Empowering employees

4. Empowering employees

As a dynamic family business, we firmly believe that our employees are the driving force behind our company. It is thanks to their knowledge, skills, and dedication that we are able to produce and market high-quality products all over the world. As a result, we want to give our employees every opportunity to learn and grow. In addition to comprehensive orientation programmes for new employees, job-specific training courses, and digital tools, we have broadened our scope to include leadership, business knowledge, and business information distribution.

We want to grow talent

Ardo Leadership Programme

Our Ardo Leadership Programme represents our commitment to assisting our employees in their leadership development. The goal is to develop their personal and team leadership skills.

The programme is divided into several modules, some of which focus on personal leadership (open to all) and others on team leadership (open to people managers). More than 200 employees are taking part in the entire programme, with another 325 following specific sections. The programme will be expanded in the future.

Every crop is a different story

We want to inspire our employees’ enthusiasm and knowledge for our vegetables, fruit and herbs. As a result, we introduced our Crop Academies, which are an excellent way to learn about our company’s operations. Each Crop Academy session focuses on a different product and is recorded for later viewing. Our internal platform houses all previous Academies’ presentations.

In terms of Crop Academies, about 15 webinars are held each year, with attendance ranging from 30 to 80 employees. If we take an average of 40, this equates to 600 attendees per year across all Ardo sites.

Employee involvement

We firmly believe that an informed employee is an engaged employee. Through our quarterly town hall information meetings, we want to include as many of them as possible in the inner workings of our company, strategy, and numbers. This initiative adds to the understanding of our business.

Our town hall meetings provide information to our white-collar employees, who translate and distribute insights to their teams. The regional meetings are attended by approximately 1,200 employees from all sites, with 60% recorded participation.

Employee development feedback

The most effective tools for guiding performance and quickly correcting errors are regular check-ins and feedback moments. For this purpose, we have an annual performance appraisal process in place. Our goal is for every employee, regardless of their position, to understand how they performed in the previous year and what is expected of them in the coming year.

The performance appraisal also identifies employees who want to advance in their careers. For those who demonstrate a strong potential and motivation, we strive to accommodate realistic career moves with a focus on long-term development.