ok to use your judgement’ when faced with an unusual situation where a colleague needs your support. We’re also working on re-writing a number of policies to make them more accessible for our managers and colleagues. The central idea is to work along the lines of employing sensible principles that work in practice.”

Home-grown talent:

The company is grateful to its core of part-time workers, many of whom joined Sainsbury’s at the time they started their own families. The company recognises that for many employees who have brought up their children or whose children have come of school age, a return to work or a re-focus on career is the next step. Abigail says: “We have a clear framework in place. The colleagues have a discussion with their manager and then we talk about what options there may be available to ascertain someone’s potential. We are proud that we have a significant number of our shop-floor colleagues that have progressed and are now deputy managers in our stores. Many of them worked in the store whilst their children were growing up and then went onto management.”

Sainsbury’s also recognises that many staff want a career break at some point and interestingly they are seeing the growth in the number of requests that are coming from those who want to travel or do volunteering not just from those wanting to raise a family.

On top of this, the supermarket has had policies in place for a number of years to help its young workforce who want time to study. Abigail says: “One in four of our colleagues are aged under 25 years old. It’s a fast-paced environment with many holding down study commitments. We offer them the opportunity to swap locations. So if they work during the term-time with us in one store but then want to be employed near their parents’ home in the holidays they can do that. We also offer term-time only contracts.”

With its focus on supporting parents, accommodation of flexible working and recognising that staff want to put family first, Sainsbury’s has truly lived up to its PR and has become “A Great Place to Work.’’ With a further focus on fostering home-grown talent, it is also showing its commitment and drive to assisting those that want to nurture their career to move forward and climb the ranks of management. For those with young children, part-time working, night shifts and term-time only contracts offer the flexibility to earn some money, maintain skills and, importantly, make time for the children.